Company fields on Business Application

[MEBoatman]

There are 4 OOB fields on Business Application (cmdb_ci_business_app) that reference the Company table (cmdb_ci_business_app):

1. Company [company]
2. Manufacturer [manufacturer]
3. Support vendor [support_vendor]
4. Vendor [vendor]

We worked with a vendor to implement Enterprise Architecture (well it was APM back then). Here's what I have found:

• We are using Manufacturer, Support vendor, and Vendor.
• We are not using Company at all.
• There are no conditions on Manufacturer - we can select any Company record for this field.
• There ARE conditions on Support vendor and Vendor. The "Vendor" field on the Company record must be true in order to be able to select a company for these fields.

I have a few questions related to this:

1. Are others using the Company field? If so...what for?
2. Is it "normal" to have no conditions on Manufacturer but to have conditions on Support vendor and Vendor?

[pavani_paluri]

Hi @MEBoatman ,

From my experience, the 4 fields on Business Application that point to the Company table:
Company -- usually meant for the internal company or department that owns the app. Many people don’t use it if they already track ownership elsewhere.
Manufacturer -- the maker of the app (like Microsoft, Oracle, or even an internal dev team). No restrictions here. You can pick any company record.
Support vendor -- the company that supports/maintains the app. Only companies flagged as “Vendor = true” can be chosen.
Vendor -- the company that sells/provides the app. Same restriction. Must be marked as a vendor.

Not using Company: very common. Lots of orgs ignore it or repurpose it.
Manufacturer unrestricted:  normal, because not all manufacturers are vendors.
Support vendor & Vendor restricted: also normal, because those fields imply a contractual vendor relationship.

Mark it helpful if this helps you to understand. Accept solution if this give you the answer you're looking for

Kind Regards,

Pavani P

[MEBoatman]

Thanks Pavani. This is helpful! There is a field on Company called "Manufacturer" that seems like it can/should be used to restrict what records can be selected for the Manufacturer field. I'm not sure why ServiceNow would have this field out there but not use it...

[pavani_paluri]

Hi @MEBoatman ,

You’re right — the Manufacturer flag on Company could be used to restrict choices, but ServiceNow doesn’t enforce it out‑of‑the‑box. It’s left open so customers can decide whether they want that restriction.

Mark it helpful if this helps you to understand. Accept solution if this give you the answer you're looking for

Kind Regards,

Pavani P

[Mathew Hillyard]

Hi @MEBoatman 

Company and Publisher (which has been re-labelled from Manufacturer) are not on the Business Application form OOTB and are extended from Base Configuration Item [cmdb], so not fields I would expect to be used unless an org really wants it. We typically track software publishers in SAM, but I guess you could populate the company who sells the Business Application (or an internal company if in-house developed in a large enterprise).

Vendor is the company who sold you the application, and Support vendor the company who provides support. These are quite limited actually, as I've seen more complex situations where multiple vendors are in play (application support, development support, infra support and more) - particularly in enterprises with a web of suppliers. This would not be the first design decision by ServiceNow to add a field to a form that eventually ends up as a related list.

I hope this helps!
Mat