Cooper Cameron, ICG Commerce Deal Centers on E-Procurement

Cooper Cameron Corp., a multibillion-dollar maker of oil and gas pressure equipment, has inked a multiyear deal with ICG Commerce for e-procurement across materials, telecommunications and many other areas, and for integration of its own RealExchange online procurement platform with Coopers SAP ERP (enterprise resource planning) system. Financial terms were not disclosed.

The main driver behind the new relationship, which was announced Monday, is Coopers “need for a better bottom line,” Keith Hausmann, vice president of sourcing and category management at ICG Commerce, said in an interview with eWEEK.com.

ICG Commerce plans to provide the equipment manufacturer with “a centralized, corporate procurement model in place of the very decentralized, ad hoc model they had before,” Hausmann said.

Cooper Cameron sees the arrangement as a partnership rather than an outsourcing deal, Hausmann said. “Some customers might view this as outsourcing, but Cooper doesnt. Cooper was very decentralized before. It never insourced, so how could it be outsourcing now?”

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Under the agreement, ICG Commerce becomes responsible for Coopers sourcing, automating and e-catalog management hosting. “Coopers main role will be to manage us,” he said.

Coopers primary raw material is metal. Other categories of procurement included in the deal are temporary labor, maintenance and supplies, office equipment, air travel and hotels, for example.

In addition to RealExchange, Cooper Camerons procurement infrastructure includes deep category sourcing experts and a best practices-based buying center.

“Cooper had implemented its SAP system, but it had never populated SAP with e-catalogs before,” Hausmann said.

ICG Commerce targets its procurement platform at the retail, transportation, and process and discrete manufacturing industries.

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