Comparing Sealed Offers and Splitting the Award: AI-Assisted Offer Evaluation on MarbleMap

The hardest part of sourcing natural stone starts after the offers arrive. Prices differ, Incoterms differ, payment terms differ — and more often than not, the cheapest slab and the cheapest desk do not come from the same supplier. In the video above, a Rotterdam buyer evaluates three sealed offers on a single demand — from Turkey, Italy and Spain — from first look all the way to confirmed orders. The goal is not just finding the lowest number; it is reading terms, lead times and total cost together and making the smartest call. This post walks through that flow step by step.

Why sealed offers change the game

On MarbleMap, offers arrive sealed: no supplier ever sees another supplier's price. Everyone quotes their true best, and nobody plays the game of shaving a cent off a visible number. For the buyer, that means the figures you compare are real prices rather than tactics. The demand also locks for editing the moment the first offer arrives — the rules never change mid-game, and every supplier competes on the same specification.

Triage first, then compare

Evaluation on MarbleMap is two-staged: when a demand attracts many offers, you triage first and compare second. Each offer is a rich card showing price, lead time, supplier rating and coverage, and the filters on the left narrow the field by country, price, lead time or rating. The demand cockpit keeps everything in one place — status, closing date, and tabs for offers, details and messages. Serious candidates go onto a shortlist, which holds at most six offers so the comparison matrix stays readable. From there, Compare takes you to the matrix.

The AI recommends, you decide

At the top of the offer list sits an AI recommendation. It explains its pick in plain sentences and tells you how much cheaper it is than the next best offer. A review panel opens the full breakdown of the recommended offer: lines, expenses, validity date, Incoterm and payment terms, all on one screen. In the video, the recommended offer answers the request exactly — Net 30 payment terms and an Incoterm from the buyer's accepted list. That transparency matters: before you act on the recommendation, you see exactly what it is based on. One principle governs the whole flow: the AI recommends, but nothing is ever accepted automatically. The decision is always the buyer's.

The comparison matrix and split award

In the matrix, rows are the demand's products and columns are the offers, with the AI pick sitting leftmost. In every row, the lowest line total earns the cheapest mark. In the video's tender, the Spanish offer leads on the Carrara slabs while the Turkish offer wins the Calacatta desk — the cheapest slab and the cheapest desk are not in the same offer, and that is how most real-world tenders end. Split award answers exactly that problem. A selector at the end of each row lets you assign that line to any bidder, and Optimal split assigns every line to the cheapest offer in a single click. The platform then compares the split scenario against the best single supplier on a landed-cost basis, allocating offer-level expenses and taxes proportionally to each awarded share. In this example, the split comes out roughly three thousand six hundred euros cheaper than the best single supplier. The final word still belongs to the buyer: sometimes the simplicity of working with one supplier is worth the difference.

A double handshake: slices, then orders

An award on MarbleMap is never one-sided. After Finalize split, the award board shows each winning supplier's slice along with its decision status. Every supplier confirms their own slice from their own screen — the price was sealed, but the commitment is mutual, and both sides know exactly what they signed. Once the slices are approved, Start orders becomes active and a separate order is created on the platform for each winner. Orders are not one-sided either: the supplier confirms from their side or proposes a change. When the confirmations arrive, the demand turns completed, with the winners, total and date in the header and the items and amounts per supplier below. This double handshake keeps every step from sealed price to confirmed order visible to both sides.

Start free on marblemap.co

Opening a demand and collecting sealed offers is free for buyers; advanced capabilities like the AI recommendation and Split Award come with Pro and higher plans. MarbleMap charges no commission, and the platform speaks thirteen languages, from English and Turkish to Arabic and Chinese. If you are a buyer, open your first demand today, let the offers arrive sealed, and keep the decision in your hands from start to finish. If you are a supplier, quote on verified demands knowing your price stays sealed from other suppliers. Get started at marblemap.co