Orientation

Supplier management
inside the project

Supplier management spans six task areas – from selecting suppliers to coordinating dates inside a running project. Linetrack covers exactly one of them. This page sorts out which task belongs in which system, instead of promising a scope a project tool does not have.

Linetrack multi-project management software for machinery and plant engineering

In short

Supplier management covers everything from selecting and qualifying suppliers to contracts, ordering, evaluation, risk and schedule coordination. The first five areas belong in SRM and procurement systems. Linetrack covers only the sixth: coordinating external partners' dates and deliverables inside the running project – subcontracts, onboarding and status feedback in the same plan as internal departments.

Definition

What does supplier management actually cover?

Supplier management consists of six task areas: supplier selection and qualification, contracts and terms, order processing, supplier evaluation, risk and compliance management, and coordinating dates and deliverables in a running project. The first five are procurement and SRM tasks with systems of their own. The sixth arises only once the project runs – usually handled by email and phone.

Supplier selection and qualification – Who is allowed to supply at all? Initial assessment, audits, approval in the supplier master data. That decision happens before the project and belongs in the procurement process.
Contracts and terms – Framework agreements, prices, payment and delivery terms. They are managed in procurement or contract management, not in the schedule of an individual project.
Order processing – Requisition, purchase order, goods receipt, invoice verification. The classic purchase-to-pay process, which as a rule runs in the ERP system.
Supplier evaluation – Metrics on quality, price and on-time delivery across all orders and years. They are the basis for supplier development and for the next sourcing decision.
Risk and compliance management – Dependencies, certificates, supply chain due diligence, second-source strategy. A procurement and compliance task with its own rulebook and its own documentation duties.
Coordinating dates and deliverables in the running project – A subcontract has a date sitting in the middle of the project plan; assembly, commissioning and the promise to the customer all depend on it. This is the area Linetrack covers.

Linetrack covers point 6 – and only point 6. Points 1 to 5 are SRM and procurement tasks; there are established systems for them, and Linetrack is not one of them. Linetrack answers the question that only arises after the award: will the date this supplier committed to for this project hold – and will we notice in time if it does not? How that works in practice is described in the supplier integration use case; the features behind it are on the supplier access product page.

Scope boundary

What an SRM system does – and what Linetrack does

Supplier selection, evaluation, risk management and purchasing processes have a well-served market of their own: SupplyOn, JAGGAER, Onventis and Simmeth are established across German-speaking industry and model these processes far more deeply than any project software ever would. Linetrack does not compete with them and does not replace them. Linetrack answers a different question: not „which supplier do we work with?“, but „will the date this supplier committed to for this project hold?“.

Task	SRM / procurement system
Supplier selection and qualification	Core function: supplier master data, audits, approvals	No
Contracts and terms	Core function: framework agreements, prices, terms	No
Order processing	Core function: purchase order, goods receipt, invoice	No
Supplier evaluation	Core function: metrics across all orders	No
Risk and compliance management	Core function: certificates, supply chain, second sources	No
Coordinating dates and deliverables in the project	Not covered – has no view of the project schedule	Yes – subcontract as a sub-project in the schedule

The dividing line is not a marketing question but a data question: an SRM system knows suppliers and orders, but not the schedule the subcontract hangs in. A project system knows the schedule, but not the sourcing decision. That is why point 6 falls between the two systems in many companies and ends up being chased by email and phone. How expensive that gap is already shows internally: in 59% of live Linetrack implementations, „manual status chasing“ was among the initial pain points (multiple answers possible). Across a company boundary the same mechanism only gets slower, because the supplier has no access to the plan whose date they are meant to hold. At Linetrack the subcontract therefore runs through the same plan as internal capacity, which multi-project management already tracks across every project – in machinery and plant engineering this is the norm, because subcontracts there sit directly in front of assembly and commissioning dates.

*Figures from a full survey of all live Linetrack implementations, as of August 2026. Multiple answers possible.

Where to go next

Where your question belongs

If you are looking for a system that selects suppliers, rates them and processes purchase orders, this page is a dead end – you need an SRM or procurement system, not a project tool. If your question is instead how an outsourced control cabinet build, an external assembly crew or a bought-in controller sits in your project schedule, you are in the right place: the supplier integration use case describes how subcontracts become sub-projects in the schedule and how suppliers report progress back themselves.

The feature level behind it – onboarding via an automatic invitation, a free collaboration license for the supplier, a separate compliance-ready project area – is on the supplier access product page. If you would rather not create subcontracts by hand, integrations shows how they are generated automatically from the ERP as sub-projects in the plan. Everything else – selection, contract, order, evaluation, risk – stays where it belongs: in procurement.

Dashboard for digital supplier management with checklist, task overview, time progress, maturity level and on-time delivery of the integrated suppliers.

Read on

Two pages that actually answer it

This page exists to sort the question out, not to rank against the SRM vendors. The real answers are on the two pages behind it.

Use case: supplier integration

How subcontracts enter the schedule as sub-projects, how suppliers report progress and files back themselves, and how a delay becomes visible before it hits the assembly date.

Product: supplier integration

The features behind it: subcontract as a sub-project with defined deliverables, automated onboarding, a free collaboration license and a separate, compliance-ready project area.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

Still have questions?

Book a meeting with our team.

What does supplier management actually cover?

Supplier management consists of six task areas: supplier selection and qualification, contracts and terms, order processing, supplier evaluation, risk and compliance management, and the coordination of dates and deliverables in a running project. The first five are handled in procurement or in an SRM system. The sixth only arises during project execution and therefore belongs in project planning.

What is the difference between supplier management and supplier relationship management?

Supplier relationship management is the strategic part: selection, qualification, evaluation, risk and supplier development across all orders. Supplier management inside a project means the operational part – coordinating the dates and deliverables of one specific subcontract. The two need different systems, because SRM knows the supplier master data and project software knows the schedule.

Do you need dedicated supplier management software?

For areas 1 to 5, yes – that is what SRM and procurement solutions such as SupplyOn, JAGGAER, Onventis or Simmeth are for. For area 6, coordinating dates and deliverables inside the project, no extra tool is needed: the delivery date already sits in the project plan. A separate supplier management tool mostly creates one more data silo at this point.

Does Linetrack replace SupplyOn, JAGGAER or Onventis?

No. Linetrack covers neither supplier master data, audits and approvals nor framework agreements, order processing or supplier evaluation, so it is not a replacement for an SRM or procurement system. Linetrack starts after the sourcing decision: once the subcontract exists, it is managed as a sub-project with dates and defined deliverables in the project plan and reported back by the supplier.

How are external suppliers brought into project planning?

Every subcontract becomes a sub-project with dates and defined deliverables inside the project – automatically when an ERP interface is connected. The supplier receives their own access including a free collaboration license and works in a separate, compliance-ready project area. Dates, files and feedback come together there instead of disappearing into individual emails. The full sequence is in the supplier integration use case.

Which companies benefit from supplier management inside the project?

Above all companies whose delivery date depends on subcontracted work: machinery and plant engineering, building and energy technology, construction and infrastructure. There, assembly, commissioning and the customer commitment all rest on bought-in assemblies and external trades. The more projects run in parallel, the more expensive each status call becomes – and the greater the value of one shared plan across multi-project management.

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