PactumAI: The Future of Supplier Deals in Procurement
Pactum AI, a software developer based in Silicon Valley, has raised US$20m in venture capital from a consortium of backers, including the Danish shipping giant Maersk, which is betting on a future where the supplier deals of tomorrow are negotiated without humans.
The investors also included Karma Ventures, 3VC, Atomico, Project A, SuperAngel and Portfolion. Pactum’s latest investment round brings its total fundraising to US$55m.
The future of procurement
The deal, reported in Bloomberg, highlighted the capabilities of Pactum AI's autonomous bots, which, according to the article, can contact thousands of suppliers simultaneously seeking the best pricing and terms for routine corporate purchases in logistics and a wide range of other sectors.
Pactum AI's technology has already been working with Maersk since 2021 for some of its spot trucking services.
As the years have gone on, procurement professionals have been contacted daily by thousands of AI bots making purchases for items like office furniture and other goods, all on behalf of companies. More and more, these bots have in fact been negotiating with each other.
With these technological leaps comes a flurry of investors interested in large language models such as ChatGPT, which, ever since it was catapulted into the mainstream in late 2022, has generated inescapable buzz. Pactum AI believes that the next wave of AI development will see the workforce spearheaded by autonomous agents.
Martin Rand, co-founder and CEO of Pactum AI, spoke to Bloomberg about what he sees as the two key trends that all businesses need to understand, “The rapid emergence of AI agents in the workforce” and “the vital need to upskill the human workforce so they can manage their AI colleagues effectively."
The impact of Pactum AI
In an interview with Medium, more details of Pactum AI were shared. The company leverages AI and chatbots to create highly detailed autonomous negotiations and save leading global Fortune 500 supply chain and logistics companies millions.
With his history as a Commercial Lead for Europe at The Climate Corporation and as a co-founder of VitalFields, which Monsanto acquired, Martin has played a part in Pactum AI negotiations with industry leaders.
As a Harvard-trained negotiator and graduate of Stanford’s Negotiation Mastery programme with a master’s degree in IT Management, Martin has been at the forefront of Pactum AI’s goal to transform productivity and profitability.
Anyone worried that their jobs will be casualties of these advancements need not worry, as Pactum AI says that these bots have not led to employees losing their jobs.
In fact, Pactum AI states that because corporate supplier contracts are often not actively managed, procurement professionals will have to understand how to use machine negotiation as a tool.
Since it was launched in 2019, Pactum AI’s software has negotiated deals in 10 languages for dozens of Fortune 500-sized customers, including Walmart, Vodafone and Veritiv. Its largest autonomously signed deal at the time of writing was a US$28 million purchase which generated savings of US$750,000.
Already a game changer for procurement
Pactum AI is already working to evolve procurement, such as its partnership with Sievo, the leader in procurement analytics.
The duo is working to integrate AI-powered procurement analytics with AI-powered autonomous negotiations, which was described as “a game changer in procurement.”
In a blog post written by Martin, it outlines how this collaboration will enable procurement teams to launch autonomous negotiations based on data-driven insights, closing the gap between data and action.
The partnership aims to enhance procurement’s strategic role, driving significant cost savings and fostering better supplier relationships.
Sammeli Sammalkorpi, CEO and co-founder at Sievo, adds, “In today’s highly competitive environment, the need for fast, automated decision-making based on reliable data has never been more important. What will create a significant competitive advantage is the capability to drive actions at scale.
“Data-driven procurement is not about better decisions. It’s about faster decisions and more of them.
"Analytics alone holds no value; it’s the actions that can be taken that truly drive results.
"To truly enable procurement leaders to drive competitiveness, they need effortless ways to analyse their data, make decisions and act on them.
"The partnership between Sievo and PactumAI is a remarkable step towards closing the data-to-action gap.”
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