Intellect Design Launches iGPX to Ensure More Transparency in Public Procurement 

Intellect Design Arena Ltd announced the launch of GPX ecosystem-focused open API-based public procurement platform – iGPX (Government Procurement eXchange). Composed with eMACH.ai – the company’s open finance platform – and engineered by the ‘First Principles’ Thinking along with embedded GenAl from Intellect’s own Purple Fabric Al platform, iGPX promises enhanced efficiency, deep transparency, unparalleled inclusivity, vigilant compliance and global sustainability, says the company.

The launch event was addressed by Debanjan Kumar, chief executive officer of iTDC at Intellect Design Arena, Vikas Misra, office of strategy at Intellect Design Arena, and Debal Dutt, chief marketing officer Intellect Design Arena. “When we launched emach.ai last year, we realized that while focusing on the movement of money in the financial technology space, there was a significant opportunity to extend our solutions to the movement of goods. This insight led us to develop IGPX, the Government Procurement Exchange,” said Vikas Misra on the launch of the platform.

Why Intellect Launched iGPX?

The company, quoting facts from World Bank analysts, stated that governments across the world  spend an estimated $13 trillion each year on public contracts for goods, services, and public works. As much as a quarter of that is wasted in inefficient or shortsighted procurement practices.“We began our journey by examining various inputs, starting with the entire commerce landscape of our country. There are four main stakeholders in this landscape: buyers, sellers, logistics providers and integrators who transport goods from sellers to buyers, and banks and financial institutions that handle payments. Commerce involves the movement of goods and services in addition to money. At emac.ai, we already manage, create, and move money for banks, so expanding our solutions to commerce was a synergistic move. We saw many similarities and realized it would be beneficial to extend emac.ai to commercial banks,” said Debanjan Kumar.

He added: “Our second input came from analyzing the market with the help of experts and advisors. According to the World Bank, public procurement accounts for around 12-20% of world trade, translating to approximately 30 billion US dollars. However, 25% of that money is often lost due to inefficiencies, as estimated by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). This implies that between 1 trillion and 4 trillion dollars are lost annually in public procurement, indicating a significant market opportunity for us to transform public procurement processes.”

The third input, Kumar said, focused on the challenges governments face during procurement. “These challenges include lengthy lead times for procurement (with tenders taking up to six months to close), cost overruns, delays, lack of transparency, and disjointed communication between departments. Departments often buy in silos, missing out on pricing advantages. The approval processes are complex, requiring multiple documents and leading to further delays, which ultimately cost money. Additionally, there are issues of vested interests and cartelization, compromising the quality and price of procurement. Organizational issues related to audits, transaction feasibility, and compliance risks also complicate the process,” he stated while providing an insight into why iGPX was launched.

What the Platform has to Offer?

With public welfare at the core, the iGPX, according to Intellect, seamlessly embeds expert Al agents for governments and public institutions to excel in their core objectives through:

• Best Price through rich product and services listing, price reasonability algorithms and demand aggregation.
• Reduction in procurement cycle time up to 95% through 100+ procurement variations, multi evaluation and consignee options.
• Tailored procurement rules and transparent bidding practices supported with unbiased grievance redressal foster social and economic inclusivity to local sellers, SMEs and other communities.

iGPX is enriched by Intellect’s experience of building and managing one of the largest public procurement marketplaces in the world for 6 years, said the company. With pre-built assets like 111 APls and 17 microservices, GP drives significant value to clients by providing the ability to compose their own signature solution quickly.