In the Gartner 2018 Magic Quadrant for Procure-to-Pay Suites, a report that evaluated procure-to-pay suite solutions from 15 different software vendors based on completeness of vision and ability to execute. SAP Ariba was recognized as the leader of Procure-to-Pay alongside SAP Fieldglass.
As businesses, from small size to conglomerates, have crossed borders in the digital age, much is expected from the procurement and supply chain landscapes to catch up. SAP Ariba aims to underpin the procurement and supply chain processes in realizing its digital transformation from source to pay as soon as now.
The procurement team’s role in the organization has evolved beyond delivering cost savings solutions to finding the best intelligent digital solutions including integration of IoT, Big Data Analytics, and, most recently, the cloud.
SAP Ariba, the leader in spend management, boasts of its e-procurement and supply chain cloud solutions that are always on and easy to deploy, helping both large and midsize companies realize the fast time to value. The company capitalizes on its capability to digitize and simplify all processes from end-to-end, on a single, integrated platform in the cloud.
With Ariba’s comprehensive cloud-based solutions and an impressive Ariba Network of 4.1 M buyers and suppliers, companies’ can now more effectively and efficiently manage all or part of the purchasing process, while controlling spending, finding new sources of savings, and building a healthy supply chain.
Exploring SAP Ariba’s Cloud-based Solutions
To date, more than $7.6 billion in goods and services is traded every day in the digital marketplace. SAP Ariba has a wide array of cloud solutions for that kind of dynamic environment.
Here’s an overview of the SAP Ariba’s Solutions by segment:
Supplier Management
SAP Ariba Supplier Management is the only end-to-end solution portfolio that lets organizations manage supplier information, lifecycle, performance, and risk all in one place that can be integrated into the organizations’ procurement process.
This segment offers two digital solutions: the SAP Ariba Supplier Risk, designed to help the buyers make smarter and safer decisions before purchase by making risk due diligence a natural part of the procurement process; and SAP Ariba Supplier Lifecycle and Performance, a unique supplier lifecycle management solution with capabilities that integrates with the organization’s procurement processes to help drive spend to preferred suppliers and scale compliance for the entire supply base.
Strategic Sourcing
The SAP Ariba Strategic Sourcing solution portfolio allows a company to manage its entire sourcing, contracting, and spending analysis processes for all types of spend – direct and indirect materials as well as services – all in one platform.
It offers three software solutions such as SAP Ariba Sourcing Software to help companies of any industry, size, or geography drive fast, sustainable results by automating and streamlining critical tasks involved in sourcing indirect materials; SAP Ariba Spend Analysis Software aid in procurement savings, risk mitigation and compliance improvement; and SAP Ariba Contract Management Software and Services to centralize contract storage, strengthen compliance, automate and accelerate the entire contract lifecycle.
Direct Spend Solutions
SAP Ariba Solutions for Direct Spend integrate seamlessly with PLM, ERP, and SAP Integrated Business Planning systems. The solutions help the company digitize extended supply chain with end-to-end, digital procurement solutions that support the company’s direct spend, from integration with their product design and R&D processes, all the way through manufacturing execution and delivery.
This segment has solutions such as SAP Ariba Supply Chain Collaboration that give companies complete supply chain visibility; SAP Ariba Sourcing Software that helps companies of any industry, size, or geography drive fast, sustainable results by automating and streamlining critical tasks involved in sourcing indirect materials; SAP Ariba Strategic Sourcing Suite that integrates sourcing, contracting, and supplier information and performance management; and SAP Ariba Supply Chain Mobile App for instant supply chain visibility anytime, anywhere.
Procurement
SAP Ariba e-procurement software solutions deliver negotiated savings that improve any company’s bottom line with compliance, visibility, and control.
It has three solution offerings such as SAP Ariba Buying and Invoicing, a procure-to-pay software solution that sets the standard for all other procurement software offerings by being user-friendly, offering streamlined catalog maintenance and a configurable interface; Guided buying, a built-in capability of SAP Ariba procurement solutions, brings suppliers and buyers together to help streamline procurement; and SAP Ariba Spot Buy, a custom B2B marketplace that simplifies and controls the procurement of non-sourced goods.
Financial Supply Chain
SAP Ariba’s market-leading financial supply chain management solutions give companies the capabilities, intelligence, and global reach to transform their payables from liabilities into strategic assets.
This segment offers two strategic solutions such as: Electronic Invoice Management, a smart invoicing solution offered through Ariba Network that permits network business rules alert suppliers about errors and prevent incorrect invoices from entering your process workflow or back-end system, and; SAP Ariba Payable which helps transform payables to strategic assets like increasing DPO, earning more on the short-term cash, delivering benefits to suppliers and closing the loop on procure-to-pay process.
Platform Solutions
The SAP Ariba platform has been designed with a granular microservices architecture to allow for agility, flexibility, and scalability to adapt to changing technologies today and in the future with cloud solutions such as Extension Studio and SAP Ariba APIs.
Extension Studio allows organizations to enhance their SAP Ariba solution with drag-and-drop tools, enabling them to quickly create forms, tailor business processes, and adapt their SAP Ariba solution to business needs with minimum dependency on IT or external services.
SAP Ariba APIs let companies enhance and extend the value of their procurement processes and gain access to cloud-based data, accelerating digital transformation.
Integration Solutions
SAP Ariba solutions offer broad integration with all back-end systems and even deeper integration with SAP solutions delivering powerful results.
Ariba seamlessly integrates with SAP ERP such as S4/HANA, which enables Ariba to offer many different integration scenarios to support many business processes, the most typical process being a purchase order (PO) and invoice automation.
SAP Ariba Cloud Integration Gateway, enabled by SAP Cloud Platform Integration, gives fast, simple way to connect back-end systems without the need for multiple adapters. It has intuitive self-service tools that quickly configure, extend, and test processes, while the automated upgrades and monitoring make it easy to keep transactions flowing smoothly.
Service for Buyers
SAP Ariba provides product service support before and after deployment, specifically, for change management, adoption, connectivity, or ongoing process improvements.
• Best Practice Center
• Content and Connectivity Solutions
• Customer Support
• SAP Ariba Education and SAP Ariba Change Management
• Success Planning with SAP Ariba
To accelerate the supply chain and procurement teams’ efforts with the organization’s journey to digital transformation, they have to leverage cognitive digital technologies available at the maximum extent possible. SAP Ariba lets them do that, from source to pay.
