Even before Release 3.0, it was possible to create contracts that did not relate just to one particular receiving plant.
An enterprise with a central purchasing department buying materials for several plants can thus agree a high-level contract which may apply to a vendor's entire corporate group and via which all plants of the group cover their requirements. Such centrally agreed contracts usually allow better conditions to be negotiated.
As of Release 3.0, the centrally agreed contract allows prices and conditions to be determined individually for each receiving plant. One advantage of this is that differences in transport costs due to varying distances between vendor and receiving plant locations can be taken into account.
Release orders are used to order (or release) materials against a centrally agreed contract. The individual release orders can be placed with different sources of supply (that is, individual vendors, or supplying companies) belonging to the principal vendor's corporate group. This is made possible by the partner functionality. You can assign several individual vendors (that is, units of a principal vendor's corporate group) to a contract. These vendors can assume a variety of roles (for example, ordering address, supplier of goods, invoicing party etc.), and you can assign different roles to the levels "purchasing organization", "vendor sub-range", and "plant".
The basis for the assignment of a release order to a certain vendor is the plant to which the materials are to be delivered or the vendor sub-range.
The partners can be defined in the vendor master record for the vendor corporate group or maintained individually in the contract. In many cases, the assignment of vendor to plant will be a 1:1 relationship. However, it is also possible for one receiving plant to be supplied by different vendors.
The vendor group Steel Inc. comprises six individual vendors that supply five receiving plants located in various regions. The assignments of sources to plant are defined in the master record of the vendor corporate group as follows: vendor 1 supplies plant 1 only; vendor 2 supplies plant 2 only; vendors 3 to 6 jointly supply plants 3, 4 and 5.
When a buyer wants to issue a release order against the centrally agreed contract with Steel Inc., he or she enters the key for the plant for which materials are to be procured. If the buyer enters plant 2, the release order is automatically issued to vendor 2. If the buyer enters plant 4, the system determines vendors 3, 4, and 5 from the vendor/plant assignments defined in the vendor master record for Steel Inc. The buyer can then choose which of these suggested vendors is to receive the release order.
In Customizing, you must perform the following steps:
For more on this topic, please refer to IMG Set up partner determination facility.