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perspective of the CIO

Upside Software offers significant value for organizations of all sizes and in all industries. UpsideContract enables effective contract management with a solution that supports regulatory compliance while entrenching effective business processes that provide immediate and lasting value. Our other products compliment UpsideContract extending its value into other functional areas further driving a fast ROI and continual value. The user configurable user interface in version 6, along with the deep Office 2003® or higher (including Office 2007®) integration removes user adoption issues to ensure a fast ROI. 

Sarbanes-Oxley Act 

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) is a hot topic for companies and their executives. To help become and stay compliant with SOX requirements, organizations are leveraging contract management systems to effectively manage and report on their business relationships and activities. Click here to learn more about SOX and how Upside Software can help.

Features for the CIO 

• Single source for management of business relationships: end-to-end procurement, contract, activity and invoice/billing management.
• Risk identification and management.
• Performance management.
• Compliance tracking and management – ensure compliance to SOX, SAB 101, HIPAA, etc.
• Extensive financial controls – automated invoice processing, budgeting and forecasting, reporting, etc.
• Advanced business rules engine and dynamic workflow determination and management.
• Extensive flexibility to support any business process.
• Automated event management with electronic notification.
• Very strong security based on role, organization and financial authority.
• Full multilingual (Unicode) support.
• Web based for quick deployment and improved accessibility.
• Full and easy integration with any other system including ERP, SRM, CRM, legacy, etc.
• Fast ROI – often less than 90 days.

CIO's Business Needs 

• A clear view and understanding of sensitive, high-profile IT contracts, procurements, projects and invoices. 
• Ensure that fees, charges and expenses are as per signed contracts and that funds are only released upon proper verification. 
• Track and manage contractual obligations of vendors – e.g. service levels, discounts. 
• Ensure that installed software (including a contract management solution) provides true business value. 
• Adherence to corporate policies and procedures for contract management and the use of appropriate templates/exhibits in all contracts. 
• Ensure consistency in contracts across vendors, and include real measures of success. 
• Identify risk elements and monitor these ongoing. 
• Integration across systems and fit within technical and business systems architectures, including managing ‘system of record’ relationships. 
• Leverage the best methods for reducing expense – minimize administrative expenses and ensure we get the best possible value from our suppliers.

Business Benefits for the CIO 

• Increases visibility, accessibility and management of contracts, commitments and activities across the enterprise, including IT licenses and contracts. 
• Provides savings of up to 80% on processing and management costs for contracts, procurement, projects and work-orders, and invoices. 
• Ensures company policies and procedures are followed. 
• Enables proactive contract and financial governance, and management of risk. 
• Improves relationships with all stakeholders – employees, customers, suppliers, etc. 
• Involves the right people at the right time – better management of critical activities. 
• Contributes to the bottom-line quickly – up and running in 3 to 40 days. 
• Provides a significant return on investment – ROI within 1 year, typically in less than 90 days.

Business Solutions to Support the CIO 

Upside Software offers a fully integrated product suite that includes:

UpsideContract is an enterprise-class contract management solution that provides full life-cycle contract management functionality including collaborative contract creation and negotiation, performance, compliance and risk management, event management, and amendment and renewal processing. 

UpsideContract-LITE is the solution of choice for organizations wishing to start with a simple solution and grow it as their needs require, or for smaller organizations where an enterprise-class system is not required.

UpsideForms provides organizations the ability to capture very detailed information on custom, definable forms and utilize this information to make solid business decisions and calculations, as well as to perform analysis to ensure compliance and enforce accuracy.

UpsideRFX manages sourcing and procurement activities, facilitating collaborative creation and management of complex RFX (RFP, RFQ, RFI, etc.) documents and related processes with functionality that supports both the purchaser and vendor communities.

UpsideBilling automates QA and processing of invoices and bills, incoming and outgoing by applying business rules to identify errors and exceptions and to dynamically determine the workflow required to address them.

Additional Information - key points about Contract Management 

Aberdeen Group research finds that ineffective control and management of supplier contracts cost businesses $153 billion per year in missed savings opportunities.

Goldman Sachs' report, "Time To Manage Those Contracts!" states, "agreement terms have become more sophisticated to include items such as rebates and chargebacks, as well as conditional agreements. It has become increasingly common for contracts to encompass thousands of products, prices, incentives, compliance levels and other variables." 

Goldman Sachs estimates that companies incur between $25 billion and $30 billion in hard costs every year from managing their contracts 

National Association of Purchasing Management (NAPM) has reported that the average Fortune 1000 company actually has between 20,000 and 40,000 suppliers 

Estimates are that about 80 percent of B2B purchases involve some sort of contract, and that makes for a great deal of "paper" floating back and forth between buyers and suppliers 

"Contract management is the proverbial area where the buy side meets the sell side," says Pierre Mitchell, analyst AMR Research. "That's where the relationship comes together and gets instantiated. It's not just legal terms and conditions that show up in a written contract. It's really all the performance measures surrounding the relationship that you have with the supplier or the customer." 

Goldman Sachs cautions that the ROI likely will vary by industry, but suggests that contract automation could accelerate negotiation cycles by 50 percent, reduce erroneous payments by 75 to 90 percent, cut operating and processing costs associated with managing contracts by 10 to 30 percent, and result in a 10 to 20 percent headcount reduction. 

PricewaterhouseCoopers suggest that companies could realize savings that equate to 2% of total annual costs by eliminating inaccuracies and non-compliance through contract automation (therefore, a company spending $1B can save $20M annually). 

Gartner Group estimates that the market for Contract Management Software and related implementation services will top $20B US by 2007. 

Upside Software Can Deliver 

Let Upside Software prove to you how the above challenges are solved with our Enterprise Business Solutions suite of products

Review the value proposition of contract management solutions 

Find a wealth of information, including white papers, case studies, customer citations and more in our Resource Center 

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