Who we are.
Spendata is a collaboration between
- industry veterans who have designed and built successful spend analysis systems, and
- consultants and practitioners who have implemented spend analysis at companies across the globe.
This mix of talent ensures that Spendata not only has the power to unlock savings, but also remains approachable and understandable.
Some history
The Spendata story started back in 2001, when Eric Strovink and Bernard Gunther joined forces at Zeborg to create ExpenseMap, perhaps the world’s first high-speed, in-memory spend analysis system. ExpenseMap was acquired and marketed by Emptoris, then IBM.
In 2005, Eric and Bernie joined forces again at BIQ, sending shock waves through the space with a spend analysis product that was much more powerful than competitive offerings, yet ten times cheaper. BIQ was acquired and marketed by Opera Solutions in 2012.
As technology improved but spend analysis products didn't, by 2015 it became clear that spend analysis could be better — much, much better. So Bernie and Eric linked up with Jeff Schachter from the ExpenseMap team and built Spendata.
Our mission.
Spend analysis innovation has stagnated, and our mission is to fix this. We think that spend analysis should be available to everyone — and priced accordingly — yet provide more power and more value than it ever has before.
Here are some of the problems we see:
- Expense. The key tools for extracting value, such as mapping, are either difficult to master, poorly designed, or deliberately withheld from the end user. This allows vendors to charge whatever they like for services because nobody else can do it.
- Functionality. An analysis tool has to make things easier, not harder. If a user has to run back to a services provider every time a new dimension is needed, or data mapping or familying is required, that's… nuts. If you can’t manipulate your spend data in real time — and if you can’t do it yourself — you forfeit the ability to extract value from it.
- Security. If your analysis tool has to send all your data up to a cloud server, then you can't even consider using it until your vendor passes an exhaustive and expensive security audit. So we built a tool that keeps all your data where it belongs: on your own machine, behind your firewall, and off the public net.
- "Where's the analysis?" If you have to dump data to Excel in order to analyze it, what's your spend analysis tool actually doing for you?
What we do.
Spend analysis is our entire focus. Our only goal is to make it easier for you to succeed with your savings initiatives.
You don't have to de-install or disrupt anything to run Spendata. Spendata runs in the browser, never moves data to a server (making data security a non-issue), and doesn't materially impact your budget. You can run it right alongside whatever systems you currently have in place.
Moving data in and out of Spendata is easy. Spendata can load your data, reverse-engineer your rules if you already have a spend cube, and get you up and running quickly. Watch our demo videos to see how fast this can be — five minutes from raw data to a useful spend cube.
Take a tour around our website, then give us a call or send us an email to learn more.