Contract management

software  provides your supply chain management team with the information that is needed to track the status of contracts with vendors and distributors and other corporate partners as part of your business software strategy

Contract Management Software allows organizations to effectively manage the various types of contracts they engage in, including: buy side, sell side, and non monetary.

The new biggest boon in Softwqare has arrived. Contract management software is steaming hot and in demand.

Commercial Contracts

Common commercial contracts include employment letters, sales invoices, purchase orders, and utility contracts. Complex contracts are often necessary for construction projects, goods or services that are highly regulated, goods or services with detailed technical specifications, intellectual property (IP) agreements, and international trade.

This type of software can help an organization:

• create boiler plate templates that would help in ensuring consistent contract creation that has been sanctioned by the organization's legal group,
• assist in versioning documents during negotiation and award phases,
• manage the tender / pre-contract phases of agreements ensuring that a buildup of corporate knowledge may be used for ongoing management of the contract,
• instill contract governance rules so that each type of contract follows a pre-defined or dynamic workflow but always ensures it is within the organization's established conduct, promoting corporate consistency of process and accountability,
• ensure visibility is available across all contracts to the authorized people,
• notify stakeholders of impending trigger points ensuring that contract management is pro-active, not re-active,
• validate payments, deliverables, commitments and compliance terms that are established in the actual contract, and
• ensure compliance to negotiated terms and conditions including rates, discounts, and rebates.

One of the essential activities of IT Asset Management is to monitor contracts with vendors. Generally, administrators sign support contracts & Annual Maintenance Contracts (AMCs) with software & hardware vendors. Keeping such contracts tracked & managed using a specialized software is an industry best practice.

Contract management software suppliers include: Accruent, Advanced Software Concepts, ARM Group, Blueridge Software, Capterra, CMSI, CobbleStone Systems, Covigna, Determine, diCarta, Ecteon, Exari, FieldCentrix, I-many, Ketera, Omniware, Open Windows Contracts, Procure, Salesforce.com, SAP, Realyst and UpsideSoft.

Supply Chain Management

The worldwide market for supply chain management (SCM) software topped an estimated $6 billion last year, and is expected to reach or exceed $8 billion by 2010, according to the most current estimates from AMR Research (617-542-6600) and ARC Advisory Group (781-471-1000).

That’s a segment that includes supply chain planning (SCP) applications as well as supply chain execution systems including transportation management (TMS), warehouse management (WMS), and manufacturing execution (MES).

The upsurge marks a significant rebound from recent years, when the SCM market was merely keeping pace with inflation. AMR estimates that spending on SCM solutions increased by 7% last year, up from an increase of just 3% in 2005. And ARC sees the market growing at a compound annual growth rate of 8.6% through 2010.

Leading the top 20 list of providers are three enterprise resource planning (ERP) vendors, SAP at $735 million, Oracle at $585 million, and Infor at $348 million. Others include two best-of-breed suppliers, Manhattan Associates with $289 million and i2 Technologies with $280 million, both providers of supply chain planning and execution solutions.