AHEAD DELIVERS FINANCIAL EFFICIENCY AND STREAMLINES PROCUREMENT FOR CALEPA

Chicago – December 22, 2023 — AHEAD, a leading national provider of cloud, data and digital engineering solutions announces that it is engaged with the California Department of Toxic Substances Control in tandem with CalRecycle, herein referred to jointly as CalEPA, to streamline procurement processes.

The AHEAD team leveraged ServiceNow’s Source2Pay platform and City Innovate’s Document Process Automation platform, together called Source2Pay Insight (S2PI), to build out a workflow solution that offsets the intensive manual processes hindering CalEPA’s ability to manage invoicing, contract and procurement concerns.

CalEPA challenged the AHEAD staff via RFP to deliver on 19 tasks ranging from system design, development, and project management to post-implementation support. AHEAD is in flight with an aggressive series of sprints to the distinct CalEPA units through a series of concise release cycles followed by comprehensive testing and acceptance.

Key benefits of the S2PInsights solution delivered by AHEAD include:

• Accelerates document production, the source of 99% of the delays in the source-to-pay process.
• Supports complex workflows when building compliant documents and evaluating responses to RFx.
• Templated approach to document production for 100% compliance with jurisdiction contracting standards.
• Modernizes workflows and eliminates redundant data entry and critical errors.
• Provides insight and analytics needed to identify bottlenecks in processes.
• Enables end-to-end lifecycle management of the procurement/contracting process, starting with intake and ending with oversight.
• Activates data hidden in documents that can then be injected into multiple systems within the government agency, including ERP systems.

“Over the last 18 months, we have been working with some of the largest government agencies in California. Our big insight when we analyzed the process flows in use is this: the processes in place are centered around document production. Speed up document production and we can accelerate CalEPA’s ability to solve problems with greater innovation,” said Kamran Saddique, Co-CEO and Founder of City Innovate. “Without compromising on accountability and oversight. We are thrilled to be on this journey with AHEAD and ServiceNow.”

“I’m thrilled to build upon our strategic partnership with ServiceNow and City Innovate to effectively deliver key tasks to CalEPA and the State of California,” said Vernon Fletcher, Managing Director at AHEAD. “This project brings out the best in AHEAD’s capabilities to solve real-world organizational challenges with world-class technology solutions.”

In addition to leveraging the ServiceNow platform, AHEAD deployed resources from Stanfield Systems (a certified Disabled Veteran Business Enterprise) to integrate with City Innovate’s award-winning Document Process Automation (DPA) platform for automated document management solutions.

To date, AHEAD has helped implement new process flow gains and helped the Departments define and charter new methods of realizing productivity wins through collective coaching and collaboration.

The business outcome provides all CalEPA organizations participating and collaborating in the design sessions with the ability to supplement, standardize and present some of the financial data from the State of California’s Fi$Cal department, making it more accessible, reportable and usable by all agencies.

About AHEAD

AHEAD builds and manages digital platforms that power the most successful organizations in the world. Our consultative approach, unmatched engineering, and innovative solutions combine to accelerate the impact of technology in every client we serve.