Service · Web development

Custom vendor portal development for suppliers and partners.

A secure environment where your suppliers confirm orders, upload invoices, manage certificates and submit compliance documents. Custom-built, integrated with your ERP, and in your own corporate style, whether it's a supplier portal, customer portal or broader B2B portal.

SSO & role managementPeppol invoicingERP integrationAudit logMulti-tenant

A vendor portal is more than a login page.

In the Netherlands it often goes by different names: vendor portal, supplier portal, B2B portal or partner portal. The technology behind it is largely the same: a secured web application in which external parties carry out tasks that would otherwise happen by email, Excel or phone. A well-built portal replaces those scattered workflows with a single source of truth that works for both you and your suppliers.

The difference between a portal that falls into disuse after six months and one that your suppliers use willingly rarely lies in the technology. It lies in how well the portal fits your partners' existing work: the screens they already know, the file formats they already use, the moments in their process when they need to get in touch. That is why every project includes time, before the first sprint begins, for short interviews with a cross-section of your suppliers.

Since 2015 we have been building portals for procurement organisations, wholesalers, manufacturers and service providers. Always custom: not a generic SaaS package that you have to half set up and half adapt around, but an environment that fits your order management, ERP and procurement process. The result is a portal your suppliers actually use, and that takes work off your team instead of adding to it.

Three types of vendor portal.

The right type depends on the number of suppliers, the complexity of your purchasing or order process, and how deeply the portal needs to connect to your existing systems. In the first conversation we advise which option makes sense for your situation.

Compact project · fixed sprint budget

Supplier portal or customer portal

A secured environment for your suppliers or customers to view orders, send order confirmations, update delivery dates and upload invoices. Single sign-on, role-based access and a clear audit log. Suited to SMEs with a few dozen to a hundred active partners.

SSORole managementOrder flowDocument management
Mid-sized project · fixed sprint budget

B2B portal with onboarding and compliance

For organisations that regularly work with new suppliers. Self-service onboarding with KvK, VAT and KYC validation, NDA flow, certificate management (ISO 9001, ISO 14001, CE) and ongoing ESG or GDPR attestations. Includes contract management and performance monitoring per supplier.

KvK/VAT checkCertificatesESG attestationsOn-time delivery performance
Larger project · fixed sprint budget

Enterprise supplier portal with ERP integration

A mission-critical portal that plugs into your procurement system in real time: Coupa, SAP Ariba, Microsoft Dynamics, Exact or your own ERP. Multi-tenant theming for different business units, Peppol invoicing, RFQ flow with versions and region-specific compliance. Part of a broader enterprise software landscape.

SAP AribaCoupaPeppolMulti-tenant

What you get at the end.

A production-ready vendor portal plus everything around it, so you can manage and extend it yourself.

  • The portal itself, in productionProduction and staging environments, running in your own cloud (GCP, AWS or Azure) or hosted by us.
  • Complete codebase and documentationSource code, build instructions, architecture overview and API documentation. You are not locked in.
  • ERP and CRM integrationsWorking integrations with your existing procurement, ordering or invoicing system via API integrations or a message bus.
  • Admin and supplier guidesConcise guides for both your internal administrator and the suppliers who work in the portal.
  • Onboarding sessionsTwo training sessions for your procurement or operations team, plus a short video tutorial for your suppliers.
  • Maintenance and further developmentOptional maintenance contract: monitoring, backups, security patches and ongoing extensions. Fixed monthly price per tier.

When a vendor portal is the right choice.

Four patterns where a supplier or customer portal noticeably takes work off your hands. If you recognise one of them, a conversation is usually worth the time.

Procurement & order flow

Email management is breaking down

Order confirmations, delivery date updates, invoice queries: everything currently runs through procurement@ or a shared mailbox. Versions get lost, nobody knows whose turn it is, and your buyers spend hours digging through them.

Compliance

Certificates and attestations

Your sector requires verifiable ISO, CE or ESG documents for each supplier. Excel trackers go out of date, reminders get missed, and during an audit you have to gather everything by hand.

Scalability

Your supplier base is growing

What ran manually with twenty suppliers breaks down at a hundred. Self-service onboarding with KvK and VAT validation becomes essential so your team isn't overwhelmed.

E-invoicing

Peppol or XRechnung becoming mandatory

From 2026, e-invoicing will become mandatory in more and more EU segments. A portal with Peppol validation and real-time status feedback stops your accounts team from processing dozens of loose PDFs every day.

How a vendor portal project works.

1

Introduction

A conversation in which we understand which flows the portal must support (procurement, onboarding, invoicing, compliance) and which systems surround it. At the end, you have a first outline of the scope.

2

Discovery with your suppliers

A workshop with your internal team plus short interviews with a handful of suppliers. What do they do now, where do they run into problems, and what do they expect from your portal? At the end: scope, screen flow and planning.

3

Building in sprints

A working build every two weeks. Your team tests along, and so does a small group of pilot suppliers. After a few sprints, you have the first working version of the most critical flow.

4

Phased rollout and management

We roll out in phases to your full supplier base, provide training, and offer ongoing support for security, ERP integrations and further development of new modules.

Not yet sure about a large project?

Test your idea first: a working prototype in 1 day

With OneDayBuild, we turn your idea into something tangible in one day for €1,150, so you can see whether further development is worth the investment. Decide to go ahead with the full build? Then we credit the full cost.

Explore OneDayBuild →

Modules we almost always build.

A vendor portal is built from a set of recognisable building blocks. Which ones you need depends on your situation, but the following modules appear in almost every project, sometimes as the core and sometimes as an extension in a second phase.

Identity

Single sign-on and role management

SSO via Azure AD, Okta, Google Workspace or your own identity provider. For suppliers without their own IdP, an invitation flow with magic link or password plus multi-factor authentication. Granular role management per organisation: office admin, branch manager, employee and, if you wish, an external accountant or tax adviser with read-only access.

Documents

Document vault with version control

Upload of PDF, Word, Excel or CAD files with automatic version tracking. Suppliers see which documents are expiring, receive timely reminders to renew certificates, and can view older versions for audit purposes. Watermarking or digital signing is optional.

Onboarding

KvK, VAT and KYC validation

A new supplier registers, enters company details and uploads the required documents. The portal validates KvK and VAT numbers in real time against the official registers, performs KYC checks where necessary, and routes the request to your buyer for approval. What used to take days can be completed within one working day.

Invoicing

Peppol and invoice validation

Upload of invoices as PDF, UBL or via a direct Peppol access point. Validation against EN16591, XRechnung and your own purchasing terms, with real-time feedback on errors. Status tracking for the supplier (in validation, approved, paid) prevents emails to the accounts team. Also read why we consider smart API integrations important here.

Procurement

Order, RFQ and contract management

Suppliers see their open orders, confirm them or propose changes, and can respond to Requests for Quotation with versions and explanations. Current contracts, rates and mass revisions are visible in one place, with an audit log for every change.

Reporting

Supplier performance monitoring

Insight into on-time delivery, complaint frequency, quality incidents and ESG scores. Dashboards for your procurement team and self-service reports for suppliers, so they can see their own performance and adjust it before you need a conversation.

Audit trail

Who did what, and when

Every action in the portal, including logins, document uploads, invoice approvals and role changes, is recorded in an immutable audit log. It can be exported for audits, searched for support queries, and connected to your SIEM for security monitoring.

Notifications

Email, push and in-app

Smart notification routing: email for matters that can wait, in-app for what happens during a session, and push for urgent questions. Each user can configure their settings, so suppliers aren't buried under messages they don't need.

Technology stack and integrations.

We build vendor portals as modern web applications on a stack that works in almost any enterprise environment and remains maintainable. Front-end on React or Vue with TypeScript, back-end on Node.js, Python (Django/FastAPI) or .NET, depending on what your own IT team knows, because ultimately your people need to be able to manage the portal, or at least understand it.

On the procurement and ERP side, we typically integrate with SAP S/4HANA, SAP Ariba, Coupa, Microsoft Dynamics 365, Exact Online, AFAS, NetSuite or a proprietary ERP. For authentication and SSO we work with Azure AD, Okta, Auth0 or Google Workspace. For e-invoicing we use certified Peppol access points such as Storecove or Tradeshift. For document storage we use Azure Blob, AWS S3 or your on-premises solution, depending on your data sovereignty requirements.

We don't choose technology based on personal preference: we look at what your team already runs, what your managed service partner supports, and which licences you already hold. Often we end up with a combination that isn't the most fashionable at first glance, but which carries the least risk for your situation over the medium term. For a broader view of our approach, see also developing enterprise software.

Frequently asked questions.

What clients usually want to know before we start.

What is the difference between a vendor portal and a customer portal?
Technically they are closely related: both are secured environments for external parties. The difference lies in the target audience and the direction of the work. A vendor portal (supplier portal) is aimed at your procurement partners who confirm orders, upload invoices and deliver compliance documents. A customer portal or B2B portal is aimed at your customers who place orders themselves, track status and retrieve invoices. The underlying architecture is similar for both; we often design one platform that supports both roles.
Can the portal integrate with SAP Ariba, Coupa or another procurement system?
Yes. We build integrations with SAP Ariba, Coupa, SAP S/4HANA, Microsoft Dynamics 365, Exact, AFAS, NetSuite and proprietary ERPs via REST, SOAP or message bus (RabbitMQ, Azure Service Bus). For suppliers who are themselves on a large procurement network, the portal can act as the front end for your side of the process and communicate with their system via cXML or EDI.
How do we handle access and authentication?
For your internal users, via SSO on your existing IdP: Azure AD, Okta, Google Workspace or your own Identity Provider. For external suppliers we usually work with an invitation-based account flow, optionally with SSO if their organisation offers it, plus multi-factor authentication. Magic-link login or iDIN is also possible for smaller parties without their own IdP.
How does the Peppol or e-invoicing flow work?
The portal validates invoices against UBL 2.1 / Peppol BIS 3.0 or XRechnung / EN16931 at the moment of upload, gives real-time feedback on errors, and automatically pushes approved invoices through to your accounting system. Suppliers can see the status of each invoice: in validation, approved, in payment, paid. That prevents emails asking "has my invoice been seen yet?"
Does the portal work multi-tenant for different business units or brands?
Yes. For groups with multiple operating companies or regions, we build multi-tenant theming: one codebase, with branding, roles and ERP integration specific to each tenant. Suppliers see only the business units they work with, and your internal admins can switch between tenants from a single login.
What about security, GDPR and the audit trail?
Encryption in transit (TLS 1.3) and at rest, role-based access following the principle of least privilege, and an audit log that records who did what and when. GDPR baseline as standard, NEN 7510 or ISO 27001-aligned where relevant. For larger projects, we carry out a DPIA at the start and a penetration test in the final sprint.
What determines the cost and timeline?
The biggest variables are the number of roles, the number of integrations with your existing systems, and how deep the onboarding validations need to go. A compact supplier portal for one primary flow is a project of a few sprints. An enterprise supplier portal with multiple ERP integrations, Peppol and multi-tenant theming runs over several sprints. We always work with a fixed sprint budget so you can steer scope from sprint to sprint.
Do you build custom, or do you set up an off-the-shelf package?
Custom, but pragmatic. We don't reinvent the wheel: for SSO, document storage, invoice validation and email flows we use proven libraries and services. The application logic, screens and integrations with your ERP system we do build custom, because that's exactly where every organisation works differently.

Talk to us about your vendor portal.

A no-obligation introductory call of half an hour. We listen to your procurement and supplier flow, ask sharp questions, and offer direction you can use, even if it turns out we are not the right partner. You can also read our broader software development page for context.

Edit content