Laptops Category Procurement Intelligence Report

End User Software and Hardware market around the world is undergoing rapid transitions that have a massive potential to influence the way companies strategize for Laptops procurement and the cost they have to incur. In a bid to differentiate themselves in an overcrowded technology space, suppliers are now focusing on creating industry-specific specialized products. Buyers see this trend as an opportunity to procure more targeted solutions and are developing internal capabilities to identify and leverage innovations in the supplier base.

Buyers are showing an inclination to onboard suppliers whose offerings span beyond Laptops. The practice brings in several advantages such as rationalization of supplier base, economies of scale and reduced category management cost.

New locations and vendors are emerging as cost effective suppliers of Laptops, offering an opportunity to widen the supplier base and gain further negotiation leverage with incumbent suppliers.

Sometimes, procurement functions are unable to timely alter their practices while responding to market conditions. Industry experts acknowledge that periodically reviewing procurement best practices and adopting learnings from across procurement categories can help procurement teams respond to market needs in a more agile way. This report combines our experience of other categories with Laptops procurement insights and hand picks best practices that can work for category managers delving in this market.

For example, Investing in benchmarking studies not only helps category managers to improve their knowledge about market pricing or billing rates but also in negotiating with suppliers. In fact, this holds true for all technology procurement sub-categories.

Buyers should ask for a detailed account of the data protection capabilities of the supplier. In addition, buyers should also enquire regarding the redundancies available during instances of outages or disruptions. While some providers can provide backup, others may have limited capabilities in hardware redundancy.

Buyers must clearly define clauses pertaining to the ownership of subcontracting services that are not a part of preferred suppliers' portfolios. Subcontractors should be bound by the same terms and conditions as the main contractor to ensure consistency in quality and manage any adverse event such as data breach.

Laptops procurement managers also need to proactively identify and mitigate potential risks that can arise in the supply chain or contracts for Laptops procurement. Some examples include: