We can't comment on every press release that hits our desks, but here are a few market news stories this week that we thought we should bring to your attention, and some of our own you may have missed.
New fintech initiative - finance payroll, pay employees, avoid bankruptcy, keep economy going
The IP for a new non-profit solution to businesses in crisis has been offered to the UK government to help keep business and the economy afloat. Developed by Violet One it uses the London capital markets to finance employee wages, at no cost to the government. Read about ithere.
An interview with the newCoupaCPO
We talked to Michael van Keulen about his move to Coupa, his priorities as CPO and generally about the role of procurement and its future when we emerge from the coronavirus crisis. Read thathere.
Coronavirus impact on M&A and procurement technology investing
Spend Matters Founder Jason Busch, also due diligence, M&A and investment advisor, has published his thoughts on investing during the coronavirus era – read themhereandhere.
Coronavirus: vendor news roundup
(Find all our coronavirus response coverage aggregated here)
Good to see so many firms pulling together at this time - see alsolast week's roundupfor more firms' initiatives. This week - in no order other than when it arrived in our inbox:
GoDaddy builds coalition of companies to help small businesses weather covid-19
The company that empowers everyday entrepreneurs announced that over 30 brands, including American Express, Nextdoor, PayPal, Salesforce, and Slack, have joined the company's growing #OpenWeStand movement. These companies are contributing resources, tools and insights to help sustain entrepreneurs and the small and micro businesses they operate during this challenging time. In the procurement worldAvettahas also joined the movement and is pledging to support small businesses by contributing resources to help them navigate the crisis. Read more herehttps://www.openwestand.org/
欧洲调查电晕的供应链Crisis
143 supply chain executives and directors from manufacturing, wholesale and retail companies in Europe completed Supply Chain Media’s online survey in the last week of March, which was an extremely hectic period for their supply chains. The short survey consisted of a series of questions about how they were assessing the situation, the bottlenecks identified, the changes in supply and demand, the action taken and the ultimate impact on their company. Read about the resultshere.
Ebury launches Coronavirus Lending Facility to support UK and European SMEs
Ebury, 50.1% owned by Santander, has launched an initial £40m lending facility to help UK SMEs manage their working capital during the Coronavirus crisis and aims to expand this programme into the hundreds of millions in collaboration with Governments in the UK and Europe. More details here.
Taulia Launches Rapid Start Invoicing to Help Businesses Impacted by COVID-19
Working capital technology solutions,Taulia, has announced the launch of Rapid Start Invoicing which can be implemented within seven days to help businesses respond to the covid-19 disruption by giving their suppliers the ability to submit invoices electronically and enabling the business to keep AP processes going and pay invoices on time. Just yesterday the firm announced a newAPAC headto meet demand for financing.
Court orders Amazon to shut all warehouses in France while worker safety reassessed during pandemic
Amazon has shut down all six distribution centres in France following a court ruling that it needed to reassess the safety of workers during the pandemic. The ruling stipulated that Amazon could only ship essential goods while officials assessed its hygiene and security measures, and included a $1.1 million fine for non-compliance. About 10,000 staff are to stay at home for five days. The full story ishere.
SpendEdge launches webpage dedicated to covid-19 related procurement and supply chain challenges
Procurement market intelligence firm, Spend Edge, has announced the launch of its webpage that prescribes holistic action plans to address and eliminate business risks caused due to the pandemic impact of coronavirus on global business. Read morehere.
Rapid Procurement Survey in times of COVID-19
Inverto recently conducted a survey with over 100 business leaders to determine the impact of the coronavirus in Europe, which found: over 65% of companies have already taken liquidity, business and supply measures to maintain their business activities; 90% of decision-makers surveyed believe that risk management and supply chains will look different after the COVID-19 crisis. You can contribute to the surveyhere.
Spend Matters Coronavirus Response- We are asking readers for their view from the Covid-19 trenches, on what you are perceiving and what would really help. Pleasefill in the surveyand tell us your pain points, depending on what you share we’ll follow up with you directly. This is a non-commercial effort to help procurement organisations understand how they can help themselves, their supply chains, and beyond.
SpendMatters- PRO series examining categories of relevant solutions that procurement, finance and supply chain organisations should investigate to reduce, and even mitigate, coronavirus supply risk, is now free - see our coronavirus roundup and interviews with CEOs on procurement in crisishere.
And in other news ...
Tradeshift Partners With Chain IQ To Optimize Indirect Spend
UK Treasury announces extra £9.5bn for public services
Ann Ackerson Named Chief Procurement Officer for BAE Systems
Agiloft adds AI engine to its no-code CLM platform
Previse completes $11m funding round led by Reefknot Investments and Mastercard
PwC: Supply chains will up supplier scrutiny after coronavirus
Aavenir source-to-pay solution receives $2m in funding
Cisco offers big payment deferrals until 2021 as companies seek remote-work tools
Waitrose to speed up payments to vulnerable suppliers
Spend Matters 50 Providers to Know & 50 Providers to Watch Lists — to be released April 21st!
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