Procurement is keeping everyone busy these days, from aligning your business needs to the reality of the market and finding the balance between costs and quality; it's definitely a complex task.
The good news is that you don't have to figure out everything alone; there are people who have already faced the same challenges and know the best approach to solve them.
Shall we listen to their advice?
Introduction
We'll be talking with Rajanatha Shettigara, VP of Engineering at Vayu Robotics, a company that's changing the way robots work for multiple industries with an affordable approach.
Procurement for large companies
It's a well-known tale that large companies have established procedures when it comes to procurement. their reputation in the market helps them to gain access to high-quality suppliers without so much afterthought.
That's a bonus point, for sure, but it doesn't change the fact that for some big companies, collaboration across departments or with external suppliers doesn't come easy.
The case for start-ups
Smaller companies, on the other hand, had a unique advantage. More often than not, you'll find people of one department wearing multiple hats at the same time, something that can be beneficial for the company as it connects all the dots in the supply chain.
The 3 factors
Costs, quality, and lead time.
These three factors can easily make or break the success of your company, and it falls under the responsibility of procurement to balance everything correctly. For Vayu Robotics, it helps to rely on a small but seasoned team, where every single engineer comes with their own professional network.
The challenge
For Vayu Robotics, as Rajanatha says, the most difficult thing is not being able to fully know what's going to happen in the future. Supply chains, after all, can be affected by many unexpected events, so what's a procurement leader to do?
Focus on your product design, and build your priorities around what you have at the present moment
Things to watch out for
Especially for start-ups, one pitfall that must be avoided is to not learn how to align your processes with the company's main purpose because this is what is going to keep moving things forward. The other is not taking care of your costs. Be careful with your budget and try to discover as many optimization opportunities as possible.
