Axya was founded in 2019 to help traditional direct (custom) manufacturing companies modernize procurement and supplier management and become more effective and efficient in both processes than traditional ERPs — that barely allow a customer to send purchase orders, track inventories, and maintain basic supplier profiles — will allow. This, of course, is a far, far, cry from where manufacturers need to be today (but where many are stuck when the majority of S2P solutions were designed for indirect and few were designed with traditional custom manufacturing in mind).

The Axya solution has 3 primary modules / capabilities on the buy-side:

• sourcing
• order management / procurement
• supplier management

All designed to supplement the ERP where it is weak and help a contract manufacturer manage its direct sourcing, procurement, and supplier management. We’ll take the modules one by one and discuss their core capabilities.

Sourcing

The sourcing module is designed to take a part or bill of material from the ERP, create an RFQ, and allow a buyer to complete that RFQ and execute a sourcing project. When a requisition is created in the ERP, it is automatically pushed to Axya through direct integration, and will include any attached part or component diagrams. (Axya supports most of the major ERPs — including SAP, Infor, Epicor, etc. — and has integrated with them numerous times across its 100+ customer base.)

The RFX module is quite straightforward. When a buyer logs in, they see the RFQs assigned to them, including the ones newly created by an ERP push that needs to be completed, and can select one to work on. The RFP consists of the header information (name and number, dates, master documents, and status), the part list (populated from the Bill of Materials), and suppliers — which the platform can be configured to auto-select based on the part or components or to force manual selection. The buyer can alter the list to their liking from suppliers loaded into the application and each supplier will receive their own, secure, copy of the RFQ.

The platform supports internal chat between team members and external chat between team members and suppliers, each in the supplier’s own portal and/or e-mail box (more later). In addition, if not all of the required documents needed to detail the part creation are in the ERP, the buyer can upload additional documents before the RFQ is sent. In addition, the portal tracks which documents are accessed, when, and by which suppliers. (And if any part of the BoM needs to be updated, the change can be made through the Axya platform.)

Once the quotes are in, the buyer can see them side by side for easy comparison. At a part level, the buyers can then select a supplier for an award, or have the platform auto-select the the lowest cost supplier for each part and then generate an award that can be saved and pushed back into the ERP.

Procurement

When a purchase order is created in the ERP (off of an award), it can automatically be pushed to the Axya platform where, like an RFQ, it can be managed through the platform. In the Axya platform, the buyer can see the status of an order (sent, acknowledged, in process, shipped, in receipt, complete). The buyer can, through the portal, communicate with the supplier, review change requests, track order (and revision) history, and do 2-way order-receipt matches.

All supplier communication, directly or indirectly, goes through the platform, the buyer can make manual updates at any time, and can set up automatic reminders to notify the supplier if a certain time has passed since receipt, acknowledgement, last shipment, etc. to make sure the suppliers are reminded on a timely basis.

Supplier Management

The supplier management module allows the buyer to maintain extensive supplier profiles that go much broader, and deeper, than what the ERP supports. Supplier profiles can be customized on implementation and can contain deep details on certifications, insurance, specializations, technology, locations, etc. It can support metrics, documents, notes, custom forms, specifics per shop, and any other requirement the organization needs to track.

In addition, the platform can be used to store all contracts related to the supplier (but the platform does not support contract negotiation, signature, or lifecycle management) for quick search and retrieval.

The platform also associates all RFQs, active POs, and metrics with the supplier. These metrics are operational metrics and include total requests sent, responded, awarded, and their value; orders sent, in process, shipped, and complete; and overall success rates.

Dashboard

A buyer logs into the dashboard where they can see a summary of the RFQs, orders, and supplier requests in the system (where information is gathered/updated through forms), as well as see a summary of critical information that includes:

• new orders pulled in from the ERP
• unacknowledged orders
• orders that need attention (revision requests, late)
• new requisitions pulled in from the ERP (which templated new RFQs)
• RFQs in progress
• RFQs requiring attention
• unread messages
• … other tasks that need to be performed

In addition, the buyer sees key summary information through widgets that can be drilled into for quick task access, which include (but are not limited to):

• various order status dashboards
• various RFQ status dashboards
• various request status dashboards
• (active) supplier summary (in the Axya platform, only active suppliers are pulled in during integration)
• team (member) summary
• basic performance/execution-based analytics across RFQs, orders, and suppliers

On the supplier side, they have three solutions:

• supplier portal
• email, Excel, and PDF
• weekly recaps

Supplier Portal

Like most sourcing platforms, Axya has a modern supplier interface where they can log in and see their RFQs, Purchase Orders, and communications and can manually respond to each of them through the platform. However …

Email, Excel, and PDF

Unlike most sourcing platforms, Axya was built to support traditional manufacturers who are engineering geniuses but technological novices when it comes to modern SaaS platforms and who like to work in Email, Excel, and PDF — making it one of a select few platforms that doesn’t require a supplier to ever access the portal.

All RFQs, Purchase Orders, and Messages are sent to the supplier through e-mail, with attachments they can download, fill out, and send back for RFQs and Purchase Orders (and they can simply respond to the email for messaging). Since the Axya platform directly integrates with Microsoft Outlook in addition to directly integrating with the ERP, it can track, monitor, and replicate all communications that flow through email in the Axya platform as long as they contain the RFQ id, order id, or communication id.

The platform will also automatically import and process any Excel or PDF attachment, and if it is a bid file, extract the bids; an order acknowledgement, capture it; a shipment, note it; a response, associate it with the question. This is one of the most unique, and powerful features of Axya — allowing sellers (and buyers) to work in their familiar, preferred environments.

On the buyer’s side, they can access the Axya panel inside Outlook at any time and associate any communication from a supplier with an active RFQ, order, (survey) form, or question (from a chat) as needed. Moreover, a buyer can also handle the majority of communications with a supplier who prefers to use email, Excel, and PDF through email, with limited need to log into the portal once the RFQ, order, etc. has been issued (until it is complete and time to make an award or complete an order).

Weekly Recaps

The system automatically creates a weekly recap for all suppliers with open orders, survey form requests, RFQs, or questions (not responded to); that summarizes all of them with direct single-click links that will take the supplier to the appropriate RFQ, order, survey, or question; and once in the RFQ, order, survey, or question they can submit a quote, submit an acknowledgement or update, answer the survey quickly and easily.

Implementation and Integration

Axya takes a staged approach to implementation, starting with one buying team and their active suppliers to quickly get the client up and running, verify the implementation and integration, and give them time to help the client identify the buying teams, suppliers, products, and profile requirements that the client needs which they will work on for phase 2, which will quickly be implemented once phase 1 is complete. The timeframe is client dependent, but depending on the ERP and complexity of the integration requirements, initial implementation is doable in a few weeks, and phase 2 can be completed in a few months.

Conclusion

Axya is a very powerful direct sourcing, procurement, and supplier management solution …

that is almost a complete solution for direct / custom manufacturers, with only a few small pieces needed. The first is DIY (do-it-yourself) form capability, because right now Axya has to create all the supplier surveys a buyer wants to send to the supplier (which will soon become burdensome on Axya if not addressed), and the second is invoice acceptance, 3-way matching, and ok-to-pay.

Axya has realized both of these, and has already started building a DIY form builder for supplier surveys and information gathering, which will be released later this year, and just started researching advanced technology for invoice processing, as direct invoices are significantly more difficult to parse as indirect (due to the need for very precise low-level part mappings), as they recognize the need for invoice processing and 3-way match.

And while there is more that could be done, there is little the average mid-sized direct/custom manufacturer will need, at least not for a few years while they progress up the Source-to-Pay maturity curve. As a result, Axya is a great solution for a MM custom manufacturer struggling in the modern digital world due to lack of modern Procurement support in the ERP.