The Chase Manhattan Corp. and Deloitte Consulting today unveiled plans to form a new company designed to help businesses streamline procurement of such items as office supplies, temporary help, and computers.

The companies say the new venture, which has not yet been named, can wring as much as $350 million in annual savings from procurement costs for major companies, resulting in profit margin improvements of up to 25%.

The new company will provide electronic procurement and electronic marketplace services as well as payment management services to link customers' purchase and payment processes.

Online procurement software vendor Intelisys Electronic Commerce Inc. signed on as a partner to the new company. Intelisys, which provides online procurement applications to Chase, will also provide software and create online marketplaces for the new company.

The founders say the company, which is expected to launch in the second quarter, will feature technology that is interoperable with major procurement and enterprise resource planning systems. "We can work with a company's existing procurement processes or create an entirely new one for them," says Doug McCracken, managing director, Deloitte Consulting.

Chase and Deloitte say their combined spending on indirect purchases, or goods and services not used to produce core products, amounts to approximately $8 billion, and they intend to use the services of the new company to trim their own costs. Indirect spending, the companies, say is an easy target for cost-cutting. "Chase has already achieved more than $200 million in annual savings" through improvements in its purchasing practices, says Chase executive VP Denis O'Leary.