Question 1

What is pre-discovery?

Accepted Answer

pre-discovery: the stage before procurement and before any sales call, where a public-sector or enterprise buying team discovers and sizes up technology together. It is the stage that has never had a name. PartnerAZ is built for it, and only it.

Question 2

What is PartnerAZ?

Accepted Answer

PartnerAZ is the pre-discovery layer for public sector and enterprise buying teams across Canada. It sits upstream of procurement. Buyers set standards. Vendors submit a solution profile against those standards. A neutral fit score, computed as a score per criterion, surfaces the best fits first. Free for buyers, no vendor can pay to rank higher, and no unsolicited outreach, ever.

Question 3

How is this different from an analyst report or an AI search answer?

Accepted Answer

Analyst reports rank software for a fee or from a channel you cannot audit. AI search answers are confident averages of marketing, and most buyers no longer trust them for vendor evaluation (Gartner, 2024). PartnerAZ gives you a result on your own standards that you can read line by line and that no vendor can pay to move.

Question 4

How does the scoring work?

Accepted Answer

Vendors answer structured questions about their solution in a solution profile. That information is mapped against your organization's specific requirements, and the result is a score per criterion. The score is a guide, not a decision; your team chooses what to evaluate next.

Question 5

What does 'upstream of procurement' mean?

Accepted Answer

It handles the research and evaluation phase that happens before your procurement office gets involved. RFQs and RFPs begin after the shortlist is already set. PartnerAZ builds the defensible shortlist that feeds into that process.

Question 6

Is PartnerAZ really free for buyers?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Enterprise and public-sector organizations access PartnerAZ at no cost, with no trial and no tiers. The platform is funded by vendors who pay for visibility in the marketplace (a future browsable layer), which sits entirely outside the fit score.

Question 7

Are our buying standards kept confidential?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Your organizational standards, including security requirements, budget thresholds, integration requirements, and evaluation priorities, are never shared with vendors. Vendors cannot see what they are scored against. This is a design principle, not a feature.

Question 8

Can vendors contact us directly?

Accepted Answer

No. Vendors have no ability to initiate contact with buyers on PartnerAZ. A vendor cannot reach you until you choose to meet. When you are ready, you set up the discovery meeting on your terms; we do not broker or force premature meetings.

Question 9

Is this compatible with our existing procurement process?

Accepted Answer

Yes. PartnerAZ is designed to hand off to your existing process, not replace it. Once your team has a shortlist, your standard RFI, RFQ, or RFP workflows take over exactly as they always have.

Question 10

How do vendors submit?

Accepted Answer

A vendor submits one solution profile against a buyer organization's standards. The profile stays on file for the whole organization, so no buyer meeting is required just to understand the product. Today, vendor submissions are free.

Question 11

Can a vendor pay for better ranking?

Accepted Answer

No. Visibility is determined entirely by fit against the buyer's standards, not by what a vendor pays. Visibility in the marketplace (a future browsable layer) will sit entirely outside the score; ranking is never for sale.

Question 12

Can vendors see who is evaluating them?

Accepted Answer

No. Solution profiles are evaluated against buyer standards without vendors knowing who is reviewing them, what the standards are, or where they stand relative to others. When there is a match, the buyer chooses whether and when to meet; we do not broker premature meetings.

Question 13

How do buyers get started?

Accepted Answer

Walk through the demo, then email the founders when you are ready. No sales calls until you ask for one. Free for buyers.

Question 14

How do vendors get started?

Accepted Answer

Email the founders to make yourself discoverable. Vendors submit a solution profile against a buyer organization's standards. Free today; a paid visibility tier in the marketplace lands later as a separate, optional layer.

Question 15

Is our organizational data used to train AI models?

Accepted Answer

No. Your standards, evaluations, and discovery activity are private to your organization. They are never used to train models, shared with other buyers, or made visible to vendors.

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