Patent ID: 7165036

Claim:
A computer-implemented method of determining financial relationships between multiple business divisions, the method performed using a computer system comprising one or more processing units and one or more memory units, the method comprising: (a) using the computer system, collecting procurement data from a plurality of data sources, the procurement data including information regarding a plurality of procurement events; wherein one or more of the data sources has an associated source-specific product catalog; (b) using the computer system, storing in memory a global catalog specifying, for each of a plurality of products, mapping relationships between source-specific product attributes specified by the one or more source-specific product catalogs and one or more generic attributes specified by the global catalog; (c) using the computer system, mapping the source-specific attributes associated with products identified by the collected procurement data to the corresponding generic attributes using the mapping relationships specified in the global catalog stored in memory; (d) using the computer system, for each of a plurality of business divisions of a business entity, generating a set of spend formulas for determining spending associated with that business division; (e) using the computer system, generating a set of supplier intelligence business rules regarding a procurement process, each supplier intelligence business rule interrelating at least one spend formula associated with a first one of the business divisions with at least one spend formula associated with a second one of the business divisions; (f) using the computer system, analyzing at least a portion of the procurement data using one or more of the set of supplier intelligence business rules to determine an analysis identifying the financial effects of a decision made by the first business division on the second business division; wherein the analysis includes identifying information regarding particular products based on the generic attributes associated with the one or more products as determined using the mapping relationships specified in the global catalog; and (g) using the computer system, displaying on a display device results of the analysis identifying the financial effects of the decision made by the first business division on the second business division.