Nearly two-thirds (63%) of global procurement executives are diversifying their supplier base in response to recent geopolitical events. This sourcing shakeup is opening up the rare opportunity for suppliers to attract multiple, potentially lucrative new customers in a short timeframe. The rapidly evolving tariff landscape is just one of many urgent disruptors prompting this search. 

Getting on the radar of large buying organizations has always been difficult, and process and technical challenges make it even harder. B2B procurement processes have long lacked centralized, efficient ways for companies and capable suppliers to connect, onboard and transact day-to-day business. 

“Discoverability is probably the biggest challenge,” says Tony Harris, senior vice president of product marketing for SAP Business Network. “The legacy systems and search tools that companies tend to use simply don't enable suppliers — particularly small and medium-sized companies — to really showcase their products and services expertise. Therefore, they struggle to be discovered by buyers.”

But a growing number of suppliers are breaking through these barriers to win new customers and streamline their interactions. By tapping the supplier benefits offered by the multi-enterprise business networks in use with many of their current and future customers, they can connect procurement and supply chain processes across their supplier ecosystems. 

Streamlining Customer Transactions

According to IDC, buying organizations adopt business networks to enhance efficiency, improve data management, and provide better scalability and analytics capabilities in their supplier relationships. Business networks enable suppliers and their customers to execute a wide variety of communications and transactions in one place. This includes:

• Planning collaboration, including forecast capabilities and external manufacturing visibility

• Contract manufacturing management, including purchase order collaboration, discrete PO, consignment purchase order, subcontracting purchase order

• Full order confirmation, ship notice and invoicing capabilities

• Quality processes with inspections, reviews and notifications

• Supplier managed inventory

In addition to procurement transactions, suppliers can leverage some platforms to plan and execute supplier managed inventory (SMI) programs. PTA Plastics, for example,, a 70+-year-old plastics parts manufacturer based in Oxford, Connecticut and Longmont, Colorado, is successfully using SAP Business Network to monitor inventory levels and plan orders for a major customer.

“I see that being way more proactive, instead of reactive,” says Kent Seeley, COO at PTA Plastics. “There's a lot of value in being forward-looking and the sharing of responsibility.”

According to an IDC study¹, suppliers using the network reported a broad range of benefits over manual methods, including:

• 37% increase in customer satisfaction
• 50% faster invoice approval and sending
• 48% shipping notice sending
• 21% increase in staff on-time delivery of documents
• 19% increase in forecast accuracy, reducing stockouts

Suppliers already using a multi-enterprise business network “are growing the top line through increased customer satisfaction and increased growth,” Harris says. “On the other hand, they're lowering the bottom line cost by virtue of having a platform that delivers a greater level of efficiency.”

Leveraging business networks for brand visibility

Suppliers can engage with business networks at varied levels depending on their needs and scale. Free access typically enables them to showcase their product catalogs and credentials to potential customers, respond to requests for proposal, and check the status of incoming payments through a portal. 

Some networks also offer enhanced, enterprise-level access, rules-based automation, and integration to these business-to-business (B2B) trading partner platforms for a low monthly fee. This is especially beneficial to suppliers with multiple customers and a significant volume of transactions on the network; these features enable access to deeper integration and premier support.

A new approach introduced by SAP Business Network directly addresses buyers’ urgency to identify new and alternative suppliers and suppliers’ challenges in connecting with them. SAP’s Business Network, promote subscription enables suppliers to access enhanced discovery tools and stand out in buyers’ supplier qualification processes. 

Industrial supply company Manutan uses the promote subscription, to elevate the company to prospective customers. 

“We have subscribed to the promote subscription to connect with new buyers and fully support their activities on SAP Business Network,” says Jarred Meilink, e-procurement project manager for Mantuan. “As we progress with promote, we are developing our regional network catalogs to broaden our reach and engage with new buyers who are actively seeking suppliers like us. Furthermore, we are examining the contextual insights provided by promote to improve our profile, including recommendations for more precise keywords and category selections, to boost our visibility and attract new customers.” 

Businesses like Manutan also have access to the platform’s AI tools, which allow users to quickly autofill public catalog content and respond directly to SAP Business Network Discovery postings that outline sourcing needs. 

A tool for growth

Business networks are providing PTA Plastics, Mantuan and others with streamlined access to supply chains of every size and type, from the largest household names to small up-and-comers. Working within a business network brings the benefits of digitalization to existing customer relationships. It also provides suppliers with new opportunities to gain exposure to previously difficult-to-penetrate firms at a time when identifying new sources is a top priority.  

Discover the ROI and business outcomes your peers have achieved by connecting and transacting with their customers through SAP Business Network, as revealed in research conducted by IDC, and how you can get started with growing your business today.

1. IDC Business Value White Paper, sponsored by SAP, “The Business Value of SAP Business Network—for Selling Organizations,” #US53181425, April 2025.