Business Soſtware
From fax machines to AI: why many mid-market wholesalers are still being leſt behind
Business Software B
harat Sharma, founder and CEO at Apex B2B, explains how B2B commerce has quietly evolved into one of the most complex areas of digital transformation, and why electrical wholesalers and buying groups are reaching a turning point.
B2B commerce has undergone a quiet revolution over the past two decades. For many electrical wholesalers and buying groups, the journey has moved from fax machines and paper catalogues to ERP systems, customer portals, mobile ordering, and now AI- driven commerce experiences. Enterprise adoption of AI is accelerating, with more organisations moving from experimentation to production use cases. Furthermore, recent figures show that 79% of B2B businesses are looking to invest in technologies that improve purchasing experiences for customers.
30 | electrical wholesaler June 2026
Yet despite rapid technological progress, many mid-market wholesalers still operate with highly manual and fragmented processes behind the scenes.
Orders continue to arrive through emails, spreadsheets, and phone calls. Product information sits across disconnected systems. Sales teams manually process repeat orders, customer-specific pricing, and approvals, while procurement and finance teams spend valuable time reconciling data instead of focusing on growth and customer service.
The reality is that B2B commerce has become one of the most operationally complex forms of digital transformation, yet mid-market wholesalers have historically had the fewest practical options available to modernise effectively.
The operational reality of wholesale B2B commerce is fundamentally different from
consumer eCommerce. Electrical wholesalers and buying groups operate in a highly complex environment involving large product catalogues, negotiated pricing, repeat ordering, layered approvals, trade credit, and strict financial controls.
Behind every order sits a combination of ERP systems, warehouse operations, supplier dependencies, fulfilment workflows, and customer-specific processes that all need to work together accurately.
In many businesses, these systems have evolved incrementally over decades, often resulting in fragmented technology stacks where ERP, pricing, CRM, inventory, and eCommerce systems all operate separately. To bridge the gaps, teams rely heavily on spreadsheets, manual workarounds, and email-based processes. While these workflows may function operationally, they create significant inefficiencies. Teams spend valuable time
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