Multinationals agree to help small suppliers bid for big business deals

Leading multinationals in Europe are set to help under-represented small businesses bid for contracts.

They have come up with an action plan which will offer underrepresented businesses the same opportunities to compete for contracts as larger suppliers.

The European Supplier Diversity Business Forum will be aimed particularly at companies owned by ethnic minorities, immigrants, women or people with disabilities. It seeks to open doors for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) which often do not bid for contracts with multinational companies.

It currently has 12 multinational members: Bristol-Myers Squibb, Cisco, Citigroup, Credit Suisse First Boston, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs International, Hewlett Packard, IBM, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, Spring and Weil Gotshal and Manges.

In a speech last year to a supplier diversity seminar run by the forum, the then treasury chief secretary, Paul Boateng, said the British government was concerned with issues of supplier diversity and he believed this should also be taken up by other European governments and the EU itself.

The forum provides procurement and diversity managers with strategic and practical support for building supplier diversity programmes. The initial focus will be on France, Germany, the Netherlands, the UK and Sweden.

Programme director Beth Ginsburg said supplier diversity was important to procurement in a globalised world. It was good for businesses of all sizes and good for the community at large. "The benefits cut both ways," she told ELP. "International procurement gains from widening its potential supply base to capture new talent and serve an increasingly diverse consumer base most effectively.

"Supplier diversity gives a multinational potential to enlarge its customer base and enhance its reputation as a socially responsible company. With this comes more customer loyalty and improved relations with other communities."

She said it also helped SMEs increase contact with multinational procurement teams and improve relations with prime contractors. Forum members will aim to embed supplier diversity in their companies, working with buyers and prime contractors to reach third- and fourth-tier suppliers.

They will set goals for contracts with under-represented businesses.