VORTAL: Simplifying Procurement Process

In the midst of transforming technologies, services and delivery options along with intensifying pressure to make the right decision at the right time and at the right price, procurement and operations leaders in the public sector struggle with their own inertia. Constrained by a highly structured and regulated environment, public procurement organizations buckle under the challenge of improving the overall efficiency by cutting down costs, bringing in transparency and visibility into the processes and speeding up delivery. In this scenario, public sector officials can no longer wait for the serendipity of discovering a holistic e-procurement solution. A suite that underpins more than proposal and catalog management, unlike the conventional solutions, is their need of the hour. Their search of comprehensive e-procurement platform ends with VORTAL that touches the entire lifecycle of the sourcing process. The firm’s eProcurement platform allows government and local bodies officials to walk through the compliance maze while procuring goods and services. “Our platform injects efficiency into the complex procurement process of government bodies and helps them to a select a right supplier from the large pool,” says Miguel Sobral, CEO of VORTAL.

One of the leading e-Sourcing and e-Procurement solutions providers, VORTAL connects thousands of public and private buyers with an international community of qualified suppliers. VORTAL’s public eSourcing platform is immensely beneficial to both buyers and suppliers. While suppliers can discover business opportunities with innovative tools including market intelligence, lead generation, reputation management, and reporting, buyers can achieve more savings, increase transparency and reduce risk. Catering to the specific requirements of national government, central purchasing bodies and small government agencies, VORTAL is a one-stop for everything from spend aggregation, suppliers base management, dynamic purchasing system, procurement planning to e-Auctions framework agreements, e-Sourcing and e-Evaluation, contracts management and e-Catalogues.

VORTAL allows public sector organizations to restructure and streamline their procurement process with the content library, unlike the other procurement solutions that merely facilitate message exchange between buyers and suppliers. Public servants can utilize the readily available information like templates on VORTAL platform to generate a request for proposals (RFPs) and standardize the existing tender procedures. With well-structured procedures in place, they can evaluate the tenders and zero in on the vendor that fulfills a range of criteria. “While complying with a gamut of regulations, government officials can check material suppliers for their services and subsequently conduct procurement process in a more efficient and transparent manner,” adds Sobral. After the contract is awarded, communicating any requirements and issues is a simpler task as public body officials can utilize the platform’s in-built functionalities like attachments.

Users can quickly start leveraging the power of the comprehensive, highly customizable, easy to install and cloud-native VORTAL platform after the firm performs compliance checks for a particular jurisdiction. At the outset, the company provides the proof of concept, explains how VORTAL functions and subsequently acquaints users with the functionalities through training. Colombia, Honduras and Dominican Republic are examples of countries implementing VORTAL to streamline its procurement process and float tenders in a simplified and transparent manner. After deploying VORTAL platform, public officials can easily select the supplier from the large pool. The platform also helps the local bodies in sourcing goods and services, making use of highly friendly user interface. Today, the Colombian government raises tens of thousands of request for proposals through VORTAL platform every month and easily adheres to its principles of cost efficiency.

Success stories akin governments in Latin America and a leading position in Europe are only one of the factors that inspire VORTAL. The firm is also driven by the mission of sharing its expertise and knowledge in the procurement arena. To this end, it collaborates with the stakeholders in the procurement process and shares with them the advanced practices through its arm—VORTAL academy. With merger and acquisitions, VORTAL has already set its focus on the growth curve.