Can you provide an overview of Procureship’s mission and its core focus within the maritime industry?

Procureship’s mission is to revolutionize marine procurement by employing cutting edge technologies and unique customer support. We mainly focus on the optimization of the entire purchasing cycle and all its adjacent operations such as IHM, e-invoicing, freight forwarding, contracts/vendor management.

How does Procureship’s platform or service contribute to the efficiency and cost-effectiveness of maritime procurement processes?

Procureship eliminates unnecessary manual work and automates all relevant procurement functions. I outline below some of our features which enable our platform to achieve this:

-Ability to send numerous RFQs to multiple suppliers with one click.

-Receiving all quotations for any type of items (including large makers) directly within the Buyers’ ERP covering 100% of the purchasing flow.

-Faster response times due to supplier integrations, quotations auditability as they are structured and inclusive of all needed information for evaluation.

-Invoices received automatically and mapped with relevant order items.

-IHM forms gathered electronically according to IMO’s specifications.

-Live spares forwarding status updates via our integrations with freight forwarders.

What are the key features or benefits that Procureship offers to shipowners and operators, and how do they address common challenges in maritime procurement?

Our optimisation tools lead to significant benefits (reduction of purchasing cycle >35%, invoice processing >50% faster, reduction of purchasing costs ~5%). Each shipping company can opt for the modules of Procureship that best serve its needs and embed them into their current ERP or use them autonomously.

Our marketplaces (suppliers recommendation engine, approved service providers ranking) offer the ability to find the most suitable vendors for any type of inquiry worldwide.

Our contracts module addresses the issue of managing tenders & contracts electronically while placing relevant orders seamlessly.

Our e-invoicing module solves the time-consuming issue of gathering and matching hundreds of invoices daily whereas our Freight Forwarding feature optimizes the way orders are being tracked and dispatched.

Can you discuss the importance of transparency and competitive pricing in maritime supply chains, and how Procureship is enhancing these aspects for its clients?

Transparency lies at the core values of Procureship. We strive to be truthful and precise regarding our services and our long-term vision towards our clients. We firmly believe in catering to the needs of both Buyers and Suppliers alike. Otherwise, we would not have been successful in creating a fair and functional marketplace. By giving the ability to suppliers to quote to new buyers in an efficient and timely manner while Buyers can perform an accurate evaluation process, we clearly enhance competition and efficiency within the maritime supply chain.

How does Procureship ensure the quality and reliability of the suppliers and products within its network?

We have established a three-step verification process for suppliers who become part of our network:

1. initial online registration with mandatory information
2. office team verifies provided data such as product categories, memberships/classes
3. assigned account managers provide on-the-spot reference support for new suppliers to Buyers.

Additionally, we perform our own checks i.e. suppliers who repetitively quote a brand as genuine may be requested to provide packing list and authorization letter so we verify with the maker.

What role does collaboration with maritime suppliers and other industry stakeholders play in Procureship’s strategy for delivering value to its clients?

Engaging with suppliers is imperative to us. During the early stages of our journey, we realised we should keep vendors content in using our system otherwise we would not be successful in optimizing the marine procurement cycle (easy quotation process, free integration, freemium account plans, recommendation marketplace). We are always in open communication with the marine industry’s stakeholders requesting their feedback and ideas on how we can further improve our features.

Can you share a success story or a significant project where Procureship’s platform had a notable impact on a maritime company’s procurement strategy or outcomes?

Yes, multiple. Our initial Buyer, StarBulk performed various KPIs to ensure cost/time savings on the purchasing operations of its entire fleet. We would not have proceeded with marketing our platform to more Buyers unless we could demonstrate such a tangible proof of concept. The most indicative success story is our customer retention rate. When presenting Procureship to a new company we always urge them to request references regarding our service by any of our 80 integrated buyers and more than 8,000 suppliers worldwide. Additionally, we offer a free trial of our system without any hidden costs so users can be certain of the platform’s value before proceeding.

What are the main trends or challenges that you observe in maritime procurement, and how is Procureship positioned to address these?

More digitalization is coming. We have witnessed a significant shift compared to when we started 8.5 years ago, when most companies were not familiar with the e-procurement concept. Shipping companies and marine suppliers are increasingly researching for software solutions to improve their operations. As this trend keeps growing, the challenge for stakeholders is to identify which are the most suitable tools based on their needs (out of multiple options) and how they can connect them to their current systems and workflow. Procureship has intentionally created a suite of products that can be integrated with any type of system and/or can be offered autonomously so we can adapt to different Buyer/Supplier needs.

How does Procureship plan to continue evolving its platform to meet the changing needs of the maritime industry?

We are committed to continuing our path of constant R&D, locating new areas for optimization and value creation which are relevant to our suite of modules. Meanwhile we will keep following all the related advancements in the tech industry seeking to employ new technologies that will enhance our features.

Looking to the future, what are the long-term goals for Procureship, and how do you envision your company’s role in transforming maritime procurement practices?

We wish to keep growing both in terms of clientele and number of modules. We already have a pipeline of new products under development which will solve growing issues of our sector e.g. ESG compliance, vendor management, contracts maintenance. As we keep investing in the quality and the growth of our software engineering/operations team we envision Procureship providing pioneering features that create value for our customers in ways not previously conceived.