New Year Insights for the procurement solutions and services marketplace 2024: Tradeshift

Spend Matters is publishing a series of articles about procurement, supply and services trends for the year ahead from expert tech and service providers in the market.

We are highlighting the customer demands, market movements and advances in procurement tech that are exciting the world of solution providers, how they expect them to shape the S2P landscape next year and how they plan to respond to them.

Our series runs from mid-December to mid-January, then our senior analysts will wrap up with their own take on the key themes that emerge.

In no order of preference, other than by the date they arrived in our inbox, today let’s hear from James Stirk, CEO at P2P provider Tradeshift.

Geopolitics becomes a procurement issue

Supply chain resilience will assume new meaning, with geopolitical tension presenting a complex puzzle for any global business. Chief Procurement Officers will come under mounting pressure to accelerate supply chain reconfiguration efforts started during the pandemic.

Change on this scale is complex. It requires businesses to quickly identify, vet and onboard large numbers of new suppliers. I have some bias here, but I’m excited about the potential for B2B marketplaces to expedite this process by delivering access to a diverse pool of suppliers in specific categories and geographies. In many cases, buyers can outsource vetting requirements to the marketplace operator, making them responsible for serving up suppliers that check the right boxes.

Regulatory compliance takes center stage in the boardroom

As a raft of new regulations come into force in 2024, procurement teams that may have struggled to get an audience prior to the pandemic will find themselves in the boardroom spotlight. The EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive joins an expanding array of global ESG compliance rules that require verifiable reporting on ESG performance. Geopolitical tensions are also leading to a rise in tariffs and sanctions applied to certain goods.

Where procurement teams would once base sourcing decisions primarily on cost and speed, they now have to take a much more holistic view based on a thorough assessment of potential risks. Whilst the ever-widening range of compliance banana skins is potentially overwhelming, I expect to see more procurement leaders looking to embed technologies that streamline the due diligence process and automate compliance checks.

AI faces a transitional year

When OpenAI launched ChatGPT, it took everyone’s breath away. Procurement teams have not been alone in feeling the urgency to come up with strategies to embed AI capabilities into their core processes. However, a discernable gap has emerged between the aspirations and the practicalities of effectively harnessing AI’s undoubted potential.

We’ve seen several stories emerge over the past year about instances where ChatGPT has presented information that is either false or misleading. Similar issues will arise if procurement teams try to layer AI over unstructured, incomplete or inaccurate data. 2024 is poised to be a transitional year, with a notable emphasis on assisting organizations in cleaning, consolidating and digitizing existing data sets so that they’re building from a single, reliable source of truth.

Many thanks to Tradeshift and you can read our in-depth analysis of its solution here.

Read our senior analyst’s take on the key themes from the series here.

Access Spend Matters dedicated ‘Artificial Intelligence in Procurement’ page for more AI insights.

If you need to find the right procurement technology provider or service for your business needs next year, try Spend Matters TechMatch for a free rapid shortlist.

For granular analysis and comparisons of procurement technology solutions, subscribe to Spend Matters Insider.

As always, reach out to discover how Spend Matters can help with your new year commitments and wishes.