Case Study: British Airways achieves over £80M in savings and streamlined procurement with SAP Ariba

Comprehensive Approach Yields £80M in Savings

British Airways, Europe’s largest airline, needed to hit a 10% operating margin and deliver phased cost reductions (£650M, then £450M, then £300M) while managing £4B in annual spend across 350,000 orders and 500,000 invoices. The scale and complexity of purchasing and supplier management posed a major obstacle to meeting those targets.

BA implemented Ariba sourcing, contract management and procurement solutions to close the sourcing-to-procurement loop, link negotiated agreements to purchases and automate £1B of indirect spend. The program delivered more than £80M in savings, moved 80% of purchases online (4x order capacity), cut transaction costs by 40%, raised employee productivity by 48%, reduced suppliers from 14,000 to 2,000 and lowered inventory by over £200M.

British Airways

Silla Maizey

Procurement Director