What is business partner in SRM and difference between partner functions and BP roles?

[Former Member]

Hello,

can any one help me to understand the concept of Business partner, partner functionality and partner role in SRM?

Thanks,

Trisha

[daniel_marlen]

Hello Trisha,

I'm not an ADM expert (BPs, BP Roles), I've got experience only in PRS area (Partner Functions), but as you got no answer for this query, I try to explain it in a higher level.

• Business Partners: in the system every user is a Business Partner. The BP ID can be found in PPOMA_BBP for every user and you can check the partner data using this ID in transaction BP or in table BUT000.
• BP Roles determines what actions can be performed by the users. With the different role assignments you can give different authorizations to users in areas like document creation, display, access of functionalities or tabs on the Web. With this you can ensure that users have access only those documents or functions that their role of business processes needs. You can check/change the assigned roles in transaction SU01.
• Partner Functions: these are partner types that can be assigned to business documents like SC, PO, Contract etc. To name a few, Partner Functions are the Recipients, Delivery Addresses, Suppliers, Bidders, Contact Persons, Locations etc. Every Partner Functions has a unique number PARTNER_FCT (e.g.: Delivery Address: 00000027, Supplier: 00000019) These partners can be maintained on header and/or item level in the business documents. For every Partner Functions you can maintain a Business Partner by populating the BP ID.
  You can find all the Partner Functions and you can also create custom ones in SPRO SAP Implementation Guide -> SAP Supplier Relationship Management -> SRM Server -> Cross-Application Basic Settings -> Define Partner Functions

I hope I could clarify a few points in this topic.

Best Regards,

Daniel