A supplier that wants government work in India is dealing with two procurement paths at the same time. One path is the older way of doing tenders. In that system you see NITs in advance, then you submit bids in stages. A committee reviews the offers, and the whole process usually takes months. The other path is GeM, the Government e-Marketplace. Here, a buyer can raise a purchase order fast. Others can view many details, including pricing. Supplier ratings also play a role. In some cases the full deal finishes before the tender process even reaches the pre-bid step.

These two routes are not just the same thing with a new label. They feel different. The rules change. Competition works in a different way. The timelines also behave differently. So, a supplier must decide where to focus, how to price, and how to spend time on outreach.

In 2026, GeM activity is still rising. The government also keeps pushing for wider use of the platform. So the question of how to split time and money between the two channels is not a simple choice. It is a real strategy. Three years ago, GeM was still finding its footing, and most categories leaned more on traditional tenders.

What GeM Has Become in 2026

GeM is not just a pilot for online procurement anymore. It is now a key and rapidly growing way for the central and state governments to buy goods and services. Buyers use it across many categories. Since the start, the number of transactions has jumped a lot. Today, it plays a visible role in how money flows through government procurement in India. The way the platform works has changed over the years. You can choose different buying methods in the same marketplace. Some purchases happen through direct buying. Other purchases come through competitive bids. There are also deals run through reverse auctions. Which method is used depends on the deal size and the type of requirement.

GeM has also tightened its approach to quality. Seller ratings and product information Now, sellers use ratings and product information more consistently. in a steadier way now. Buyer feedback is also more consistent. That feedback shapes what later buyers decide to purchase.

Payment timing has improved as well. GeM can link with government payment systems. This helps cut down waiting time in the payment stage. In similar procurement categories, payments made through GeM usually arrive sooner than those tied to the older tender route.

State adoption of GeM has grown a lot. The platform now covers more than central government offices. It includes state departments, state PSUs, municipalities, and other public bodies. Before, many of these groups relied on separate state tender portals. With this shift, more buyers are now reachable through GeM. That has widened the market for suppliers listed on the platform.

Several policy moves back this trend. Departments have been told to review GeM first for items that fall under the listed categories. Many entities also have targets that push them to buy through GeM. The range of categories on the platform is also expanding step by step. Taken together, these factors suggest GeM’s share of government buying will keep rising through 2026 and later.

For vendors, the message is clear. In many categories, GeM will not stay a backup option for long. It is turning into a main procurement route. That requires planning and day-to-day follow-up. Suppliers also need to keep investing and managing their presence on the platform.

What Traditional Tendering Still Does That GeM Cannot

Even with GeM growing and getting more policy support, most government buys in the big value buckets still go through the older tender route. Departments use their own portals, CPPP, and state e-procurement sites. In these areas, the GeM model does not fit well.

Many deals need more than a ready-made listing. The work can be complex, tied to one project, and built around detailed technical needs. Think about a road contract, a large IT system rollout, or a specialised consultancy task. Each case has its own setting, site constraints, and needs of the buying office. Because of that, the catalogue-based approach that GeM relies on does not work.

These tenders also ask for steps that GeM cannot handle well. Buyers often require full specs, technical bids, site visits, and evaluation by committees. They may also need some negotiation during the process. That kind of workflow sits outside what GeM is set up to do.

For high-value contracts, the case for a full competitive tender is still strong. When the money and technical checks are hard, agencies keep using the traditional system. The effort to run an open tender makes sense for a ten crore or hundred crore contract. It does not look the same for a ten lakh purchase of a standard item.

Some procurement categories are not on GeM yet. In other cases, GeM product specs do not show the technical details a deal needs. For those gaps, agencies still use old channels and run tenders the traditional way.

GeM uptake is also not complete across all states. In those places, purchases go through state portals first. They follow the local procurement rules. Those rules may not match GeM’s mandatory use steps. Suppliers who want work from a specific state government should stay active in that state’s tender process, even if GeM shows some related options.

Traditional tenders can fit better when the work depends on how a supplier plans and delivers. The way proposals are scored for quality and cost often suits categories where the team and method matter as much as the final rate. Examples include professional services, design, research, and complex managed services. These areas need a real check of the proposal, not only a quick comparison of price. In practice, traditional tenders support that type of review better than GeM does today.

The Fundamental Structural Differences That Drive Strategy

Beyond the category-level differences, GeM and traditional tendering differ structurally in ways that affect every aspect of how a supplier should position, price, and operate in each channel.

Visibility and discovery work differently across the two channels. On GeM, your listing is continuously visible to every government buyer with access to the platform across India, at any time, without a specific tender notice being published. A buyer who needs what you sell can find your listing, check your price and rating, and place an order today, without you having done anything beyond maintaining an active, well-described listing. Traditional tendering requires the government to publish a specific tender, the supplier to identify and monitor that tender, prepare and submit a bid, and wait for the evaluation process to complete.

This difference in discovery dynamics is fundamental. GeM creates inbound opportunity flow for listed suppliers, with buyers finding sellers. Traditional tendering creates event-based opportunity flow, with specific tenders that suppliers must actively pursue. Both require effort but of a different type, and the return on that effort is distributed very differently across time.

Price transparency is a defining characteristic of GeM that has no equivalent in traditional tendering. Your listed price on GeM is visible to every buyer and every competitor. Buyers can compare your price against every other listed seller in the same category in real time. This transparency creates continuous competitive pressure on pricing in a way that traditional sealed-bid tendering does not, where competitor prices are revealed only at bid opening after all bids are submitted.

The competitive implication is that price management on GeM is an ongoing, dynamic activity rather than a bid-by-bid decision. Setting your GeM listed price requires a continuous assessment of the competitive landscape, your cost position, and the price at which you are likely to win orders without sacrificing unnecessary margin. Getting this balance wrong, by pricing too high and watching orders go to competitors, or too low and eroding margin across a high transaction volume, has compounding consequences on GeM in a way that a single mispriced traditional bid does not.

Order frequency and size differ significantly between channels. GeM is typically the channel for smaller, more frequent, more standardised purchases. Traditional tendering is typically the channel for larger, less frequent, more complex requirements. A supplier whose offering is well-suited to both channels may find that GeM generates many small transactions while traditional tendering generates fewer but larger contract awards. The operational model to serve both efficiently, including order fulfilment, invoicing, quality control , and customer management, needs to be calibrated accordingly.

Payment timelines have historically been somewhat faster on GeM than in traditional procurement for comparable categories, partly because GeM's integration with government financial systems reduces some of the manual processing steps, and partly because GeM orders are typically for standardised goods where dispute and certification complexity is lower. This is not a universal rule, and payment delays occur on GeM as they do in traditional procurement, but the general pattern is that GeM's payment cycle is moderately shorter for standard goods procurement.

Rating and reputation function as competitive differentiators on GeM in a way that has no direct equivalent in traditional tendering. A high seller rating on GeM, built through consistent delivery, quality, and responsiveness, influences buyer purchasing decisions across the entire platform, compounding over time into a competitive advantage that new or poorly-rated sellers cannot quickly replicate. In traditional tendering, past performance influences future bids primarily through completion certificates and reference clients, which are evaluated manually and occasionally in the context of specific bids.

Category by Category: Where the Balance Sits in 2026

The right balance between GeM and traditional tendering is not uniform across all suppliers and all offerings. It depends heavily on what you are selling and to whom.

Standard, catalogued goods with consistent specifications, stable pricing, and broad government demand across multiple departments and categories, including office supplies, basic IT hardware, standard furniture, vehicles, uniforms, and common consumables, are strongly GeM-oriented in 2026. The mandatory use provisions, the buyer preference for the convenience of direct GeM ordering, and the platform's growing category depth make GeM the primary channel for these categories and traditional tendering increasingly secondary.

For suppliers in these categories, GeM listing quality, pricing competitiveness, ratings management, and delivery performance are the primary competitive levers. Traditional tendering may still produce occasional opportunities in this category range but should be treated as supplementary rather than primary.

Specialised goods with significant technical variation, including industrial equipment, scientific instruments, medical devices, specialised materials, and custom-engineered products, remain significantly weighted toward traditional tendering despite GeM's expansion. The GeM catalogue model struggles to accommodate the technical nuance of these categories, and government buyers in these categories continue to prefer the specification-driven evaluation that traditional tendering provides.

For suppliers in these categories, traditional tendering is the primary channel, with GeM serving as a supplementary route for the more standardised elements of their product range where catalogue listing is feasible.

IT products, software, and technology services sit across both channels with increasing GeM weight. Hardware and standard software are well-represented on GeM and are increasingly procured there by preference. Custom IT services, system integration, software development, and complex managed services remain in traditional tendering. Suppliers in this sector typically need both channels active simultaneously, serving commodity hardware demand through GeM while pursuing complex service contracts through traditional tenders.

Construction works, civil engineering, and infrastructure remain almost entirely in traditional tendering. GeM's architecture is fundamentally not suited to project-based construction procurement, and there is no near-term prospect of this changing. Suppliers in these categories should maintain exclusive focus on traditional tendering and treat any GeM presence as minimal and peripheral.

Professional services including consultancy, legal, audit, design, and research remain in traditional tendering, typically using quality-and-cost-based selection that requires technical proposal evaluation. GeM has made some inroads into lower-complexity service categories, but the professional services sector is predominantly a traditional tender market.

Facility management, security services, housekeeping, and support services are increasingly procured through GeM for smaller requirements, with traditional tendering remaining the channel for larger, more complex service contracts. For suppliers in these categories, both channels require attention and the split between them depends on the typical contract size and complexity of opportunities in their target geography and client base.

How to Assess Your Own Category and Position

Picking the right place to invest starts with a clear look at what you offer and what each channel needs. You can keep the check simple and still get a good answer.

First, does your business sell what buyers can find on GeM? If yes, does the GeM listing describe your product in a way that matches how people actually shop for it? If your item fits the GeM way of listing and other firms are already selling similar goods there, then GeM is worth your immediate focus. If the catalog pages cannot show your offering well enough, then you should rely on normal tendering.

Next, compare deal size. Look at what a typical GeM order looks like for your category. Then compare it with the typical deal size from traditional tenders. If GeM orders in your category are usually small, then each order brings in less money. You would need more orders for GeM to matter. If the work to stay visible on GeM costs more than the money you make from those usual small orders, then the payback may not be good enough to justify major spending.

Which government teams do you want to sell to, and how do they buy in your space? In most cases, central departments have moved further along in using GeM than state offices and local bodies. If you focus on how your chosen buyers procure, not on the blended average of all governments, you get a clearer view of where your sales chances really are.

How strong are you on GeM compared with your standing in older buying routes like tenders? Some sellers that do well in traditional tendering later learn that their costs are too high for GeM. On GeM, prices are easier to compare, so profit room can shrink fast. Other sellers, meanwhile, use better operations and bigger scale to keep prices low on GeM. For them, GeM can work better than traditional tendering, since traditional tenders often leave more space for subjective checks.

Building a Dual-Channel Strategy That Works

For many suppliers, the GeM versus tender choice is neither one nor the other. If your catalog covers more than one tight product bucket, you usually need both paths. The key is to split your time and money across them in a way that matches what each one brings to your business.

A dual approach on GeM only works when you keep it alive. That means your page stays up-to-date and the details match what you truly sell. Your rates should be checked often so buyers see you are in line with what others charge. On-time delivery matters, because it affects your score. You also need to reply to buyer questions in a clear and timely way, since that helps trust and can lead to repeat orders.

If your GeM page was made two years ago and nothing has changed, then it is not an active channel. It can turn into a drag, and you may receive orders you cannot handle well.

Traditional tendering needs a disciplined way of working, with clear choices on where to bid. The steps we laid out in the earlier posts for tracking the pipeline, checking eligibility, keeping papers in order, and preparing bids still hold for normal tenders. Those parts cannot be swapped out just because GeM is now present. A tender does not win by chance. Suppliers need to go after it on purpose and get ready in detail. That skill has to stay strong even when GeM starts taking a larger share of buying.

Next, you need pricing plans that match each route to purchase. The price you list on GeM is meant to fit a shared public market, so it has to be in line and openly competitive. A price for a tender is used in a closed process where bids are judged against set competitors for one stated scope. These are not the same math. They ask for different checks and different thinking. If you treat both channels as if they run on the same pricing logic, you often end up with bids that miss the mark for one side or the other.

You also need operations that can run both styles of orders without slowdowns. Buying twenty units of a standard product on GeM is a very different job from signing a traditional tender contract for a complex service that spans several years. Each case needs its own fulfillment steps. It is hard to build one operating setup that fits both and still keep them separate in practice. Suppliers who sell through both channels at the same time face this as a real management task.

The 2026 Decision: Where to Invest Incremental Resources

If a supplier is doing better in one sales channel than the other, and they are deciding where to add more business development time and operational effort, the 2026 picture suggests a few clear moves.

First, if you win well through regular tendering but your GeM footprint is still small, and your product space is one where GeM is growing fast, then GeM activation should be at the top of your list. The time when a strong tender player can hold its ground without a real GeM setup is getting shorter, especially in areas where GeM is being used more often.

Second, if you are active on GeM but you are not going after regular tenders in that same category, it helps to check whether tender deals exist outside what GeM can cover today. Some suppliers notice a pattern: GeM often handles the smaller ticket items, while traditional tendering can open the door to bigger contracts with better margins. The catalogue approach on GeM cannot fit everything.

Third, if you already work in both channels, focus should shift from adding more channels to keeping quality high in how you operate. On GeM, strong delivery results help guard your rating. In traditional tendering, good bid quality and strict compliance are what lead to wins. Spreading effort into extra categories or channels where your strengths are weaker is usually not the best use of resources.

Final Thought

GeM and traditional tenders are not rival paths where one win means a loss in the other. They work side by side. Each one fits different parts of public buying. Vendors that build real strength in both areas can reach more of the work the government puts out.

What happens in the market will keep moving. GeM will reach more buyers over time. More states are also likely to adopt it. New rules will push extra categories onto the site. If a supplier waits and reacts late, it will feel like it is always behind. If a supplier plans early and keeps investing, that two-way setup can turn into a stronger edge as public procurement changes.

In 2026, it is not really a choice between GeM and older tendering. The real issue is how well you handle both.