THE WOODLANDS, Texas and PLEASANTON, Calif., January 21, 2003 -- Pantellos, a leading supply chain services company for the utility industry, today announced a partnership with Xign Corporation that brings a new electronic invoice and payment service to help utilities automate financial settlement with suppliers. Pantellos now enables utilities to realize their vision of a closed-loop, fully electronic procurement-to-settlement process.
Based upon the ePayables solution from Xign Corporation, the new Pantellos eSettlement Network lowers payables processing costs, improves utilities' ability to negotiate and capture supplier discounts, and strengthens supplier relationships. The service offering creates a network that links buyers and suppliers, allowing them to electronically exchange invoices, resolve disputes and make payments using standardized processes. By combining the Pantellos eSettlement Network with other Pantellos electronic sourcing and electronic marketplace services, utilities can fulfill their e-procurement initiatives with a completely automated procure-to-pay process, for significantly improved efficiency, accuracy and cost-savings.
"From day one, Pantellos has been working to identify, develop and deliver e-procurement tools for our customers. A completely automated electronic settlement solution has been a missing ingredient," said Steve Newland, vice president of sales and marketing for Pantellos. "We chose to partner with Xign based on its outstanding industry reputation and its ePayables solution that provides unparalleled capabilities and features."
According to industry estimates, the cost of business-to-business financial settlement-including invoice receipt, invoice approval and processing, payment, remittance, reconciliation and dispute resolution-ranges from $40-$60 per transaction. Processing of paper invoices and paper checks drives most of these high costs and extensive delays.
Because the Pantellos eSettlement Network is Web-based and flexible enough to integrate with a broad range of supplier and buyer systems, customers can eliminate paper and reduce their payables processing costs by up to 50 percent. They can also process invoices faster to capture lucrative discounts often offered by suppliers in exchange for prompt payment.
"Pantellos has done a remarkable job of helping customers streamline their supply chain processes to achieve new levels of operational efficiency and cost savings," said Mike Eberhard, Xign vice president of worldwide sales. "Through this partnership and the benefits of electronic settlement, Xign and Pantellos can help customers generate greater business results."
Specific Pantellos eSettlement Network capabilities include: electronic invoice capturing, invoice validation and approval routing; electronic payment processing; invoice status and detailed remittance information; and online, collaborative dispute resolution. The Pantellos eSettlement Network can be integrated with existing accounting systems or provide an optional workflow capability for managing the payment process.
