CORK, Ireland – March 17, 2021 – Keelvar – the leading global provider of intelligent sourcing automation – announced today its Founder and CEO Alan Holland, a pioneer in sourcing automation, has been named a 2021 ‘Pros to Know’ award winner by Supply & Demand Chain Executive.

The award recognizes Holland for playing a critical role in accelerating innovation in strategic sourcing optimization and automation. Under his leadership, Keelvar has built intelligent systems that optimize, modernize, and automate the sourcing process to allow procurement teams worldwide to shift their attention from time-consuming and labor-intensive tasks to innovation management and risk assessment.

“Keelvar’s mission is to empower strategic sourcing teams to respond to ever-changing market conditions of today’s world with agility and resilience,” said Alan Holland, founder and CEO of Keelvar. “Our work has never been as important as it is today, and I’m honored to be recognized for driving sourcing innovation forward and helping businesses leverage procurement as a differentiator.”

Most recently, Holland has led Keelvar to define a new category of strategic sourcing software -- Intelligent Sourcing Automation -- that uses AI-powered bots to automate sourcing event creation, negotiations with suppliers, and award recommendations.Leading companies have already moved to adopt Keelvar's logistics sourcing bots to generate significant time savings while also executing complex processes as a result of the pandemic’s impact on capacity, carrier availability issues, and rate fluctuations.

“While many companies have struggled to regain their footing as a result of COVID-19, this year’s Pros to Know winners stepped up to the plate to deliver innovative solutions and programs in a time of crisis and need. These winners collaborated, optimized,developed, educated and played a critical role in the survival and success of their company amid a global pandemic,” says Marina Mayer, Editor-in-Chief of Supply & Demand Chain Executive and Food Logistics. “I am honored to recognize these individuals and teams and extend my utmost gratitude to everyone in the supply chain industry for their time, efforts and innovations to keep supply chains afloat.

Prior to founding Keelvar, Holland was a lecturer within Europe’s largest AI research lab, in the Computer Science Department at Ireland’s University College Cork, where he specialized in optimization, game theory and algorithmic mechanism design. Holland left the University to commercialize advances in AI for procurement teams, and his specialist knowledge has given Keelvar an edge in terms of innovating with offerings that exceed competitors’ technical capabilities. 

To learn more about Alan Holland and how Keelvar is driving the next generation of sourcing forward, visit www.keelvar.com/company.

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About Keelvar

Keelvar is moving procurement forward with its best-in-breed software for intelligent sourcing optimization and automation, designed for easy adoption, scale, and productivity. Keelvar’s SaaS-based products utilize artificial intelligence, machine learning, and category expertise to deliver purpose-built solutions that are delivering results for blue-chip global companies. Customers including Siemens, Logitech,Samsung, Coca-Cola, Novartis, DSV, Grupo Nutresa, CommScope, and more are turning to Keelvar to advance their strategic sourcing journey spanning logistics, direct materials, and indirect spends. That momentum has resulted in Keelvar receiving $18 million in Series A funding in June 2020 and steady growth of its team worldwide, with headquarters in Cork, Ireland. Visit www.keelvar.com for more information. 

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