Building and Verifying an Industrial Supplier Network

Sourcing beyond the incumbent list

Most procurement functions buy from a list assembled years ago and renewed by inertia. Widening it is not about volume of vendors but about having a credible alternative on every critical line item. Start from the material rather than the company: browse per-commodity price pages on Tradloc to understand who produces the grade, in which regions, and what the normal trade routes are.

Due diligence before a first order

The checks below take a day and prevent the failures that cost a campaign. Apply them in full to any supplier receiving an advance payment.

• —Legal existence — trade licence, registration number, ownership and authorised signatories
• —Financial capacity — audited accounts or bank reference proportionate to the order value
• —Production versus trading — confirm whether the counterparty manufactures or intermediates
• —Quality system — ISO certification, batch traceability, certificate of analysis practice
• —References — two contactable customers buying the same grade
• —Sanctions and compliance screening on entity and beneficial owners

Technical qualification for chemical suppliers

Commercial due diligence does not establish that a product performs. For stimulation and production chemicals, qualification means laboratory testing against the actual well conditions — brine composition, temperature, formation mineralogy — not against a generic specification sheet. Compatibility, inhibitor efficiency and corrosion testing under representative conditions are the gate, and they are exactly the workflows the KEMISIM platform is used to define and evaluate.

Run that programme before the supplier is in the critical path, not during a campaign when the alternative is accepting an untested substitute.

Formalising the relationship

Once qualified, the relationship needs instruments. Create a mutual or one-way NDA with DocMak before technical exchange, set distribution and supply terms using DocMak agreement makers for the supply framework, draft service and agency agreements on DocMak where the supplier acts as regional representative, and formalise partnerships with DocMak JV and MOU generators where a consortium is being formed for a tender.

Ongoing management runs on the same document chain: issue a purchase order to suppliers using DocMak against the framework, and hold the price against a market reference each cycle using the Tradloc estimators rather than accepting rollover pricing unchallenged.