Honda Motor Europe has signed IBM on a five-year deal that will see the latter company manage and run the former firm's finance and procurement operations across Europe.

Under the agreement, IBM plans to manage the source-to-pay, record-to-report, and order-to-cash processes, and roll out a helpdesk that will have a single view of Honda's entire finance and procurement function in a bid to simplify customer service.

"We have a strategic need to transform our finance and procurement operations into the very best in the world and in so doing make Honda's European operations a business that every dealer and supplier want to work with," Honda Motor Europe business administration general manager Joe Crump said.

IBM and Honda Motor Europe signed the finance and procurement service agreement in 1Q 2021.

The contract extends an existing 10-year relationship between the two companies that already covered finance.

In the past, the two inked a deal that saw IBM Watson technology and analytics be used in the automaker's Formula One engines to improve performance and racing decisions in real time.

"We look forward to bringing our business process experience, technology and transformation methodologies to help Honda Motor Europe bring its Zero Touch ambitions one step closer," IBM Honda global account managing director Dave Miller said at the time.

"We plan to bring together people, processes, and solutions into intelligent workflows through an optimised managed services approach that can enable Honda Motor Europe to enhance its finance and purchasing operations and become the partner of choice to its network of dealers and suppliers."

Honda has since decided to leave F1 at the end of this year.

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