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Subscriptions are a way for businesses, sellers, merchants, and other marketplace participants to participate in services or capabilities provided by B2BCMarket on an ongoing basis.
A subscription is different from a product listing or an individual order. Products represent marketplace offerings, orders represent transactions, while subscriptions represent an ongoing participation or service relationship.
A subscription is an ongoing arrangement in which a participant receives access to a particular marketplace capability, service, plan, or feature for a defined period or according to a recurring arrangement.
Depending on the applicable B2BCMarket service, a subscription may provide access to features or capabilities that are not represented as individual marketplace products.
A subscription should not be confused with a marketplace product.
Product
Represents a marketplace offering.
Order
Represents a transaction involving an offering.
Subscription
Represents an ongoing service or participation relationship.
These concepts can work together while maintaining different responsibilities within the marketplace architecture.
Subscription-based capabilities may be relevant to different participants in the B2BCMarket ecosystem.
The availability and purpose of a subscription depends on the particular service or marketplace capability associated with it.
Businesses may use subscriptions to access marketplace capabilities that support their participation in B2BCMarket.
A business may operate one or more companies and branches while maintaining a subscription at the appropriate business or account level.
A company represents a company-level entity within the connected business structure.
Subscription capabilities may support company-level marketplace activities without changing the company's public identity or its relationship with the parent business.
A branch represents an operational or geographic presence of a company.
Subscription functionality can support marketplace participation while the branch continues to maintain its own public identity, location, service area, and connected products.
Sellers may use subscription-based services to support their marketplace participation.
A seller's subscription does not replace the seller's business structure. Instead, it can provide access to capabilities that operate alongside the Business, Company, Branch, and Product relationships.
Merchants may participate in subscription-based marketplace services where applicable.
Subscription services can provide a structured way for merchants to access capabilities associated with their marketplace activities.
Subscription services may be organized into different plans.
A plan can define the capabilities, limits, features, duration, or other conditions associated with a subscription.
The exact plans and features available can vary according to the service being provided.
A subscription may operate for a defined period or according to a recurring billing arrangement.
Examples of subscription periods may include:
The applicable subscription period depends on the selected service or plan.
A subscription can have a lifecycle of its own.
Depending on the service, a subscription may move through states such as:
These statuses describe the subscription relationship and should not be confused with the public availability status of a Business, Company, Branch, or Product.
A subscription may be renewable depending on its plan and terms.
Renewal extends the subscription relationship for another applicable period. Renewal behavior can depend on the subscription configuration and payment arrangements.
A participant may be able to cancel a subscription according to the applicable subscription terms.
Cancellation of a subscription does not necessarily delete the participant's business, company, branch, or product information.
Subscription state and public catalog identity remain separate concerns.
Where a subscription requires payment, subscription billing and payment processing can be associated with the subscription.
This is different from an individual marketplace order.
Marketplace Order
Payment associated with a particular transaction.
Subscription
Payment associated with an ongoing service or participation arrangement.
Orders and subscriptions can coexist within the marketplace ecosystem.
A participant may have an active subscription while also creating or receiving individual marketplace orders.
The subscription controls the applicable service relationship, while the order represents a particular marketplace transaction.
The B2BCMarket Connected Entity Architecture (BCEA) defines the public relationships between the major marketplace entities.
Business
↓
Company
↓
Branch
↓
Product
A subscription does not replace this hierarchy.
Instead, subscription services operate as a separate capability or commercial layer around marketplace participation.
The overall architecture can therefore be understood as several related layers.
Public Marketplace Structure
Business → Company → Branch → Product
Transaction Layer
Buyer → Order → Payment
Participation / Service Layer
Participant → Subscription → Marketplace Capabilities
Keeping these layers distinct makes the architecture easier to understand and allows each layer to evolve independently.
A subscription may determine whether a participant has access to particular capabilities.
Access rules can depend on the subscription status, selected plan, applicable limits, and other marketplace rules.
Depending on the service, subscription features may include capabilities such as marketplace participation tools, business management functionality, merchant-oriented services, or other platform features.
The availability of individual features depends on the applicable subscription plan and the service configuration.
Subscription plans may include limits or usage conditions.
For example, a plan could define limits related to the number of entities, marketplace activities, users, or other platform capabilities.
Such limits are service rules and do not change the public identifiers of marketplace entities.
Public catalog pages focus on publicly discoverable marketplace entities and their relationships.
Subscription information may contain account, billing, entitlement, or participation information that should not be exposed as public catalog data.
Therefore subscription information can remain separate from public catalog representations.
Subscription information may include private commercial or account information.
Such information should be handled according to the applicable privacy, security, and account-access rules rather than being exposed through public Business, Company, Branch, or Product catalog pages.
A typical subscription lifecycle can be represented as:
Subscription Selected
↓
Subscription Started
↓
Active Subscription
↓
Renewed / Continued
↓
Expired or Cancelled
The exact lifecycle depends on the subscription service and its applicable rules.
Separating subscriptions from catalog entities and marketplace orders provides a clearer architectural model.
B2BCMarket can therefore be viewed as a connected ecosystem in which several different relationships operate together.
Business
↓
Company
↓
Branch
↓
Product
↓
Order
↓
Payment
Participant
↓
Subscription
↓
Marketplace Capabilities
These layers can work together while maintaining clear boundaries between public identity, marketplace discovery, transactions, and ongoing services.
Continue exploring the B2BCMarket introduction: