Back to Hub

Tradeshift’s “Sellers Club” Targets Bottomline and Accounts Receivable Technology With a Many-to-Many Offering

06/20/2018 By

Sarika Garg, Tradeshift’s chief strategy officer, took the podium for a few minutes at Tradeshift’s analyst day to introduce what the procurement/finance technology provider is calling its “Seller’s Club.”

The concept is that the “Club” is a membership, not a subscription. While a supplier-paid offering, Garg made the point of noting that Tradeshift remains free for suppliers to transact.

Our take is that the Club appears to be a new offering for suppliers that is taking aim at another class of solutions entirely compared with procurement, accounts payable automation and supplier network offerings aimed at the buyer — where Tradeshift started. No doubt it will complement and interact with Tradeshift’s new offering for banks (which we’ll cover on Spend Matters PRO tomorrow).

What is the Seller’s Club? Specifically, we sensed that Tradeshift is positioning it as an accounts receivable centric solution for small and mid-tier suppliers — sort of a next generation Bottomline Technologies built on a many-to-many platform in which third-parties can also integrate additional apps to extend the core capabilities.

Tradeshift wants suppliers to use it to interface with all customers, not just buyers on the Tradeshift network. This includes suppliers using other networks including Coupa, Basware, SAP Ariba and Oracle, as well as those sending invoices via PDF to smaller buyers. In other words, think of it as an AR-centric app combined with a portal of portals. At least to start.

Today, Tradeshift is offering four different levels of Club membership:

Free— This includes access to a “web UI” to manage transactions. In other words, this is the standard Tradeshift connectivity offering for suppliers doing business with Tradeshift buyers.

Silver— This includes “managed integration” services (think Ariba supplier network paid offering type integration enablement), monitoring reports and alerting and billing. The limit is 500 documents per year.

Gold— This includes tighter service level agreements (for connectivity), “advance reporting,” and “set-up marketing profiles with badges.” The limit is 5000 documents per year.

Platinum and Platinum X— These include “concierge services,” access to buyer events / intros, discounted apps and the ability to transact more than 5000 documents per year. Platinum X would seem the unpublished “Global Services” type tier (no word on the Mercedes terminal to terminal transfers).

The roadmap for the Tradeshift Seller’s Club includes GPO-type offerings for suppliers (e.g., discounts on small parcel) as well as numerous other components that Tradeshift shared, including the following:

  • The ability to manage enhanced network profiles and connectivity
  • Capability to invite buyers “with offers”
  • Enhanced “self-service integration”
  • Open marketplace selling
  • Seller-led financing (e.g., factoring and early payments)
  • GPO offerings (e.g, discounted logistics)
  • Billing management
  • One-click dispute management
  • Incorporation of AI into core apps and third-party app development

Stay tuned as our coverage continues.