A new CEO-level survey predicts the scale of the fall in the number of supply points over the next two years. Carried out by management consultants AC Kearney, the survey indicates: l Business-to-business transactions via the internet will be worth $400bn by 2001 ­ more than a 1,000% increase in two years l Companies expect to cut the number of suppliers they deal with by 25% over the next two years l Percentage of total external spend by major companies over the internet will be 29% in the USA and 14% in Europe l One-third of large companies, or twice as many as today, will use strategically managed consortia by 2001 to leverage their buying power {{COVER FEATURE }}