Ford Motor Company Takes Multi-Million Dollar Equity Stake in Captura
25 September 2000
Captura Announces Ford Motor Company Takes Multi-Million Dollar Equity Stake in Captura; Investment Will Drive Development of Captura Expense Engine Infrastructure Technology
BOTHELL, Wash.--Sept. 25, 2000-- Ford Motor Company and Captura(R) today announced a multi-million dollar investment by Ford in Captura to expand its technology to provide a complete corporate expense management solution.The technology will provide a single, unified system for automating all corporate expenses and online e-business transactions.
"Ford has been using Captura Expense(TM) to automate the travel expense process throughout our organization, and we recognize the potential of Captura's technology to automate other business processes, including e-procurement, purchasing, and online exchange transactions," said Jim Yost, Chief Information Officer at Ford. "Through our investment in Captura, we're supporting an innovative technology that can integrate all transactions into a single expense management system to help us make more intelligent spending decisions."
"Captura Expense Engine is the next major advancement in total expense management, solving a complex process in capturing, validating, reconciling, integrating, and analyzing global expense transactions," Dan Vetras, President and CEO of Captura, said. He said Captura is the first company to provide an integrated solution to the problems created when customers use multiple financial systems.
Vetras said Ford's commitment to innovative technology and Captura is a strong indication of his company's leadership in helping make companies more profitable and productive through total expense management systems.
"Using Captura Expense Engine can result in substantial, quantifiable savings for mid-size and large companies. It can help reduce processing costs for invoices, expense reports, and purchase orders from an average of more than $80 per transaction to $2-4, save even more by using the expense data generated to negotiate better vendor agreements and reduce expense reimbursement to employees and suppliers from 30 days or more to as little as 24 hours," Vetras said.
What is Captura Expense Engine?
Most companies currently use multiple financial procurement systems for travel and entertainment, ERP, purchasing, and online trading exchanges. However, there is typically no direct integration between these systems, making it difficult to determine how to reconcile expenses once they are submitted. Captura Expense Engine provides the solution that allows businesses to realize the full potential of e-commerce by enabling buyers and sellers to seamlessly perform all financial processes and operations online. Captura Expense Engine captures expenses, regardless of purchase type (indirect vs. direct) or purchase vehicle (e-commerce vs. traditional), and places that information into a single data repository where a variety of e-services are applied. Captura Expense Engine benefits companies like Ford by providing detailed expense information in a single, unified system for managing and accounting for corporate expenses, empowering management to make better decisions about allocation of company resources.