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90% of RFQs Still Come by Email — Here’s How the Agent Responds for You

August 12, 2025

6 min read

Author:

Sumit Sinha

CTO & Co-Founder, Kavida.ai

Author:

Sumit Sinha

CTO & Co-Founder, Kavida.ai

90% of RFQs Still Come by Email — Here’s How the Agent Responds for You

Table of Contents

In an era of digital transformation, procurement teams might assume the days of email-based sourcing are over. The reality is starkly different: 90% of RFQs (Requests for Quotation) still arrive via email. Despite the proliferation of Source-to-Pay (S2P) systems and procurement platforms, the inbox remains the beating heart of supplier communications.

Why? Because suppliers in complex, global supply chains are spread across geographies, industries, and levels of digital maturity. While some are happy to log into a buyer’s portal, the majority prefer the simplicity, familiarity, and ubiquity of email.

For procurement teams, however, this convenience for suppliers translates into complexity, delay, and administrative overload. Instead of strategic sourcing, buyers are stuck wrestling with sprawling threads, mismatched file formats, and endless manual tracking.

The RFQ problem isn’t that procurement professionals can’t handle email. The problem is that handling RFQs via email at scale is slow, error-prone, and limits the team’s ability to act strategically.

The RFQ Problem in Detail

The persistence of email-based RFQs stems from three realities:

Supplier-driven habits

Suppliers often work with dozens of customers. Using email allows them to manage incoming RFQs in a single, familiar environment.

Low barrier to participation

Unlike portals or proprietary systems, email doesn’t require new logins or training, making it faster for suppliers to respond.

Fragmented technology adoption

Even companies with advanced procurement software often find that their suppliers—especially SMEs—are not fully integrated into their systems.

For procurement teams, these realities have consequences:

RFQ creation

Often manual, whether or not a formal S2P system is in place. Teams recompile specs, line items, and terms from scratch.

Supplier outreach

Requires drafting, attaching, and sending bespoke emails, often tracked in sprawling spreadsheets.

Follow-ups

Chasing suppliers manually, with no systematic reminder logic.

Quote intake

Messy with Excel sheets and PDFs arrive in different formats, requiring hours of reformatting

Validation and comparison

Involve manual checks for missing data, compliance issues, or pricing anomalies.

Even with an S2P system, the challenges persist. The tool may generate the RFQ, but chasing responses, structuring data, and making supplier decisions still happens in the inbox.   

The result? Sourcing cycles that should take days can drag into weeks, costing opportunities, delaying production, and eroding competitive advantage.

Common Issues from Mishandling RFQs

When procurement teams struggle with RFQ management, the business impact is significant. Common issues include:

In short: mishandled RFQs turn sourcing into a reactive firefight rather than a proactive, strategic function.

Step-by-Step Guide to How the Agent Manages RFQs

Kavida’s RFQ Agent addresses the problem head-on working inside the inbox to automate, structure, and accelerate the entire process from request to decision.

The Business Value of an RFQ Agent

In a team processing 50 RFQs per month, the agent can reclaim over 400 hours, equivalent to adding 2.5 full-time procurement professionals without increasing payroll.

Beyond time savings, the qualitative benefits are equally important: improved supplier relationships, reduced risk, better decisions, and the ability to focus on strategic sourcing rather than admin.

One agent can manage dozens of RFQs simultaneously without increasing headcount.

The Future of RFQ Management is Here

The reality is that email isn’t going away. For procurement, the challenge is not to force suppliers into rigid portals but to meet them where they are while removing every ounce of inefficiency from the process. 

Kavida’s RFQ Agent does exactly that. It lives in your inbox, transforms unstructured supplier quotes into clean, decision-ready intelligence, and drives sourcing cycles at a speed and scale no human team could match. 

The future of procurement will be defined by orchestrating intelligent, data-driven sourcing decisions in real time, unlocking competitive advantage, accelerating production, and freeing teams to focus on high-impact strategy, supplier partnerships, and innovation.

90% of RFQs Still Come by Email — Here’s How the Agent Responds for You

Table of Contents

Author:

Sumit Sinha

CTO & Co- Founder, Kavida.ai

Sumit is our CTO and co-founder, driving Kavida’s technical innovation and leading the development of our agentic AI platform to deliver real-time intelligence, automation, and resilience across global supply chains.