For those who have been working in the world of supplier master data management this is nothing new but for the agnostic procurement or finance professionals who are now embarking on this journey, many end up learning the hard way, that the SIM module you are paying for will go to waste. This should also be sending some alarm bells to those who are looking at doing Supplier Information Management (SIM) within a “procurement or strategic sourcing” suite. This concept isn’t something new, Bob Solomon was maintaining such a view of vertical solutions up until 2014, which further supports the trend and explains why SAP has taken this direction.

The common thread in these tools is that they all hold supplier data even though they are being pitched as different types of tools, they are actually three tools used for buying different goods or services from suppliers / third parties. Because of the way supply markets are structured and internal buying behaviours – driven by category and by industry – there will be more and more specialist tools coming out which are fit for purpose.

The most interesting aspect of this, is that it shows us that there is a clear long-term trend- as the procurement function matures so do the tools. Concur – a tool focused on making travel, invoices and expenses easy.Fieldglass – a tool focused on buying services / contingent labour.(It does plenty of other things but that is beyond the scope of the discussion at hand.) Typically referred to as procure-2-payment. Ariba – a supplier network focused on buying both direct and indirect materials.The three acquisitions that really stand out are: Over the past few years SAP has been buying up specialist cloud companies in order to broaden its procurement and spend management solutions portfolio.

Sap p2p