The problem
Our client is a major UK enterprise with over 500 field engineers working across the country. Every day, engineers on-site need materials — cables, pipes, fittings, components. The standard practice was to walk into the nearest supplier and buy whatever was available at whatever price.
Nobody was comparing. Nobody was tracking. Engineers were purchasing freely on the company account with no controls and no visibility. When spending runs into the millions and every engineer is doing it independently, the losses add up fast.
There was no intelligent guided buying solution. No way to compare the same product across different suppliers. No way to steer engineers toward cost-effective alternatives when something at half the price would do the job. Supplier invoicing was another problem — without valid purchase orders tied to actual needs, fraudulent and inflated invoices were slipping through.
The company had built a scrappy internal MVP to start tracking purchases, and it worked — adoption hit 90%. But tracking alone wasn't enough. They needed a system that could actively guide engineers to better purchasing decisions at the point of need.
What we built
An intelligent procurement platform — think "Compare the Market" for trade materials.
Cross-supplier search — Engineers search for a material and instantly see results from multiple suppliers. Prices, stock levels, and nearest collection points side by side. No more walking into the nearest shop and hoping for the best.
AI product matching — With hundreds of thousands of product codes across different suppliers, the same item is often listed differently. AI matches equivalent products across catalogs so engineers can compare like-for-like, even when suppliers describe things differently.
Guided buying — The platform surfaces preferred products and negotiated pricing. Cost-effective alternatives are highlighted. Premium options that aren't needed for the job can be deprioritised or hidden entirely — controlling the demand profile without restricting the engineer.
Purchase order integration — Orders are placed directly through the platform, generating valid purchase orders on the company account. No more uncontrolled spending. No more invoices without matching orders.
Built for scale, then SaaS — Designed for internal use first, but architected from day one to be licensable. Any company with field engineers purchasing materials on-site faces the same problem. The platform is being built to serve one enterprise first, then offered as a product to others.
The result
The scrappy MVP proved the concept — 90% adoption across 500+ engineers, with tens of thousands of transactions tracked. The full platform replaces guesswork with data at the point of purchase. Engineers still get what they need, fast. The company gets visibility, control, and savings that scale with every transaction.
When every purchase is compared, matched, and tracked across £5M+ in annual procurement, the savings compound fast.