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MANN+HUMMEL – A Question of Price and Performance

In Marklkofen near Dingolfing in Bavaria, MANN+HUMMEL operates its largest filter plant in the world. (Picture: MANN+HUMMEL)

When it comes to invitations to tender for transport, MANN+HUMMEL is particularly interested in one thing: a good and quick overview of the various offers from the individual logistics service providers. The filtration expert has therefore been relying for many years on the TENDER solution of the Freiburg based software company Cargoclix. 

Freiburg i.B., 19 August 2020: The small community of Marklkofen in the Lower Bavarian district of Dingolfing-Landau has less than 4,000 inhabitants. Nevertheless, a lot of really big business for logistics begins here – at the renowned filtration specialist MANN+HUMMEL, which operates its largest filter plant in the world here. To ensure that more than 170 million filter elements a year can make their way from here all over the world, transport service providers are required who are both punctual and reliable, and who offer the right price.

One of those responsible for this in Marklkofen is Elke Ertl, who, together with her colleague Bernd Wilde, is responsible from here for central freight purchasing at MANN+HUMMEL for all company locations worldwide. Whether tenders for general cargo or full loads, or transport from Europe to Asia, sometimes site-related or even global: many times a year it is necessary to find those logistics service providers where price and performance are optimally matched. Whether 200,000 euros or even two million euros sales volume per tender, the margins in this area are large. It was not until the end of April that the search for a service provider who transports around 100 standard trailers per year with filters and filter parts on disposable pallets from Poland to Turkey was on the agenda – an order for which 47 transport and logistics companies digitally expressed their interest. In order to find the right provider from this quantity of messages, the company has been relying since 2006 on the Internet marketplace TENDER of the Freiburg based software company Cargoclix, which enables worldwide tenders for contracts for transport by road, rail, air and sea freight, but also by inland waterway. A decision which has more than paid off for MANN+HUMMEL and has simplified work processes more and more. Only last year Cargoclix had revised TENDER and in doing so had placed the emphasis on a simple user guidance with modern templates, which is intuitively accessible to the user. At the same time the users also have the possibility to create individual and complex tender projects with little effort and without previous knowledge in the system.

“When we started our search for a tendering system back then, the interaction of time and performance was important to us,” reports Bernd Wilde, who still remembers the beginnings well. He says the company looked at many systems, some of which, in his opinion, were “simply bred up with far too many functions” or with insufficient customer service, which often ends with the start of the tendering process. But customer service and good support were important to MANN+HUMMEL. “The good accompaniment and support was one of the main reasons why our decision was made in favor of Cargoclix,” says Elke Ertl. “Even if there are problems, a service provider has entered his price incorrectly or whatever – we always get the right help from Cargoclix very quickly.’’

The Top 3 Always in View

At MANN+HUMMEL, the procedure for a tender via TENDER is the same every time. “No matter how many companies would like to take on the tendered contract – we always take a closer look at the top 3 who offer the best price,” Elke Ertl explains the process. However, at this point at the latest, price is only one of many criteria that play a role in the decision making process, because reliability is just as important. To test this, MANN+HUMMEL carries out test shipments. “Specifically, the favoured service provider is allowed to take over a trip and we can then see straight away whether the service is suitable”, she explains the further procedure. Is the company punctual? Is the transport handled quickly? Is the order fulfilled as agreed? The next step is to find an answer to this question.

The MANN+HUMMEL team pays particular attention to punctuality.  After all, the goods to be transported are prepared in time for collection in the warehouse. However, if a service provider is not on site at the agreed time, the consequences are quickly felt. “Then things can quickly become cramped in the warehouse”, knows Elke Ertl. In addition, the filtration specialist obtains information about the rating of the interested company: Is it solid on the market or is it perhaps acutely threatened by insolvency? This point also plays an important role in the decision-making process. Service providers who have already taken over transport services for MANN+HUMMEL in the past are also given an opportunity. “The current service provider still has the chance of a so-called last call”, says Elke Ertl. In concrete terms, this means that he is informed about the price of the top 3 offers. So he still has the opportunity to offer the service at a similar price, too.

What MANN+HUMMEL appreciates about TENDER is not only the large database with numerous service providers, but also the fact that the call for tenders offers the opportunity to get to know completely new service providers. “We have already had test shipments with a freelance service provider who had massive interest in a contract – and it worked. This is a great advantage: Often a service provider comes up who was not known to us before – and still makes exactly the right offer for our needs”. Only once in the past few years did a transport order in the sea freight sector fail to come about, “that’s when we missed the mark,” recalls Ertl, whose correct job title is “Manager Category Management Freight Purchasing Non Production Material. After the tendering process was completed, the service provider reported that it was unable to maintain the low price it had offered. This was, however, “a one-time thing”.

Tenders with Great Clarity

According to Elke Ertl, a further advantage of TENDER is that the service providers bidding for the contract can already see during the tendering process where they stand and how big the chance is of being shortlisted. “In addition, TENDER is very fast,” she says. The first thing to do is to prepare the tender well. “But then the time from the moment the tender is launched until the company is commissioned is very short. Often it takes just two weeks,” she adds. In her opinion, the archive function integrated into TENDER is also very useful: “This allows us to easily access old tenders.”

When MANN+HUMMEL started to put its TENDER services out to tender 14 years ago, the service providers were initially sceptical. “Many freight forwarders were no friends of online tenders”, says Elke Ertl. However, this problem has long been a thing of the past: “In the meantime everyone has accepted it.”

CARGOCLIX TENDER 

CARGOCLIX TENDER is a leading marketplace for the execution of electronic tenders for contracts. Adapted to the needs of transport and logistics, TENDER is designed for all major transport modes and logistical services. Many thousands of companies from industry, trade and logistics worldwide have registered on the platform since 1998 and use TENDER. Cargoclix TENDER is available to all users in the Cloud as “Software as a Service”. 

System description

Invitation to tender public or closed group of participants
Contracting authorities can decide whether a tender should be carried out publicly or in a closed circle of participants. Cargoclix has a leading network in the area of transport and logistics.

Rating system
The rating system gives you insight into an effective system for assessing service providers and allows you to see how other clients rate a particular service provider.

Blacklist
To ensure that no undesirable service providers participate in a public tender, unsuitable freight forwarders and carriers can be effectively excluded from their own tenders by means of a blacklist.

Closed bid invitation
A closed tender only reaches the service providers selected by the shipper. Non-invited service providers do not see a closed bid invitation.

Expansion of the service provider base
Cargoclix TENDER offers an effective possibility for the administration of regular service providers. Shippers can easily integrate their system service providers into the platform and organize them clearly in groups. In this way they keep all important facts and informative KPIs of the companies at a glance at all times.

Prequalification of tender participants (optional)
Prior to the actual tendering process, it is possible to pre-qualify for a pre-qualification. In a separate round, invited service providers fill out a questionnaire prepared by the shipper. In this way, a larger group of service providers can be specifically checked for suitability for the tendering project. After prequalification, the shipper decides which service providers are to be admitted to bidding.

System supported creation of the tender
The preparation of the tender is menu-driven. Step by step all components are created. Even the preparation of complex consignment structures for different modes of transport is easy and clearly arranged. The matrix supports different field functions (price fields, text fields, drop-down fields, percentage fields, formulas, etc.), optional and mandatory fields, single and bundle prices, etc.

Transparency in the tender process
When submitting bids, the contracting authority decides how much information the bidders should receive about their own position compared to the competition. The spectrum ranges from high transparency to blind bidding.

Bidding in one or more rounds
The principal can decide whether the bidding is to take place in one or more bidding rounds on the Internet.

Analysis of the tendering results
Once bids have been submitted, TENDER supports the effective evaluation of the tender results. The system makes it easy to create scenarios with different assumptions and then compare them. TENDER also helps you to find the best price under the given restrictions.

Best Price
The “Best Price” option determines the mathematically best price under the framework conditions defined by the shipper.

Award decision and conclusion of the contract
The award decision is made by the shipper. As a rule, the decision is preceded by personal discussions between the shipper and the service provider. In most cases, the conclusion of the contract is documented by both parties by signing the contract on which the shipper bases his decision.

Audit-proof archiving of tender results
After a call for proposals has been closed, the results are stored securely in the archive. All details of the tender are stored and a decision to award a contract can be tracked in an audit-proof manner even after years.

Download of the results
The data stored in the archive is available to the shipper for download and can thus be easily imported into other applications at any time.

Templates
All tenders contained in the archive can be used as templates. Tenders that have been carried out in the past can thus be easily copied, revised and used as a template for a new tender.

About MANN+HUMMEL 

MANN+HUMMEL is a leading global expert in filtration. The group of companies with its headquarters in Ludwigsburg develops filtration solutions for automobiles, industrial applications, clean indoor air in industry and public spaces and the sustainable use of water. In 2019, more than 22,000 employees at over 80 locations worldwide generated sales of EUR 4.2 billion. The products include air filter systems, suction systems, liquid filter systems, technical plastic parts, filter media, cabin filters, industrial filters as well as membranes and modules for water filtration, wastewater treatment and process applications.
Further information is available at https://www.mann-hummel.com.

About Cargoclix

Cargoclix is a neutral Internet marketplace for the electronic tendering of transport and logistics services, as well as a provider of modular time slot management systems. The range of services offered by the logistics platform “Cargoclix TENDER” includes worldwide tenders for contracts for transport by road, rail, air freight, sea and inland waterways, courier express parcel services as well as logistics services such as warehousing. With over 28,000 registered members from industry, trade and forwarding, TENDER is one of the leading international tendering platforms for transport and logistics.

The central product of the time slot management business unit is the modularly adaptable software “Cargoclix SLOT” for the optimization of processes at the ramp. With more than 65,000 members, SLOT is one of the most widely used time slot management systems. Cargoclix is a trademark of Dr. Meier & Schmidt GmbH. The company was founded in 1998 and has its headquarters in Freiburg i.Br. www.cargoclix.com

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