Dive Brief:
- Buyers and suppliers in China will have access to SAP Ariba, SAP's online B2B marketplace by the end of 2016, the company announced last week.
- SAP Ariba's network includes over two million companies in 190 countries looking to trade goods and services. Upon expansion, all users will be able to engage in bids and enter relationships with Chinese counterparts.
- The cloud-based service also offers supply chain finance, management and analytics solutions. The marketplace records over $1 trillion in annual commerce, according to the company.
Dive Insight:
SAP is hedging its bet on China's growing e-commerce marketplace by expanding its offerings to help usher the country's digital transformation, alongside digital commerce giant Alibaba, the South China Morning Post reports.
Alibaba Cloud, the company's digital platform, recently announced a partnership with 11 global technology companies, including SAP, where the Chinese company will help the foreign companies provide their services to Chinese customers. SAP has been selling its services in China for 21 years, but the AliCloud partnership is part of an effort to "expand SAP's cloud footprint in China," SAP Greater China President Mark Gibbs told the Morning Post.
The Ariba announcement is a separate, but similar effort to expand the company's market share in the world's most populous country.
A SWOT analysis of the SAP Ariba network recently labeled the platform's lacking presence in China as its sole weakness, although other analysts maintain the network's purchase-to-pay model is also inhibiting.
