Israel's Ministry of Defense has mobilized Qlarium in the race to procure urgently-needed medical equipment and supplies in China to beat Covid-19.
The Israeli startup's technology is assisting the Ministry of Defense by conducting due diligence on hundreds of Chinese companies, of which a certain percentage have been disqualified. By using Qlarium's technology, supply chain time to bring quality medical equipment from China has been significantly shortened and the likelihood has risen that the equipment ordered will quickly reach hospitals throughout Israel.
Qlarium was founded in 2017 by CEO Yaron Shapira and CTO Assaf Dagan. Qlarium, which is based in Tel Aviv has developed a system based on artificial intelligence (AI) technology, which automatically and effectively conducts powerful due diligence on worldwide suppliers and provides the customer - in this case the Ministry of Defense - an intelligence picture about the reliability of the suppliers, with an emphasis on the Chinese market. In this way, Qlarium allows the decision makers in the Ministry of Defense Procurement Department to decide with which suppliers to conclude agreements and who it is better to avoid.
Shapira said, "Following the coronavirus crisis, we have identified more and more companies that have no credibility offering services that apparently they cannot fulfill, or without the ability to provide them in the short term. We have mobilized ourselves on this matter, and we hope that by conducting due diligence on the credibility of suppliers, and speeding up the supply chain, hospitals will be better prepared to cope with the coronavirus and as a result of that, perhaps the economy will resume sooner to operating at full production."
Qlarium's system examines a range of parameters such as shareholders, and other companies that are owned by them, previous and current lawsuits, company equity, licenses that have expired, changes in the company's structure and the supplier's export history. With the assistance of its AI system, information gathered from a range of different sources in the Chinese language and translated for the intelligence report about the supplier, the procurement team can clarify the reliability of the supplier, trade records, if the company is genuine or fake, and if it is worth investing the energy in conducting the procurement process with it.
Qalarium's uniqueness is its ability to analyze in real time, without any interaction with the organization being analyzed, using information from third parties. The system, which is connected to dozens of Chinese language data banks, retrieves the data, analyzes it in Chinese, and translates it into a complete business intelligence report - and all within several minutes. The final report that is received consists of several pages with at its core Risk Scoring on the organization being examined. According to this mark, the procurement agency, insurance companies and banks can conduct their foreign trade risks.
Qlarium's system routinely serves leading banks and insurance companies. The company's customers include insurance giants Euler Hermes, Munich Re, and Hollard, which provide insurance policies to importers around the world, covering them against late or non-arrival of goods to their destinations. International banks use Qlarium's technology in order to manage credit exposure to Chinese organizations and conduct 'know the customer' due diligence. To date, the company has raised funds from leading investment bodies: Prytek and theDOCK.
In the coming few months, the company is adding data bases about Japan, India and the rest of East Asia.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on April 6, 2020
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