They overhauled IBM's supply chain, wringing millions of dollars worth of savings out of the operation and reducing stock levels to historic lows. Could they do the same for you? Now you'll have a chance to find out. Leveraging the expertise of the in-house team that engineered its well-publicized supply chain transformation, Big Blue has introduced what it calls the world's first supply chain business transformation outsourcing (BTO) capability. The new service will tap into IBM's rich internal supply chain experience and deep consulting expertise, as well as new IBM analytics technologies, to help businesses optimize their supply chain processes, from procurement and logistics to strategy and planning.

As IBM sees it, the new service has enormous growth potential. Supply chain optimization and management represents a market of approximately $23.5 billion, which is larger than any traditional business process outsourcing market opportunity.

Technologies, processes and global partner networks developed by IBM to renovate its own supply chain as part of the company's transformation to an "On Demand" business will be incorporated into the new offerings, along with design support provided by IBM consultants who have both deep supply chain and industry expertise. This consulting capability includes the team of logistics experts from Maersk Data, which IBM acquired in 2004.