A reverse-auction-only tool, on this page, means a tool whose job is the live reverse auction. SuperNegotiate runs that kind of auction inside one live thread that also holds the RFQ, the negotiation, the evaluation and the award. This page says how the approaches differ and when each fits. It does not name vendors, and it does not state another product's price or feature list.
Choose a reverse-auction-only tool when the requirement is only the live price competition. In a reverse auction, suppliers bid against each other in real time and can see they are being beaten, so prices keep moving after the first submission. If that is the whole job, an auction-only tool is the better fit. It is also the better fit when the RFQ, the technical evaluation, the award and the audit trail already live in another system you mean to keep, and you do not need them inside the auction.
Choose an auction-only tool when you do not need a memory of how each supplier behaved on earlier events, and you do not need the negotiation to continue after the auction clock. This page does not say an auction-only tool lacks those things. It says that if you do not need them, the narrower approach matches the narrower job. A single competitive price event, with no later event that should start from what this one taught you, is that job.
Do not choose the hosted SuperNegotiate tiers when the organisation needs an on-premise deployment as standard. Those tiers are SaaS only. Self-hosting is a separate, one-time paid perpetual license, priced on request, and it is not one of the hosted tiers. Do not choose SuperNegotiate for purely transactional catalogue buying either. That is a P2P tool's job, not this. And do not choose it for single-source or sole-supplier spend with no competitive tension. A reverse auction, on this product or on an auction-only tool, needs rivals.
Choose SuperNegotiate when the auction should sit in the same live thread as the rest of the event. Buyers, evaluators and invited suppliers share that thread. The event can be a quote request, a reverse auction, or both. Weighted scoring, timed knockout rounds and private counter-offers are part of the auction. A technical evaluation panel can score non-price criteria. The award can go to one supplier or be split, with accept and decline tracked, and the audit trail exports with the commercial record.
Autopilot is the negotiation after the quotes are in, not a second auction. The buyer sets a target and a floor. Autopilot opens the conversation with every supplier, counters their pushback, trades payment days, warranty and lead time when price stalls, chases suppliers who go quiet, and runs all suppliers in parallel, including overnight. It reports why it stopped: target met, supplier at equilibrium, or the clock ran out. It will not cross the floor. Every price, concession, target check and floor check is computed by a deterministic rules engine against your own database. No language model decides prices. An optional language layer can draft the wording around that number. It is off unless enabled, and with it off the engine sends from templates. It never sees a price.
Recall is the memory an auction-only event does not have to carry, and that a repeat category often wants. It is built from the buying organisation's own events: average concession, rounds to floor, reply rate, which message tone has worked, item price history, and which rival a supplier concedes more against. It stays in your tenant. It is never pooled with other customers, never sold back as a benchmark index, and no model is trained on it.
Suppliers join from the link you send, a QR code, or the six-character event code. They do not create an account and they do not install software. You admit each supplier before they can submit a price. They see the event, your name, and what you are buying. They do not see your target, your floor, or your maximum budget. Whether they see their rank is a setting on that event, and it stays off unless you turn it on.
SuperNegotiate is hosted, paid SaaS. Published prices, billed annually: Starter from £750 a month (£9,000 for the year, 3 seats), Team £1,650 a month, Business £3,600 a month, and Enterprise from £8,250 a month. A seat is a person on the buying side. Suppliers are not seats. The first month on a hosted workspace is free and runs a real event. First month free, then billed annually on the tier you choose. The figures are on the pricing page. The no-account trial, five events per email address and six suppliers per event, is on the trial.
A tool whose job is the reverse auction itself. Suppliers bid against each other in real time and can see they are being beaten, so prices keep moving after the first submission. This page does not name vendors and does not claim what else such a tool includes.
Yes. Any event can be a reverse auction, with weighted scoring, timed knockout rounds and private counter-offers. The auction sits in the same live thread as the RFQ, the negotiation, the technical evaluation and the award.
When the requirement is only that live price competition. If the RFQ, the evaluation panel, the award, Recall and Autopilot are already handled somewhere else, or you do not need them, an auction-only tool matches the narrower job.
The buyer sets a target and a floor. Autopilot negotiates every supplier in parallel, including overnight, and can trade payment terms, warranty and lead time when the price stalls. It will not cross the floor. No language model decides the price. The number comes from a deterministic rules engine.
Recall is built from the buying organisation's own events and is never pooled across customers. SuperNegotiate is hosted, paid SaaS. Starter is from £750 a month, billed annually. Team is £1,650, Business is £3,600, and Enterprise is from £8,250 a month. The first month is free, then billed annually on the tier you choose.
SuperNegotiate — the procurement operating system