Navigating the Pre-Award Phase

The Pre-Award phase is a critical stage in public sector procurement. It ensures that all requirements are clearly defined, budgets are managed, and competitive bidding is conducted transparently. SAP Ariba Sourcing and Procurement for Public Sector in SAP S/4HANA provides specialized tools to streamline these activities, tailored to the unique needs of government and public sector organizations.

Purchase Requisitions are the starting point for the procurement process. In SAP Fiori, users benefit from a modern, intuitive interface designed for efficiency and compliance. There are several ways to create a Purchase Requisition: automatically via Material Requirements Planning (MRP) or Sales and Distribution (SD) orders, and manually via Purchasing Requests or directly through the Manage Purchase Requisitions app.

The key difference between a Purchasing Request and a Purchase Requisition lies in their scope and user experience. Two interfaces are available depending on the user: the full Purchase Requisition app for procurement professionals handling complex or non-standard scenarios, and the Manage Purchase Requests app; a simpler, shopping cart-style interface designed for end users who need to raise a request without deep procurement knowledge. Purchasers can review and process requests from either interface before determining a source of supply.

The Manage Purchase Requisitions Application

The Manage Purchase Requisitions app supports complex item structures through item hierarchies, allowing procurement teams to group related materials and services under a single parent item within one requisition. The following graphic shows an active Purchase Requisition in the full app, providing the purchaser a complete view of the document including its status, total value, and access to tabs for items, contacts, budget, notes, and approvals.

The Manage Purchase Requests Application

The Manage Purchase Requests app is a streamlined version of the Manage Purchase Requisitions application, offering a catalog-based, self-service purchasing experience. End users can browse available products, add items to a cart, and submit requests in just a few steps without the need to navigate the full procurement interface. Relevant user data, such as accounting information, plant, and company code, is automatically populated from system defaults.

The Process Purchase Requisitions app is the central workspace where procurement professionals manage, prioritize, and act on purchase requisitions. It consolidates all items in one place, giving buyers the tools they need to determine sources of supply, create follow-on documents, and manage their daily workload efficiently.

One of the app's most practical capabilities for public sector environments is granular workload assignment. Rather than routing requisition items to a purchasing group as a whole, items can be assigned to a specific, named buyer. This gives procurement managers clear visibility into who is responsible for what, supports accountability, and helps distribute work equitably across the team. Items that need immediate action are surfaced through the Action Required view, so buyers can prioritize without having to manually filter through the full queue.

Source of supply determination can happen automatically or manually. For automated scenarios, the app integrates with the BRF+ rules framework, which allows organizations to define custom business rules that assign sources of supply and trigger the creation of follow-on documents; such as purchase orders or purchase contracts, without manual intervention. In manual scenarios, buyers can assign or change a source of supply directly within the app and then choose the appropriate follow-on action.

The following graphic shows the Process Purchase Requisitions app with a requisition item selected and the Follow-on Actions menu expanded. Available options include:

• Create Purchase Order
• Create Purchase Contract
• Create Sourcing Project
• Add to Purchase Order
• Add to Purchase Contract
• Add to Sourcing Project

These options illustrate the range of procurement paths a buyer can take from a single interface. Items that need clarification can be held, rejected, or sent back to the requestor directly from the same screen.

When no appropriate source of supply exists for a purchase requisition, the next step is to initiate a Sourcing Project to run a Request for Quotation (RFx) or a broader competitive bidding process.

A sourcing project enables procurement professionals to systematically identify and engage potential suppliers. Starting from the purchase requisition, the responsible purchaser can create a sourcing project that carries forward all relevant requirements; such as materials or services, quantities, delivery dates, and budget information. Sourcing projects are fully embedded in the end-to-end public procurement process, allowing teams to manage publication, negotiation, and contract award all within a single system.

The SAP Ariba Supplier Quotation Management (QTM) application enables suppliers to actively participate in sourcing projects by allowing them to review opportunities, express interest, and submit quotations.

QTM is an additional SAP solution running on SAP Business Technology Platform (SAP BTP public cloud) and integrates seamlessly with SAP Ariba Sourcing and Procurement for Public Sector in SAP S/4HANA. It provides the central interface for integrating suppliers into the end-to-end sourcing process.

Optionally, QTM can be connected to the SAP Business Network to support supplier onboarding and access management. Without SAP Business Network, supplier access remains possible; however, onboarding capabilities are not available.

QTM requires an additional license and is only necessary when suppliers are expected to participate in sourcing projects and submit quotations.

Suppliers are invited to participate in the RFx process, where they can submit their bids. These bids are evaluated based on predefined criteria such as price, quality, delivery performance, and compliance requirements. Sourcing projects also support negotiations, multiple bidding rounds, and the creation of awarding scenarios. Publishing and awarding decisions can be routed through an approval process using SAP Flexible Workflow, ensuring the appropriate levels of oversight before commitments are made.

For regulated or public sector scenarios, sourcing projects allow procurement teams to publish opportunities to public portals such as SAM.gov, ensuring compliance with legal requirements and enabling transparent, competitive bidding processes. The system provides a highly flexible integration framework for connecting to public procurement portals. Rather than offering predefined integrations, it enables customers to connect to any required portal via SAP AIF, with predefined events available to control and trigger communication.

Once a supplier is selected, the results of the sourcing project can be used to create or update a source of supply; such as a purchase order or purchase contract. This source of supply is then assigned back to the original purchase requisition, enabling the creation of follow-on documents. Importantly, all obligations defined in the purchase requisition are automatically carried forward, into the follow-on documents. This ensures consistency throughout the process and guarantees that budget consumption is handled seamlessly from the initial request through to final procurement execution.

Sourcing Procedure Types: End-to-End Process Flows

The procedure type selected for a sourcing project controls how suppliers are invited and accepted into the process. Three options are available:

• Open: Any supplier can view the project in QTM, express interest, and is automatically accepted and added to the supplier list to be able to participate.
• Restricted: When suppliers express interest, a confirmation from the responsible purchaser is required before they are added to the supplier list.
• Closed: Only a predefined list of suppliers can see and participate in the sourcing project, no additional suppliers express interest.

The two diagrams below illustrate the complete process flow for each main scenario. More advanced courses will cover these flows in detail. At this stage, the goal is simply to understand that the procedure chosen shapes the entire supplier engagement experience from publication through to award.

Pre-Publishing a Sourcing Project

The system also supports a pre-publishing feature, which allows purchasing teams to fully prepare a sourcing project, including items, terms, contacts, and documents; before it becomes visible to suppliers. This ensures all participants begin from the same starting point at a defined date and time, which is a legal requirement in many public sector jurisdictions. The screen below shows an example of a sourcing project in this pre-published state, with the procedure type, key dates, and follow-on document type already configured.

Publishing a Sourcing Project

Once the process is underway, the sourcing project moves into its published, active state. The following graphic brings together three views of the same published sourcing project to illustrate what this looks like in practice; the general overview with status and participant count, the version lifecycle showing the stages the project has passed through, and the supplier quotations view confirming that a bid has been received and is ready for evaluation.

• Pre-Award ensures clear requirements, budget control, and transparent competitive bidding in public sector procurement.
• Purchase requisitions initiate the procurement process and can be created via MRP, SD or Fiori apps. The full Manage Purchase Requisitions application and the leaner Manage Purchase Requests app serve different user needs and use cases.
• The Process Purchase Requisitions app centralizes workload management, enables the assignment of items to named buyers, and automates follow-on documents via BRF+.
• Sourcing projects enable RFx processes, facilitate supplier engagement through QTM, support flexible portal integration, and ensure that all obligations defined in the purchase requisition are carried forward into follow-on documents.
• Procedure types (open/restricted/closed), along with pre-publishing and publishing states, support compliant and controlled supplier engagement, including the routing of decisions through approval processes