Summarizing SAP Ariba Sourcing Benefits and Key Capabilities (2024)

Why SAP Ariba Sourcing?

• Unified platform to manage all source-to-settle processes
• Powerful process and workflow management with savings-tracking technology​
• Comprehensive RFx management, forward and reverse auctions
• Power to extend the value of existing ERP Investments​
• Access to a wide user community​
• Unified supplier experience and collaboration
• Easy to adopt interface
• Ability to deliver at scale​

Realize the Benefits of Total Commerce Management

• Bottom line results: Realize immediate savings.
• Faster supplier discovery: Discover new qualified suppliers, using SAP Business Network Discovery to improve bid competitiveness.
• Agility: Dramatically reduce sourcing cycle times and administrative costs​.
• Flexibility and lower total cost of ownership: Rapidly deploy a SaaS solution for faster time to value and accelerated innovation, and use support services from SAP to eliminate IT burdens​.
• Efficiency: Create sustainable organizational knowledge using analytics for in-content intelligence.​
• Global reach: Trade globally with ease using support for multiple languages and currencies.
• Reduced risk supply: Use continuous performance measures to detect and mitigate risk.
• Adoption: Help foster internal adoption and realization of the benefits through a simplified, intuitive user interface.​​​

Summarizing the Benefits of SAP Ariba Sourcing

• Improve Spend Coverage​
  • Easy content creation and collaboration experience through single page event creation, inline editing of content, bulk line item management, project widgets, contextual learning and in-application messaging.
  • Enable sourcing managers to easily create and manage the sourcing pipeline to rationalize the supply base, negotiate lower pricing, or respond to unforeseen demands.
  • With a simple and easy to use interface, ensure high user adoption and coverage across spend categories.
  • Supplier access to the world's largest business network to manage sourcing events, supplier onboarding and lifecycle management projects, and PO, Invoice, Inventory, Quality, Forecast, and Financing collaboration.
• Execute Desired Sourcing Outcome
  • Define and drive your sourcing strategy using a range of patented RFP and auction tool sets supported by comprehensive decision framework and analysis engines.
  • Comprehensive event format support - RFPs, RFI, auctions (forward, reverse, index, Dutch, Japanese, total cost, bid transformation with patented rules to drive market results.​
  • Mechanisms to drive event competitiveness, market feedback, compliance through event scoring methodology, multi-round sourcing, sealed envelop, traffic lights and so on.​
  • Constraint based optimization solver with built-in and configurable scenarios, what-if analysis and so on, for awarding large complex events with bid analysis for comparative visualization based on user criteria.
• Realize Sustainable Savings​

  • Enforce negotiated savings through fully integrated contracting, supplier management, operational procurement, and analytics processes.

  • Integration with SAP Ariba Buying and Invoicing for operational procurement compliance, SAP Ariba Supplier Management solution for Supplier status based event inclusions, SAP Business Network Discovery integration for event posting​.
  • SAP Endorsed app certified integration with Icertis Contract Management for follow-on contract authoring, negotiations, obligations management and contract performance management​.
  • Native integrations with SAP S/4HANA and ERP system for material master, request for quotes and award integration. API library to support 3rd party app extensions and add-ons.

SAP Ariba Sourcing Key Capabilities

• Electronic, template-based support for RFIs, RFPs, and auctions​.
• Auction support, including a variety of types, such as reverse, index, forward, Dutch, Japanese, and total cost, with rules to drive the best market results​.
• Comprehensive automated and team scoring features with comparison reporting​.
• Sourcing support desk, sourcing advice, and guidance by expert SAP Ariba personnel​.
• Flexible project management tools with integrated workflows, document management, and approvals​.
• Centralized sourcing information faster and easier access​.
• Dynamic, real-time event views, integrated reporting, and decision analysis of multiple "what if scenarios​.
• Rapid identification and assessment of new sources of supply​.​

Contracts

By using contract management functionality built into SAP Source-to-Contract Suite, you can say goodbye to misplaced and mismanaged paper contracts, as well as the risks of lost savings that go with them.​

• Manage procurement and sales contracts, IP licenses, internal agreements, and more​.
• Standardize and control contract deployment and approval​.
• Collaborate with internal stakeholders and trading partners​.
• Integrate vendor master and contract data to and from other back-end systems.​

Supplier Lifecycle and Performance

SAP Strategic Sourcing supports the management of supplier information by helping ensure that the supplier information in your vendor master data is accurate and up to date.

• Assess and qualify suppliers using matrix-based filtering based on a category, region and business unit​.
• Access a 360-degree view of supplier information.
• Streamline supplier onboarding processes, including workflows and approvals.​

Summarizing SAP Ariba Sourcing Benefits

The SAP Ariba Sourcing solution integrates patented "request for" RFx technology, process workflows, commodity intelligence, and supplier discovery, resulting in a flexible, comprehensive sourcing solution that enables fast, sustainable, bottom-line results. ​

• Slash cycle time and administrative costs​
• Reduce IT burdens and costs​
• Trade globally in many languages and currencies​
• Mitigate supply risk using performance measures​

Solution Objectives

Develop an informed sourcing strategy and determine the right processes, activities, and tasks.

• Project management: Model best practices, including phases, tasks, milestones, team members collaborators and more​
• Process, workflow, and approval management: Use workflow management and savings technology to accelerate sourcing cycles​
• Document management: Enable easy document collaboration, sharing, and management using version controls, comment capabilities, and an audit trail​
• Knowledge management​
• Resource management: Employ management and reporting tools to manage user priorities and staff availability across projects​

Source and select suppliers

• Rather than relying on a vendor list or searching the internet to find new suppliers, you can use the SAP Business Network Discovery solution for supplier matching, so that you access more than a million qualified suppliers worldwide.​
• The solution allows tenders to express their interest in a tender or bid opportunity and self-invite, which is a key requirement for public sector organizations.​
• SAP Ariba Sourcing automates RFX creation and distribution as well as scoring, using multilevel weighted scoring settings where stakeholders can score supplier responses collaboratively.​

Track and report savings and spend

• You can deploy SAP Ariba Sourcing with an optional, pre-integrated solution that provides savings pipeline and tracking functionality for driving and evaluating the impact of sourcing programs.​
• Capture and report on estimated, negotiated, implemented, and actual savings and spend savings analysis across regions, time periods, departments, suppliers, and spend types.