Inside Zip: Joe Fox on what’s next for procurement and AI
On page description Industry veteran Joe Fox goes deep on orchestration and the AI era ahead.
At Zip, we believe that shaping the future of procurement requires more than just innovative strategy—it demands deep industry expertise and a bold vision for what’s coming up next.
That’s why some of the brightest minds from industry giants like Coupa and SAP have chosen to join Zip. They saw firsthand the challenges of legacy systems, the limitations of outdated procurement models, and the growing need for a next generation, orchestration-first approach.
These industry veterans recognized Zip as the pioneer in procurement innovation, and chose to be a part of it. Now, they’re bringing the experience, insights, and strategic expertise to help businesses move beyond dated procurement systems and into a future that’s more flexible, user-friendly, and truly built for the way modern business flows.
Meet the Industry Leaders who left the old ways behind to help drive the next era of procurement at Zip.
Meet Joe Fox
Role: Head of Strategy at Zip
Previous Roles: Senior Vice President, Product Strategy at SAP Ariba
What brought you into the world of procurement?
I was working at Ernst & Young within the Oracle Service Line when I saw a demo of Ariba. At the time, there were virtually no software innovations in the procurement space. Most finance tools still left buyers and suppliers dealing with manual processes.
But that’s when I saw a new area for significant automation. I met the team at Ariba and joined their field consulting team out of St. Louis. I’ve stayed in procurement ever since, including a return to Ariba in 2008, where I spent the next 10 years through the SAP acquisition.
Most of my career has been in product management and strategy, working across the full source-to-pay lifecycle and B2B supplier network space.
What inspired you to join Zip?
Over the years, I’ve worked with many procurement software providers and watched companies expand their tech stacks, adding P2P, sourcing, contracts, risk systems, and supplier networks. But when I saw a demo of Zip, it was clear they had solved the next big challenge: user experience.
Zip brings true process orchestration across systems, intake, and even suppliers. When I met the founders and saw the value they were delivering to customers, I knew I had to be a part of it.
What was your reaction the first time you encountered Zip?
Wow. Zip’s innovation could enable a smooth employee experience while giving procurement teams powerful tools to automate compliance, supplier onboarding, and requisitioning.
Key to this was the focus on making it easy for all employees to engage with procurement.
Seeing intake lead to orchestration, with robust workflows and the no-code ability to adjust questions, flows, and connections to other procurement systems just blew me away.
What are some of the problems in procurement you believe Zip helps solve?
Zip is focused on first providing an easy, but effective user experience while engaging with procurement and submitting requests.
The “single front door” solution solves the employee adoption challenges caused by multiple confusing and disconnected systems. Zip ensures that employees are routed to the right system at the right time, with the right context, while procurement maintains control over risk, compliance, and policy enforcement.
Lastly, Zip’s orchestration with suppliers makes it fast and easy to have a Supplier 360 capability with a broad supplier profile; supplier-based information gathering, and the ability to capture key documents over the lifecycle of the relationship. Now, procurement can give employees one place to go for automated, effective engagement.
What are you most excited about in the next era of procurement?
The next era of engagement that I’m most excited about is how process orchestration and AI will reshape procurement.
With intake and orchestration in place, AI can be purposefully built-in to guide users, enforce policies, eliminate confusion about the process steps required, and even deliver agents to extend procurement’s reach. In some companies where supply chain is key to portions of spend management, the AI components will be able to see and assist with every aspect of establishing supply, managing risk, and responding to market shifts in real time.
The combination of process orchestration and AI is the next era for procurement—full source-to-pay, key finance processes, and the supply chain. It’s exciting to be part of launching that future.
What advice can you give for those seeking digital transformation?
Jump in on all fronts: start with training, introduce new roles and processes, and begin digital transformation now.
Design your full procurement organization with AI and orchestration in mind. Layer intake and orchestration across your procurement suite to accelerate innovation. Start designing and deploying automated processes. It’s the fastest path to true digital transformation.
What’s your favorite Zip feature?
The no-code workflow builder. Procurement teams can instantly add flows and approvals on the fly, with AI assistance, right within the same UI.
It also connects to CLM, risk tools, e-signature platforms, and P2P systems. That means procurement can orchestrate both people and systems dynamically, without depending on engineering.
This feature unleashes procurement to design, build, and execute processes and controls and flows, on their own whenever they’re needed. That’s innovation.
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