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Unlike games that rely partly on centralization (Axie Infinity), fully on-chain games give players more control — and get them more engaged.

The price of Bitcoin has reached an all-time high above $72,000.

Achieving strategic sourcing excellence takes more than simply locating the right suppliers that can fulfill your requirements at the right price. It also involves obtaining crucial insights to make informed decisions. 

In today’s highly volatile business environment, having a strong sourcing strategy in place is key when it comes to overcoming challenges such as supply chain disruptions and delays. However, many organizations have inefficient operations and limited supplier options, which means they may also lack a contingency plan or alternative suppliers they can call on to overcome such challenges. 

With a strategic sourcing plan, companies have the ability to get the best quality, price, and fit for their business needs, helping them stay competitive.  

To help organizations achieve their strategic sourcing goals, SAP has the guided sourcing capability for SAP Ariba Sourcing to help streamline and automate sourcing processes. It can enable users to identify and qualify suppliers, create and manage sourcing events, and evaluate bids and proposals. It can provide a structured and guided approach to sourcing, helping organizations to efficiently identify the best suppliers and negotiate the best possible terms for their procurement needs, allowing them to complete more projects with less effort. 

Want to cut costs, limit risk, and maximize supply chain savings? Learn more about SAP Ariba Sourcing

The four key benefits of guided sourcing are: 

1. Improved user interface: The intuitive interface can make it easier for users to navigate the platform, resulting in faster adoption and increased user satisfaction. The revamp of the user experience has led to improved usability, rapid event creation, enhanced search capabilities, and contextual help with tools like SAP Enable Now. This can ultimately lead to a more efficient and productive sourcing process for businesses. The platform also offers intuitive management of the strategic sourcing and request for x (RFx) event process, making it easier for businesses to manage their sourcing events. This streamlined approach to event management can help businesses save time and resources while also improving the overall effectiveness of their sourcing strategy. 
2. Embedded analytics: The guided sourcing capability is at the forefront of innovation with features like no-touch procurement efficiency enabled by artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. Such features include recommendation of suppliers and content within strategic sourcing and smart upload in Microsoft Excel to easily import unstructured data as line items within a sourcing event in a matter of seconds. In addition to this, we plan to release a mechanism we refer to as “insights to action,” which can bring analytics back into the applications. This can enable business users to use insights and recommendations to help make decisions fast and effectively.   
3. Cross-product integrations: Through integration with SAP Ariba Supplier Risk and SAP Ariba Category Management, guided sourcing can provide enhanced search capabilities with Supplier Lifecycle and Performance (SLP) criteria. It helps make risk information readily available so it can be accessed during the negotiation phase, while spend management data is made available via embedded analytics and SAP Ariba Category Management. This level of integration helps businesses make more informed sourcing decisions by understanding and managing the level of risk at an early stage of supplier engagement and having the ability to view and analyze spend by category, which can help in making the right sourcing decisions.  
4. Enhanced capabilities via integration with partner applications: The capabilities of guided sourcing can be further extended through integration with partner apps endorsed by SAP, making it a comprehensive solution for companies looking to streamline their sourcing processes. For example, integration with Icertis Contract Intelligence (ICI) for SAP Ariba can allow for seamless collaboration between sourcing persona and legal personnel. Integration with Scoutbee Discovery for SAP Ariba Sourcing can allow customers to access new suppliers across the globe based on supplier and product characteristics.  

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The guided sourcing capability offers a wide range of benefits that can optimize and streamline the procurement process for businesses. From improved supplier management and enhanced visibility to cost savings and increased efficiency, the guided sourcing capability can provide a comprehensive solution for organizations to effectively manage their sourcing activities. By leveraging the power of guided sourcing, businesses can experience greater control and transparency in their procurement operations, ultimately leading to increased profitability and better business outcomes. With its innovative features, advanced capabilities, and integration with partner apps endorsed by SAP, the guided sourcing capability can be key to helping organizations that want to achieve strategic sourcing excellence.  

The capability is available at no additional cost for all licensed SAP Ariba Sourcing customers. For more information, check out this FAQ document. 

Salvatore Lombardo is senior vice president and chief product officer for SAP Ariba.

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Dencun — the most-anticipated upgrade since the Merge — is set to ship in two days, promising to significantly reduce layer-2 transaction costs.

There is no doubt that generative AI for business will transform every aspect of how business is done. But the reality is that generative AI is only as good as the data that it’s trained on.

While data may be the fuel powering the engine of AI, it’s good data that’s the real game changer. With good data, a company can automate processes — freeing up their people to do the most impactful work — and analyze the most important variables facing their business to create intelligent insights.

That’s where a datasphere comes in. It makes data more complete and logical by understanding the different relationships within a company’s data. And that’s what can truly bring out the best in any business today.

Deliver seamless and scalable access to mission-critical business data Explore SAP Datasphere

Having a central hub for data is more critical than ever. It allows our customers to better model their business across all SAP business applications. That’s exactly why we introduced SAP Datasphere last year to empower businesses with insights they need – based on the right data – in the context of their business. Since then, generative AI has disrupted and simplified even more business processes, and data capture is no different. This week we announced new generative-AI features in SAP Datasphere that will transform enterprise planning through simplified data landscapes and more-intuitive data interaction.

Why is this important? Because having a unified data view that simplifies the data landscapes while retaining context and logic is what enables businesses to adapt faster to market changes and make better decisions. It’s also a more efficient way of working. Because while you’re busy pulling data together, competitors are circling your customers.

I am constantly speaking with our customers about the value of SAP Datasphere. It’s a data architecture that harmonizes mission-critical data across an organization. I hear amazing outcomes they’re able to achieve: from PwC breaking down silos in the different countries where it stores sensitive data so its workforce can access it more efficiently and securely for customers, to the Lufthansa Group taking data from different parts of its operations like aircraft, HR, and procurement, to see how decisions from one could impact the other. 
 
With our additional news this week, such as making our generative AI copilot Joule available in SAP Analytics Cloud and expanding our partnership with Collibra to help our customers meet compliance, privacy, and regulatory requirements related to AI as they evolve, we’re making it easier to find the right data and use it to drive deeper insights, more efficiencies, faster growth, and more trust in their business.

While PwC and Lufthansa show what’s possible today with a simplified data fabric, imagine what is about to become possible when you infuse it with the power of generative AI that understands your business – and then learns from that data. This has the potential to deliver exponential value from your data.

Or think of it this way: years ago, the biggest differentiators for businesses were price, location, products, and services. Today, and especially in the years ahead, it could very well be how effectively a business is training their AI models. That’s why building the right data fabric is one of the most important investments any business can make today.

It’s been said that the best way to predict the future is to invent it. And in an era where data is being created exponentially, I believe that those businesses that can separate the signal from the noise when it comes to their data will be the ones that invent the future in an AI-first world.

Scott Russell is a member of the Executive Board of SAP SE.

Take a guided tour and experience firsthand the power of business data with SAP Datasphere Start now

Bitcoin broke a new high of $71,415, three days after Ether breached the $4,000 mark for the first time since 2021.

Bitcoin bulls waste no time attempting BTC price discovery after the highest weekly close in history.

The technology required to make Ethereum immune from a quantum attack could be developed starting “tomorrow,” said Buterin.

According to data from BitMEX, BlackRock's IBIT now has nearly 198,000 Bitcoin, outpacing MicroStrategy’s holdings.

Portugal’s general elections are crucial for the country’s blockchain and digital assets industry.

ARK has "brought forward" its expectations for where Bitcoin will be by 2030, as BTC price strength sees another all-time high in play into the weekly close.

XRP’s price is trailing the broader crypto market’s gains, but fractal analysis suggests it may soon gather upward momentum.

The adjustments include changes to Maker Vaults, SparkLend DAI Borrow Rate, the PSM, the Dai Savings Rate (DSR), and the Governance Security Module (GSM) Pause Delay.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit declared that the rationale given by the district court for dismissing the lawsuit against crypto exchange Binance was erroneous.

Bitcoin price reaches new highs, U.S. senators draft stablecoin bill, and SEC delays decision on options trading for Bitcoin ETFs.

The global total value locked in DeFi protocols reached $100.1 billion on March 9. These figures, however, still fall short of the $189 billion record set in November 2021.

Bitcoin addresses holding at least 1,000 BTC are climbing again despite the BTC price reaching over $70,000 for the first time.

ETH price set a new multiyear high at $4,000 right as Bitcoin price hit a new all-time high.

Dive into the differences between buying Bitcoin in a peer-to-peer transaction on an exchange and investing in Bitcoin ETFs.

The Arbitrum community is voting on a proposal to fund a “robust legal defense” for Tornado Cash developers Roman Storm and Alexey Pertsev.