Patent ID: 6850900

Claim:
An electronic marketplace for enabling a plurality of buyers to purchase a plurality of products from a plurality of suppliers, the electronic marketplace comprising: product content transformation and storage means for transforming supplier product content from each of said plurality of suppliers into a generic form and for storing said generic form of said supplier product content; on-contract sourcing means for enabling a buyer to enter a selection for at least one product of said plurality of suppliers from said stored generic form of said supplier product content, said product being under a pre-existing contract between said buyer and said supplier previously entered into between said buyer and said supplier through the electronic marketplace; and off-contract sourcing means accessible from and housed within a same software system as said on-contract sourcing means for enabling said buyer to select at least one product of said plurality of suppliers, said product from said stored generic form of said supplier product content and not under a contract between said buyer and said suppliers, whereby if said buyer is unable to find a product using the on-contract sourcing means, said buyer can use the selection entered via the on-contract sourcing means in the off-contract sourcing means to find said product.