Oracle Purchasing provides features to enable consolidation of similar functions across all of your global business units. This consolidation is typically referred to as centralized procurement or sourcing service centers. The goal of which is to create autonomous procurement business units within the enterprise.

   Major Features:

Global Agreements

Global agreements are agreements (blanket purchase agreements or contract purchase agreements) with a supplier that can be shared between business units. Global agreements empower the centralized service unit to negotiate on behalf of some or all other business units and store the negotiation outcome in a single document. This single document can then be used for automatic sourcing of requisition demand from any enabled business units.

Center-Led Procurement Automatic Sourcing

Sourcing rules, sourcing rule assignments and approved supplier lists (ASL) are created in the owning business unit. The global agreements referenced by automatic sourcing are then available for execution in all business units enabled by the buyer. Complete process automation is achieved by defining sourcing rule assignments for the global agreements in the executing business unit.

Center-Led Procurement Accounting

In a centralized procurement environment you may create a purchase order in one operating unit, but require shipment to a different operating unit. Accounts are provided to ensure proper financial reconciliation between the procuring business unit and the receiving business unit using intercompany invoicing. This accounting requires that a transaction flow is defined between the two organizations.

   Center-Led Procurement Step by Step:

Define Transaction Flows

Transaction flows define the procurement relationship between different operating units. The details of this relationship define how the expenses are transferred from one business unit to the other (could be a different ledger).

Defining a transaction flow consists of these steps:

1. Define transaction flow

2. Define intermediate nodes

3. Define intercompany relationship

See "Transaction Setup" in the Oracle Inventory User's Guide for details on setting up transaction flows.

Global Agreements Setup Steps

Global agreements are blanket purchase agreements and contract purchase agreements which have been created to be used in a centralized procurement environment.

Defining a global agreement consists of these steps:

1. To take full advantage of all centralized procurement features, set the profile HR: Cross Business Groups to Yes at the site level.

2. Define a supplier site for the supplier in each operating unit that will be defined as a purchasing organization for the global agreement. The supplier site names do not need to be the same as the supplier site name in the global agreement.

3. Create a new blanket purchase agreement or contract purchase agreement with the Global checkbox enabled. See: Entering Purchase Order Headers.

4. Enable the the global agreement (select the purchasing organization and purchasing site) for those operating units that are authorized to order referencing the global agreement. See: Entering Purchase Agreement Information.

5. Define sourcing rule assignments for the global agreement in the executing operating unit. See: Defining Sourcing Rules

Global Buyer Setup Steps

Enterprises using centralized purchasing can set up a global buyer which can create, update, and default onto purchasing documents. This enables buyers from multiple business units to fully participate in these actions without redundant setup procedures.

1. Define the global buyer as an employee in the business group that the buyer belongs to using the Oracle Human Resources Enter Persons window.

2. Define the global buyer as a buyer using the Oracle Purchasing Enter Buyers window. This can be done in any business group.

3. Set profile option HR: Cross Business Groups to Yes at the site level.

4. Assign as many Oracle Purchasing responsibilities as required to this global buyer. These responsibilities do not need to be linked to any specific business group.

Global Requester Setup Steps

Enterprises using centralized purchasing can set up a global requester. This enables requisition creation from multiple business units (operating units).

1. Set profile option HR: Cross Business Groups to Yes at the site level.

2. Assign the Oracle Purchasing responsibility associated with the operating unit to the requester. You can assign all that are needed.

3. Requester selects the appropriate responsibility and creates the requisition.

Global Supervisor Setup Steps

Enterprises using centralized purchasing can set up a global supervisor to approve purchase requisitions. This enables approvals from multiple business units.

1. Define the supervisor and assign to an approval group as you would normally set them up.

2. Set profile option HR: Cross Business Groups to Yes at the site level.

   Once the profile is set to Yes, requisitions can be routed and forwarded to individuals in different business groups. The action history reflects the names of those who take action even though they are in different business groups.