Coupa Sets New Standard for Ease of Use in Business Software

SAN MATEO, CA--(Marketwire - May 18, 2011) - Today, Coupa Software sets a new standard for ease of use and adoption in business software with the latest release of its category-defining Cloud Spend Management platform. The company's Spring '11 release introduces rich feature advancements to empower entire organizations to use a common platform for e-procurement and expense management. With Coupa, business executives have greater visibility into and control over corporate spending practices, giving them an effective platform to curb overspending.

"We're making the Coupa experience as easy to navigate and use as Google, Facebook and Mint.com. We're doing this because we believe systematic spend management leads to real business impact -- to the tune of up to a several percent reduction in operating expenses. This can't happen without software that anyone can use," said Rob Bernshteyn, CEO of Coupa Software.

Controlling spending is a considerable challenge for companies of all sizes. The nation's largest industries squander billions of dollars each year on everything from technology to marketing services to office supplies and other categories of indirect spending. Coupa offers companies a systematic approach to procurement and expense management to foster a culture of personal accountability and encourage smarter spending practices across all employees. With Coupa, companies realize massive reductions in their operating expenses, up to several percent in some cases. Also being announced today, the company is now offering new subscribers a success guarantee: control your spend with Coupa and cut one percent from your operating expenses within six months or the service is free (see corresponding release, "Coupa Guarantees 1% Reduction in OpEx within 6 Months" for more information).

"Several enterprise solutions are not user friendly and tailored to the everyday business user. I don't believe it has to be overly complicated," said Mike Wilding, Chief Procurement Officer at Rent-A-Center. "Coupa gets it. Since subscribing last year, we continue to be impressed by the software's ease of use and cutting-edge innovation. User adoption is of major concern when investing in any system meant to be used by an entire organization. With Coupa, this has not been a concern for me."

Coupa has purposefully designed its interface to rival the simplicity and ease of use of many of the leading consumer websites today, such as Google, Facebook and Mint.com. The Spring '11 release introduces over a dozen new features and usability innovations that minimize the change management risks often associated with a broad software deployment and streamline the requisitioning, review and approval processes. New enhancements allow:

• Employees to Spend Less Time in the Application. The redesigned homepage includes:
  • To-Do List functionality for users to review pertinent information and take immediate action to approve, reject or hide purchase requests or expense reports with a single click.
  • Improved browse functionality and preferred vendors by commodity to make it easier to guide users to content from preferred suppliers, as well as enhanced search functionality to return matching catalog items first, discouraging users from entering a freeform request when approved content is preferred.
  • In-line editing abilities on the checkout page allows users, reviewers and approvers to quickly attach documents, add approvers to the approval chain, edit or delete items and read or add supplier reviews.
  • Plus, Coupa learns from past behavior to automatically fill in item and commodity information when new forms are opened.
• All Users to Access Coupa from Where It Makes Sense for Them. Updated notification and alert templates provide users more information so they can review, approve, reject and comment on requisitions and invoices directly through email. Plus, the Coupa Spring '11 release now features fixed-width formatting, making the user experience suitable for smartphones and tablet computers.
• Managers to Control Spending More Effectively. Now budget owners can see in real-time, from the main page of the application, all spending affecting the budgets they control, across both purchase orders and expense reimbursements, and including pending transactions that have yet to be approved.
• Employees to Organize and Print Expense Reports for Easy Reference. The Spring '11 release introduces several new expense management capabilities, including a Coupa Wallet for credit card transactions and receipt images to be added to an expense report, and a print view capability for expense reports that lists each expense line item, summarizes activity into a grid organized by category and date, captures all approvals and receipt images, and opens in a separate, easy-to-print window.

With this release, Coupa also introduces capabilities to help buyers categorize spend more effectively and help employees buy against contracts with preferred suppliers, including:

• New Multi-Level Commodity Structure enables administrators to define a commodity hierarchy, and use that hierarchy to power Coupa's new browse shopping interface;
• New Preferred Vendors Status by commodity ensures users are always directed to the right suppliers, even when writing free form requests;
• Real-Time Contract Management Alerts notify buyers of minimum and maximum commitment levels of invoice spend against contracts, as well as contract expiration dates.

To see a short video on Coupa's new Spring '11 release, please visit: http://www.coupa.com/press-releases/coupa-sets-new-standard-for-ease-of-use-in-business-software/.

The Coupa Cloud Spend Management platform consolidates e-procurement and expense management capabilities into a single cloud-based solution for managing, and more effectively controlling, all business spending. Recently featured in a Gartner Cool Vendors report and recognized by Spend Matters for "its extremely intuitive interface," Coupa's platform is updated several times each year with new innovations and solutions to help organizations control and streamline purchasing and expense management for organizations large and small. It is easier to use, faster to configure and deploy, and more cost-effective than any other solution available today.

About Coupa Software
Coupa is the leading on-demand provider of solutions that control and streamline purchasing and expense management for organizations large and small. Coupa Cloud Spend Management delivers an easy to use, fast to deploy and affordable solution for requisitions, expense reporting, approval management, purchase orders, RFQs, contract compliance, inventory and invoicing, with no hardware to buy or software to license. With deep domain knowledge in e-procurement, a best-in-class cloud platform, and a fast-growing community of customers doing business with over 100,000 suppliers, Coupa enables smarter spending practices that empower companies to save money quickly. For more information please visit, http://www.coupa.com or call 650.931.3200.