What Are Trading Partners? – Modalius

In Modalius, you exchange EDI files with other organizations through partner relationships. Understanding how Partners and Business Units work is essential for managing your EDI connections.

Partners vs. Business Units

Modalius uses a two-tier system to organize trading relationships:

Partner - The organization as a whole. A Partner represents a company or trading entity and manages billing, user subscriptions, and organization-wide settings.
Business Unit - A specific operational identity within a Partner. Business Units are used for sending and receiving EDI files, managing SFTP connections, and establishing relationships with other organizations.

Example: A large retailer (Partner) might have separate Business Units for each distribution center or division, allowing them to manage EDI files for each location independently.

A single Partner can have multiple Business Units. Each Business Unit has its own public ID, EDI identifiers, SFTP credentials, and connection configurations. This allows organizations to maintain distinct operational identities for different parts of their business.

What is a Partner Relationship?

A partner relationship is a connection agreement between two Business Units that enables EDI file exchange. Before you can send or receive files with another organization, you must establish a relationship between the relevant Business Units.

Each relationship connects:

Your Business Unit (as the requestor or the approver)
The other organization's Business Unit
Agreement on which party is the primary party in the relationship

Important: Relationships are formed between Business Units, not between Partners directly. If your organization has multiple Business Units, each one establishes its own relationships independently.

Relationship Status

Partner relationships can have one of four statuses:

Status	Meaning	Can Exchange Files?
Pending Response	Request sent, waiting for the other party to accept or reject	No
Accepted	Both parties agreed, connection is active	Yes
Rejected	The approver declined the request	No
Revoked	The requestor cancelled or ended the relationship	No

Discoverability

To find other organizations to connect with, Business Units can be set as discoverable. When a Business Unit is discoverable, other Modalius users can search for it and request a relationship.

If a Business Unit is not discoverable, you can still connect by entering their public ID directly when submitting a request, or by contacting the other organization to coordinate the connection setup.

Viewing Your Partners

To see your current partner relationships:

Navigate to Partners in the main menu
View the list of all relationships where your Business Unit is either the requestor or approver
Click on a relationship to see details, history, and available actions

For each relationship, you can see:

Both Business Unit names and logos
Current status
Who is the primary party
Last file activity date
Relationship history (when it was created, accepted, etc.)

Tip: If your organization has multiple Business Units, you can filter the Partners list by a specific Business Unit to see only the relationships relevant to that unit.