Webinar
Webinar Recording: Saving Is Procurement's Business – How SUSS MicroTec Achieved Targeted Cost Savings with Tacto
Cost pressure hits even well-utilized high-tech producers. SUSS MicroTec faces the challenge of containing rising material and process costs, securing margins – without falling into the trap of "AI fatigue."
In the webinar "Saving Is Procurement's Business – How SUSS MicroTec Achieved Targeted Cost Savings with Tacto," Marc Heß (Strategic Buyer, SUSS) and Torben Hinrichs (Customer Development, Tacto) show how data- and process-transparent procurement becomes a lever for economies of scale, risk diversification, and real savings.
Starting Point – Cost Reduction Despite Full Order Books
SUSS is producing at full capacity but wants to simultaneously control procurement costs and risks. Three separate procurement organizations source identical parts at different conditions. Supplier and price data were spread across four different systems before the software solution. Compliance and ESG obligations increase documentation effort. Without an integrated view, duplicate orders, price outliers, and time losses loom.
The goal: full transparency on volumes, prices, risks, and deadlines – consolidated in a strong, centrally managed procurement function.
How SUSS Uses Tacto
- Price and volume analyses: The platform shows price and order trends by commodity group, supplier, and article, automatically flagging outliers.
- Savings recommendations: Tacto Intelligence provides proactive AI-powered savings recommendations and quantifies the potential. This could be a more affordable alternative supplier, volume bundling, or volume splitting.
- Supplier meeting preparation: Print-ready one-pagers combine index comparison, cost model, and argumentation guide for every meeting.
- Onboarding & document management: One-click master data, guided workflows, and a live status display replace email ping-pong.
Process Costs – The Endless Search Becomes a Single Click
The combination of a single source of truth, automatic deadline monitoring, and guided supplier onboarding saves roughly one full working day per buyer per month:
"With Tacto, everyone gains a full working day per month – time that now flows into value-adding tasks." – Marc Heß, Strategic Buyer at SUSS MicroTec
From Data Chaos to Cost Clarity
- Collect data – Cleanly consolidate procurement and ERP information.
- Create comparability – Mirror prices at commodity group, supplier, and article level.
- Identify outliers – Positive and negative lists show the most notable movements.
- Gain insights – Understand the causes of price increases at transaction level.
- Renegotiate – Take findings into negotiations, make results visible.
Better Negotiation Preparation
As soon as a cost driver is identified, Tacto enables creating a supplier dossier in seconds: historical price and volume curves, index comparison, benchmarks, and concrete counterarguments. The procurement team enters every meeting with hard facts instead of gut feeling – and negotiates with precision.
Practical Examples – An Excerpt from Weekly Recommendations
Example: Thermal Labels
- AI signal: Bundle volume with alternative supplier
- Realized impact: €2,640 p.a.
Example: Flow Controllers
- AI signal: Significant price gap with an alternative supplier
- Realized impact: €7,501 p.a.
More Than Just Euros – Positive Side Effects
- Global transparency: Orders from all plants appear in a single view.
- Eliminate process errors: Maverick buying and duplicate orders are detected early.
- Food for thought instead of routine: Regular recommendations challenge established sourcing patterns.
- Strategic freedom: Routine tasks shrink, negotiation levers are actively utilized.
Conclusion
With Tacto, SUSS MicroTec makes saving measurable: A central data foundation, automated workflows, and AI-powered recommendations help uncover potential before it gets lost in daily operations. Cost reduction becomes a continuous routine – and procurement advances from administrative function to a recognized value driver.
Marc Heß from SUSS MicroTec and Torben Hinrichs from Tacto show in the webinar how SUSS MicroTec consolidates all price, volume, and supplier data on a central platform with Tacto, establishes automated document workflows, and receives AI-powered savings recommendations. Each buyer gains a working day per month for value-adding tasks, negotiations are based on reliable dossiers instead of gut feeling, and initial measures – from bundled thermal labels to more affordable flow controllers – deliver tangible cost savings. The result: more transparency, fewer process errors, and a procurement function that demonstrably becomes a value driver.
