Spend Matters has received an anonymous tip that a new power-player in the field is proving that you don't need Dos Equis to be "The Most Interesting Man in the World." In fact, "The Most Interesting Man in the World" is about to meet his rival: The Most Interesting Man in Sourcing.

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Brussels (Belgium), Jan. 27, 2012 /E-Invoicing Newswire via Spend Matters/ -- Regulators in the European Union and Member Countries passed legislation, officially published in the 7 January 2012 Council of the European Union Summary of Monthly Acts that includes updated requirements for electronic invoicing (also referred to as "e-invoicing") providers serving public and private sector organizations within member countries. Act 2012/421/EU represents Council Decision of 4 January 2012 to regulate e-invoicing transaction tariffs at a nominal value per invoice. Act 2012/422/EU (4 January 2012) regulates the purchase (acquisition) price of network operators and providers.

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One of the Jewish spend management problems of the holiday season is the inordinate amount of attention paid to Santa's supply chain challenges. In compassion, Hanukkah Harry has it much worse. Still, before I continue kvetching about Harry's unique situation, it's important to go on my own holiday crusade (or would that be jihad?) to correct some of the Christian and Euro-Centric thinking that some other bloggers have around the holiday challenges Santa faces. First, it's total BS that, as one blogger suggests, that Santa must deliver packages to the "1.9 billion children in the world" during a "24-hour period." To assume that all of the nearly 2 billion children in the world believe in some fat guy coming down the chimney is bunk. If we look at the growing numbers of kids being raised Muslim in the world -- let alone Buddhist or Hindi -- that Santa skips over, we've got to knock this number to one billion or less.

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Being mutually keen on music (though I haven't sold him on Canadian rapper Drake yet), Spend Matters UK's Peter Smith and I are always trading emails about the latest this-and-that around new artists, albums, etc. But Peter one-upped me earlier this week when he introduced an entirely new genre that will undoubtedly shake the United States much as the British Invasion of the 1960's did. Move over, John and Paul. See his email, below.

"We're always interested to find hidden talent in the procurement world, so we were pleased to come across Ed Baxter, an Implementation Consultant with UK-based P2P and catalogue management specialist Science Warehouse. Ed is also a talented musician, and he's put his skills to work in the service of eProcurement, as you can hear. And we've obtained the full lyrics, so you can all sing along at home...eat your heart out Lady Gaga!"

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Earlier this week, we saw that Tony Filippone had been crowned as Horses for Sources' new Executive VP of Research. In the comments section, the announcement contained the following remark from Tony himself:

Thanks to all for their best wishes and to our team of amazing analysts who make HfS Research irreverently analytical.

To be honest, I'm most relieved that Phil was too busy to make one of those crazy JPGs he's famous for. I had envisioned my head on top of the legendary Mr. Universe and 1st governator. I escaped this time, but am likely to be unlucky next time when he doubles the effort...

Have no fear, Tony. The Spend Matters team is looking out for you! In our view, you're one of the best (if not the best) analysts and research leaders in the BPO and enterprise apps market (let alone this little procurement corner of the marketplace). You're both a terminator and a stud. Congrats.

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It's not too often that you see a consultancy -- or expert staff augmentation firm for that matter -- open a new office in Pittsburgh, of all places. Even McKinsey, which has a long history of advising executive management at industrial companies, could not bring itself to dedicate an entire office to the city (the Cleveland/Pittsburgh office was run as a single group, at least back when I knew these sorts of things). Still some folks are moving into the 'burgh, despite the recent historical trend of the post-graduate talent drain away from the area. Like sourcing firm Denali, according to a recent announcement.

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We did a combined birthday party for our oldest kids this past weekend. One of the other fathers in the group, who served as a chaperone for the party, has a similar finance, procurement and operations background to many of the readers of this site. Before the party (a trip to the play Pinocchio at our local Shakespeare theater) we got into a heated exchange. We share it now for your reading pleasure in its unedited form:

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MEMORANDUM
To: Procurement Team Leaders
From: Your CPO

Later this week, many of you will be participating in our first annual supplier development event that we've modeled on the success of similar affairs that larger companies in our industry have held. But I would like to remind you that the success of this conference will not just be judged by the number of new ideas we solicit from suppliers to drive savings programs. Nor will we judge it just on the cost avoidance figure we will book on night two from the cash bar when suppliers must buy drinks for us (it's an open bar the first night for suppliers to nurture a collaborative atmosphere and show that we really do care about our vendors, publicly -- employees will need to settle their own tabs).

No, in addition to new ideas and a supplier-funded piss-up on night two, it is critical we use this event to leverage what we've learned from the former psychological warfare operations "PSYOPS" consultants that we've brought into help us extract concessions from suppliers in a new and more subtle manner.

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Note: This is a parody / satire. It is a work of fiction. All entities appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to any organizations, individuals, brands, ingredients, commodity strategies, processes, strategies etc. is purely coincidental.

We came across this intercepted memorandum late last week from a brewing company, and despite recommendations from our lawyers, decided it was too important not to publish. It also lends insight into the role of procurement and commodity prices when it comes to M&A in the suds marketplace...

To: All Procurement Managers
From: Your Bosses
Subject: Commodity Prices, Ingredient Substitution and Duck Island

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