Ariba Technologies was founded in September 1996. The principal activity of the Group is the provision of comprehensive intranet- and Internet-based business-to-business electronic commerce solution for operating resources. From its inception, the company's goal has been to build a world-class organization through a seasoned management team focused on the operating resource market opportunity, a customer-centric approach to product development, and premier venture capital funding. Ariba's founding members include: Keith Krach, president and CEO, and Ed Kinsey, vice president of finance and CFO. Ariba Technologies received $6 million from Benchmark Capital and Crosspoint Ventures in their first round of funding. According to Bob Kagle of Benchmark Capital, "Ariba is guided by three strong principles: deep understanding of a well-defined customer; systematic pursuit of a large market; and a defensible product strategy. It is unusual to see these attributes so well integrated in a startup company". .
Ariba's executive management team provides expertise in such areas as: growth and management of startup companies; the rapid development of leading-edge software technology; in-depth understanding of enterprise-oriented procurement solutions and expertise in developing and managing large-scale electronic initiatives. This golden startup idea of Ariba--automating the purchase of office supplies and services at large companies transformed the rules of competition in B2B seemingly overnight. A blueprint for software that would enable every employee in a business to order mundane but indispensable supplies--paper clips, file cabinets, pencils--by using desktop PCs to access a site on the company's intranet. In most companies procurement of such non-strategic goods and services is an inefficient, and paper-intensive process. According to Ex-CEO Keith Krach "the size of the market is huge. Any global 200 company has the need for this, and with the Internet there is a paradigm shift where you can put this software on everyone's desktop- .