SAP Ariba Ends Trade Finance Deal With PrimeRevenue

Procurement and corporate payments firm SAP Ariba has reportedly ended its supply chain finance agreement with PrimeRevenue.

Reports in Supply Chain Finance Briefing on Saturday (June 1) said the agreement between SAP Ariba and PrimeRevenue, which was first announced in 2016, has quietly ended. Their tie-up enabled companies using the SAP Ariba platform for procure-to-pay to obtain supply chain financing from PrimeRevenue, which integrated into the portal.

At the time, SAP Ariba pointed to the data integration between the companies that would enable greater efficiency and speed in obtaining trade finance.

A statement provided to the publication from SAP Ariba noted that the company is “constantly reevaluating our existing offerings and partnerships to better serve our customers’ needs.”

“We are always listening to suppliers and buyers so that we can improve their experience and operations,” the statement continued. “We continue to respect PrimeRevenue and their supplier finance capabilities.”

Reports also noted that SAP Ariba has removed all mention of PrimeRevenue from its website. Other partners will offer supply chain financing within the SAP Ariba platform.

“SAP Ariba will continue to evolve our ecosystem in payments and financing based on customer needs, as evidenced by our recent partnerships with Barclaycard and America Express,” the company’s statement said.

SAP Ariba announced its partnership with Barclays in February, which enables companies using the procure-to-pay platform to make vendor payments via Barclaycard Commercial Payments’ Precisionpay solution, which supports virtual card payments.

Its collaboration with American Express was announced in April, and enables virtual card payment functionality provided by American Express within the SAP Ariba platform as well, via Ariba Network APIs.

PrimeRevenue did not provide a comment on the matter, the publication said.

Supply chain finance is a popular target for B2B FinTechs looking to address the trade finance gap and accelerate payments to vendors while supporting corporates’ cash flow needs. However some analysts have warned that supply chain finance could expose businesses to “negative credit implications” when they do not classify supply chain finance as debt, drawing criticism from industry players.