System and method for managing purchasing contracts

• US 20020010686A1
• Filed: 01/17/2001
• Published: 01/24/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 04/04/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sabre AS (Luxembourg) SARL (Sabre Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Michael D. Whitesage
• Inventors: Whitesage, Michael D.
• Granted Patent: US 7,016,859 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/80
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/063 Operations research, analysis or management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0631 Resource planning, allocation, distributing or scheduling for enterprises or organisations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0639 Performance analysis of employees; Performance analysis of enterprise or organisation operations
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06393 Score-carding, benchmarking or key performance indicator [KPI] analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0201 Market modelling; Market analysis; Collecting market data
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0202 Market predictions or forecasting for commercial activities
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/188 Electronic negotiation

Abstract

A system and method of managing purchasing contracts between supplier entities and customer entities for the purchase of products includes the step of generating at least one purchasing contract between at least one supplier entity (e.g., a product originator such as an airline company or a distributor such as travel agency) and at least one customer entity. The purchasing contract generated is one that is applicable to one or more contracted purchasing transactions effected, at least partially, through a computerized system. The generating step includes identifying one or more contract terms, wherein each contract term has one or more term attributes, and storing a term data set of the term attributes associated with each contract term in one or more computer databases. The method also involves collecting transaction data relating to one or more purchasing transactions and storing the transaction data in one or more computer databases. Preferably, a computer program is executed to identify one or more of the purchasing transactions as a contracted transaction (i.e., applicable to a specific contract) by selecting at least a portion of the transaction data for a purchasing transaction and comparing the selected portion with the term attributes for a contract term. In this way, the transaction may be identified as a contracted transaction if the selected portion is identified with one or more of the term attributes.

Claims

1. A method of managing purchasing contracts between supplier entities and customer entities for the purchase of products, said method comprising the steps of:

generating at least one purchasing contract between at least one supplier entity and at least one customer entity, the purchasing contract being applicable to one or more contracted purchasing transactions effected, at least partially, through a computerized system, said generating step including

defining one or more contract terms, each contract term having one or more term attributes, and

storing a term data set of the term attributes associated with each contract term in one or more computer databases;

collecting sets of transaction data relating to one or more purchasing transactions;

storing the transaction data sets in one or more computer databases;

identifying one or more sets of transaction data as a contract transaction data set for a contract transaction identifiable with a contract term; and

generating a collection of contract transaction data sets by associating the transaction data set of each identified contract transaction with each term data set of a contract term with which the transaction is identified.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of executing a computer program to measure the performance of a contract term, whereby the computer program inputs data from one more of the contract transaction data sets associated with the contract term.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of executing a computer program to identify one or more of the purchasing transactions as a contract transaction by selecting at least a portion of the transaction data for a purchasing transaction and comparing the selected portion with the term attributes set for a contract term, whereby the transaction is identified as a contract transaction when the selected portion is identified with one or more of the term attributes.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the supplier entity and the customer entity have, associated therewith, one or more entity attributes, said method further comprising the steps of:

specifying one or more entity data representing each of the entity attributes or a combination thereof; and

including the entity data in each term data set such that the contract transaction data set includes entity data.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the specifying step includes specifying entity data representing an entity attribute from the group of entity attributes consisting of:

customer entity organization information, designated customer employee contact information, supplier entity organization information, designated supplier employee contact information, and combinations thereof.

6. The method of claim 3, wherein the step of storing a term data set for each contract term includes selecting one or more term attributes from the group of term attributes consisting of:

supplier entity identifiers, customer entity identifiers, contract identifiers, contract term identifiers, term performance rules, term discount, term requirements, and combinations thereof.

7. The method of claim 3, further comprising the steps of:

for each contract, specifying entity data including supplier entity data designating one or more individuals associated with the contract for the supplier entity, and customer entity data designating one or more individuals associated with the contract for the customer entity; and

associating the entity data with each of the contract terms for the contract such that the contract transaction data sets generated include the entity data.

8. The method of claim 3, wherein the step of generating a collection of contract transaction data sets includes generating a contract transaction data set including a supplier entity identifier, a customer entity identifier, a contract identifier, and a contract term identifier.

9. The method of claim 3, wherein the step of collecting transaction data includes,

receiving, at one or more client stations, transaction data relating to a partial purchase transaction, wherein the partial purchase transaction embodies less than a whole portion of a predetermined individualized transaction for a product;

deriving an individualized transaction from one or more partial purchasing transactions, the individualized transactions being associated with an individualized transaction data set; and

storing the transaction data set for the individualized transaction in one or more computer databases.

10. The method of claim 3, wherein the contract generating step includes:

collecting historical transaction data sets representing purchasing transactions by the customer entity;

identifying a proposed contract term having a set of one or more term attributes;

identifying historical transaction data sets applicable to the proposed contract term by comparing contract term attributes with at least a portion of each historical transaction data set;

qualifying one or more contract terms by, forecasting the performance of the proposed contract term using, as input, at least a portion of each identified historical transaction data set, and qualifying the proposed contract term based, at least partly, on the forecasted performance;

assigning the contract term to a proposed contract; and

evaluating the proposed contract with one or more of qualified contract terms.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the step of collecting historical transaction data includes collecting historical transaction data from a plurality of distinct sources.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein the step of collecting historical transaction data includes collecting historical transaction data in a plurality of data formats and converting each of the collected transaction data into historical transaction data sets in accordance with a common format.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the step of qualifying a proposed contract term includes designating the proposed contract term as qualified if the forecasted performance satisfies a predetermined performance criteria.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising the step of storing a plurality of proposed contract terms including one or more term performance rules for each proposed term, wherein the step of qualifying a proposed contract term includes comparing the forecasted performance with a term performance rule.

15. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of collecting transaction data includes receiving transaction data in a plurality of data formats and storing the received transaction data in accordance with a common format.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the step of storing received data includes storing data representing transaction attributes from the group of transaction attributes consisting of count of product units, cost of product, product code, customer entity code, supplier entity code including product originator and product distributor, and combinations thereof.

17. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of collecting transaction data includes,

providing an ancillary database containing data representing product attributes of each of a supplier'"'"'s products, whereby individual transaction for a single product are identifiable with one or more product attributes;

receiving, at a client station, parent transaction data relating to a parent purchase transaction, wherein the parent transaction embodies one or more individualized transactions;

deriving one or more individualized transactions from the parent transaction by executing a computer program to compare at least a portion of each parent transaction data with the product attributes stored in the ancillary database;

defining an individualized transaction with each of the identified products, each of the individualized transactions being associated with one or more of the transaction data set; and

storing each transaction data set for each individualized transaction in one or more computer databases.

18. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of identifying one or more of the contracted transactions includes electronically marking each identified transaction data set with a unique contract term code and one or more entity codes specifying one or more of the supplier entity and the customer entity.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the step of defining a contract term includes storing an SQL statement that describes each term and wherein the marking step includes generating an SQL statement to match transaction data sets with a contract term.

20. The method of claim 1, further comprising the steps of:

generating a transaction database for storing the collected transaction data sets in a common format;

generating a term database for storing the contract term attributes sets;

generating an entity database for storing data relating to supplier entities and customer entities;

generating an entity contacts database for storing data relating to information on individuals designated to a contract at supplier entities and individuals designated to a contract at customer entities; and

generating a term performance database for storing measured term performance data;

whereby each of the databases are computer databases interconnected to one or more data processing means.

21. In a method of managing purchasing contracts between at least one supplier entity and at least one customer entity, wherein the purchasing contract is applicable to one or more contracted purchasing transactions for products effected, at least partially, through a computerized system, a method of generating a purchase contract, said method comprising the steps of:

collecting transaction data relating to historical purchasing transactions by the customer entity;

storing, in one or more databases, a set of transaction data for each historical purchasing transaction;

defining one or more proposed contract terms;

defining one or more term attributes associated with each proposed contract term and storing the term attributes as a term data set in one or more databases;

executing a computer program to qualify each proposed contract term, including

selecting one or more of the stored term attributes;

identifying each transaction data set that satisfies the selected term attributes;

forecasting a performance result of the proposed contract term using, as input, at least a portion of each transaction data set identified; and

qualifying the proposed contract term if the forecasted result satisfies a predetermined performance criteria; and

assigning a purchasing contract between the supplier entity and the customer entity, the purchasing contract having one or more qualified contract terms.

22. The method of claim 21, further comprising the step of defining one or more term performance rules for each proposed contract term and storing the performance rules in one or more databases, and wherein the step of qualifying the proposed contract term includes comparing the forecasted performance result with one or more performance rules associated with the contract term, whereby the performance rules provide the predetermined criteria.

23. The method of claim 21, wherein the step of collecting transaction data includes receiving transaction data in a plurality of data formats and selecting a predetermined portion of each collected transaction data for the storing step.

24. The method of claim 23, wherein the step of storing transaction data sets include storing each of the transaction data sets in accordance with a common format.

25. The method of claim 22, further comprising the step of individualizing each of the collected transaction data, including executing data processing means to convert each transaction data set to one or more individualized transaction data sets, whereby each individualized transaction data set is associated with a single predetermined product.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein the step of collecting transaction data sets includes,

providing an ancillary database containing data representing product attributes of each product, whereby individualized transactions for a single product are identifiable with one or more product attributes;

receiving, at a client station, information relating to a parent purchase transaction, wherein the parent transaction embodies one or more purchasing transactions; and

deriving one or more individualized transactions from the parent transaction by executing data processing means, including

selecting at least a portion of data collected for the parent transaction,

comparing the selected data with the product attributes stored in the ancillary database to identify one or more products, and

defining an individualized transaction with each of the identified products, each of the individualized transactions being associated with one or more of the transaction data set.

27. The method of claim 21, wherein the step of identifying transaction data sets includes electronically marking each identified transaction data set with a unique code associated with the contract term.

28. The method of claim 27, wherein the marking step includes marking the transaction data set with a contract code and one or more entity codes specifying one or more of the supplier entity and the customer entity.

29. The method of claim 27, wherein the step of defining a contract term includes storing an SQL statement that describes each term and wherein the marking step includes generating an SQL statement to match transaction data sets with a contract term.

30. The method of claim 21, wherein the step of storing transaction data includes creating a common format characterized by a single line of transaction data, and wherein the transaction data set represent information selected from the group of historical purchasing information consisting of:

product description, count, cost, date, time, salesperson, computed share applicable to supplier entity, and combinations thereof.

31. A method of managing a purchasing contract between at least one supplier entity and at least one customer entity, said method comprising the steps of:

generating a purchasing contract between at least one supplier entity and at least one customer entity, the purchasing contract being applicable to one or more contracted purchasing transactions effected, at least partially, through a computerized system, said generating step including

identifying one or more contract attributes associated with the contract, including one or more contract terms, each contract term having associated therewith a measurable performance parameter wherein the value of the performance parameter is dependent, at least in part, on the occurrence of one or more contracted transactions, and

storing the contract attributes including the contract terms in one or more databases;

collecting transaction data relating to one or more purchasing transactions, the collected transaction data including data representing one or more transaction attributes associated with each purchasing transaction;

executing a computer program to identify one or more of the purchasing transactions as a contract transaction by selecting one or more of the transaction attributes and comparing the selected attributes with the contract attributes, whereby a contract transaction is identified when a predetermined one or more of the selected attributes are identifiable with one or more of the contract attributes; and

executing a computer program to measure the performance of a contract term using, as input data, transaction attributes of one or more contract transactions.

32. The method of claim 31, further comprising, after the step of collecting transaction data, the steps of:

storing the collected transaction data for each transaction as a transaction data set; and

storing the transaction data sets in a transaction database in accordance with a common format; and

wherein the step of executing a computer program to identify contracted transactions, includes accessing the transaction database.

33. The method of claim 31, further comprising the step of providing a term performance rule for determining the fulfillment of each contract term, and storing the term rule in one or more computer databases, and wherein the step of executing a program to measure contract term performance includes generating a current term performance value and comparing the performance value with a term performance rule.

34. The method of claim 31, wherein the step of storing collected transaction data includes selecting data representing one or more transaction attributes selected from the group of transaction attributes consisting of:

product code, product cost, transaction time, transaction date, seller identifier, computed share, and combinations thereof.

35. The method of claim 31, further comprising the steps of:

providing an ancillary database containing data representing product attributes of each of a supplier'"'"'s products, whereby an individualized transaction for each product is identifiable by one or more product attributes;

receiving, at a client station, parent transaction data relating to a parent purchase transaction, wherein the parent transaction embodies one or more individualized transactions;

executing a computer program to compare at least a portion of each parent transaction data with product attributes stored in the ancillary database so as to identify one or more products;

defining an individualized transaction with each of the identified products, each of the individualized transactions being associated with one or more of the transaction data set; and

storing each transaction data set for each individualized transaction in one or more computer databases.

36. The method of claim 31, wherein the step of identifying one or more contract attributes includes selecting, for the storing step, one or more contract term attributes from the group of term attributes consisting of term discount, term discount method, term date range, term performance rules, term identifier, authorized distributors, distributor commission, and combinations thereof.

37. The method of claim 31, further comprising the steps of:

defining a contract term identifier for each contract term; and

for each identified contracted transaction, associating the transaction data set with the contract term identifier with which the contract transaction is identified, whereby the associated transaction data set and the contract term identifier constitute a contract transaction data set.

38. The method of claim 37, wherein the step of executing a computer program to measure contract term performance includes using, as input, data from accessing each of the contracted transaction data sets associated with the contract term.

39. The method of claim 38, wherein the step of measuring the performance of the contract term includes selecting, for the measuring step, a performance value from the group of performance values consisting of:

total product count, total cost, supplier share, unit cost, and combinations thereof; and

wherein the step of storing contract attributes includes storing a set of contract term attributes for each contract term, and wherein each of the at least one supplier entity and the at least one customer entity have, associated therewith, one or more entity attributes, said method further comprising the steps of;

specifying one or more entity data representing each of the entity attributes or a to combination thereof; and

including the entity data in each term attributes set such that the contract transaction data set includes entity data.

40. A method of managing a purchasing contract between a supplier entity for a common carrier and a customer entity, the contract being applicable to one or more contracted ticketing transactions, each of the ticketing transactions being associated with a ticket unit, said method comprising the steps of:

generating a purchasing contract between at least one supplier entity and one customer entity, including identifying one or more contract terms, each contract term having one or more term attributes, and storing the term attributes associated with each contract term as a term data set in one or more computer databases;

collecting transaction data for one or more ticketing transactions from a plurality of data sources;

storing a set of transaction data for each ticketing transaction in one or more computer databases and in accordance with a common format;

executing a computer program to identify one or more of the ticketing transactions as a contracted ticketing transaction by selecting at least a portion of the transaction data set for a transaction and comparing the selected portion with the term data set for a contract term, whereby the transaction is identified as a contracted ticketing transaction upon identifying the selected portion with a portion of the term data set; and

electronically marking each identified transaction data set with a unique code associated with the contract term; and

executing a computer program to measure the performance of the contract term using, as input, at least a portion of the transaction data set for each identified contracted ticketing transaction.

41. The method of claim 40, further comprising the steps of:

providing an ancillary database containing data representing product attributes of each ticket unit, whereby individual ticket units are identifiable by one or more product attributes;

receiving, at a client station, information relating to a parent purchase transaction including a transaction data set, wherein the parent transaction embodies one or more ticketing transactions; and

deriving one or more individualized ticketing transactions from the parent transaction by executing data processing means, including

selecting one or more of the transaction attributes,

comparing the selected transaction attributes with the product attributes stored in the products database to identify one or more ticket units; and

defining an individualized ticketing transaction with each of the identified ticketing units, each of the individualized ticketing transactions being associated with at least portion of the collected transaction data set;

wherein the step of storing transaction data includes storing a transaction data set for each of the individualized ticketing transaction.

42. The method of claim 40, further comprising the step of generating a collection of contracted ticketing transaction data sets by associating the transaction data of each identified contracted transaction with each term data set with which the transaction is identified;

and

wherein the step of measuring the performance of a contract term includes accessing the contracted transaction data sets, whereby the computer program inputs data from one or more of the identified ticketing transaction data sets associated with the contract term.

43. The method of claim 42, further comprising the steps of:

storing, in one or more computer databases, entity data relating to each of the supplier entity and the customer entity, including entity data representing an entity attribute from the group of entity attributes consisting of;

customer entity organization information, designated customer employee contact information, supplier entity organization information, designated supplier employee contact information, and combinations thereof; and

associating the entity data with the transaction data set of each identified contracted ticketing transaction, such that the contracted ticketing transaction data set generated includes entity data.

44. The method of claim 43, wherein the step of storing a term data set for each contract term includes selecting one or more term attributes from the group of term attributes consisting of:

supplier entity identifiers, a customer entity identifier, contract identifiers, contract term identifiers, term performance rules, term discount, term requirements, and combinations thereof; and

storing data representing the selected term attributes in the term data set.

45. The method of claim 40, wherein the step of storing transaction data includes storing at least data representing attributes from the group of transaction attributes consisting of:

count of product units, cost of product, product code, customer entity code, supplier entity code including product originator and product distributor, and combinations thereof.

46. In a system for managing a purchasing contract between at least one supplier entity and at least one customer entity, the contract being applicable to a plurality of contract transactions effected, at least partially, through a computerized system, a computerized method for creating contract transaction data sets usable with the system, said method comprising the steps of:

defining a contract having one or more contract terms, each of the contract terms having a set of term attributes associated therewith, including a criteria for identifying transactions applicable to the contract term;

storing each of the sets of term attributes as a term data set in one or more databases;

collecting transaction data sets, each transaction data set relating to a purchasing transaction, and storing the transaction data set for each purchasing transaction in one or more databases;

executing a computer program to identify one or more of the purchase transactions with one or more contract terms by selecting at least a portion of the transaction data set associated with each purchase transaction and comparing the selected portion of the transaction data set with at least a portion of the term data set associated with the contract term, whereby a contract transaction is identified when a predetermined portion of the selected transaction data set is identified with the portion of the term data set; and

associating at least a portion of the term data set with each identified transaction data set to generate a collection of contract transaction data sets.

47. The method of claim 46, further comprising the steps of:

identifying at least one customer entity and at least one supplier entity, each of the entities having one or more distinct entity attributes;

specifying entity data representing each of the entity attributes or combinations thereof; and

storing the entity data with each stored term data set;

wherein the step of specifying entity data includes specifying data identifying one or more individuals associated with the contract for the supplier entity and one or more individuals associated with the contract for the customer entity.

48. The method of claim 47, wherein the step of associating each identified transaction data set includes marking each identified data set with a contract identifier and a contract term identifier.

49. The method of claim 47, wherein the step of associating each identified transaction data set includes generating an SQL statement to match the transaction data set with at least portion of the term data set.

50. The method of claim 47, wherein the step of collecting transaction data sets includes collecting data sets in a plurality of data formats and from a plurality of sources, and wherein the step of storing the transaction data sets includes storing the transaction data sets in accordance with a common format.

51. The method of claim 50, wherein the step of storing transaction data includes storing data representing transaction attributes selected from the group transaction attributes consisting of:

count of product units, cost of product, product code, customer entity code, supplier entity code including product originator and product distributor, and combinations thereof;

whereby the contract transaction data sets generated each include the selected data.

52. A computerized system for use in managing a purchasing contract between at least one supplier entity and at least one customer entity, the contract covering a plurality of contracted transactions effected, at least partially, through a computerized system, said system comprising:

one or more data storage systems storing (i) entity data specific to the supplier entity and entity data specific to the customer entity, (ii) multiple sets of term data, each set representing attributes of a contract term, including a term code, a contract code, and term definitions for identifying transaction data sets applicable to the contract term, and (iii) a plurality of transaction data sets, each set being identified with a contracted transaction;

one or more client stations for receiving transaction data sets, each data set relating to a purchasing transaction; and

one or more data processing systems communicable with said one or more client stations and with said one or more data storage systems, said data processing systems being configured

to store each of said transaction data sets in said one or more data storage systems; and

for each contract term, to compare at least a portion of said term data set with at least a portion of said transaction data sets so as to identify transaction data sets applicable to the contract term; and

associating each of said identified transaction data sets with one or more of said entity data and term data to generate a collection of contract transaction data sets.

53. The system of claim 52, wherein the data processing system is configured to store each transaction data set in a common format.

54. The system of claim 52, further comprising one or more data processing systems intercoupled with one or more of said data storage systems so as to be accessible with the contracted transaction data set,

wherein said contracted transaction data sets are stored in said one or more data storage systems.