Managing Automation - April 2008 - (Page 36)

[ INTEGRATION ] shops and lumber yards that don’t use EDI. The GIS product solved the problem. “We can take any type of input — from a simple Excel spreadsheet, to an e-mail, or any file — and import it into the system and it is formatted,” says Gary Gretka, EDI coordinator at Therma-Tru. The setup is non-intrusive, Gretka says, as the VAN provides all of the handshaking with external partners and a transaction engine that offers data mapping tools for managing orders. It also provides an audit trail, which, with about 2,300 transactions moving through the Therma-Tru VAN each day, adds to the comfort level that nothing is lost. Another side benefit is that “it has reduced data entry reduced errors, and is letting people do other things to increase customer service,” he says. That gets back to the people-to-people element that Kinaxis’ Littleson refers to, allowing people to make proactive decisions rather than reacting to unexpected events. ACCEPTING CHANGE In February, Kinaxis rolled out an on-demand service called RapidResponse for Demand Management, providing front-line decision-makers with the tools to sense demand and supply misalignments and to drive responses. It adds personal alerting and “what-if” analysis that let the user create a new supply scenario based on a virtual copy of all of the supply chain data. So, if an order is changed at the last minute from 100 gadgets to 200, the user inserts the order into the “always-on” analytics tool, which runs the order through and determines what impact the new demand will have on supply. “It can tell you within secmanagingautomation.com onds if you can do it or not,” Littleson says. It also allows RELATED ARTICLES: Beating the Odds in Global Supply the user to drill down to find www.managingautomation.com/globalsupply out the reason why someBoeing’s Big Supply Chain Wager thing can’t be done, he says. www.managingautomation.com/boeing The answers generated News Analysis: VAN Eases into 21st Century from the virtual simulations www.managingautomation.com/van are based on the actual data collected from a variety of COMPANIES MENTIONED: sources at different sites. E2open The Kinaxis RapidResponse www.managingautomation.com/e2open5 ser ver, which sits in a seIBM cure data center, leverages www.managingautomation.com/IBM a technology that Kinaxis IDS Scheer calls “the glass pipeline.” It www.managingautomation.com/IDS is the conduit that pulls inKinaxis formation from heterogewww.managingautomation.com/kinaxis neous supply networks, Sterling Commerce pooling it into a common www.managingautomation.com/sterlingcommerce data model that sits within maonline the on-demand service. The underpinning architecture is an important part of the setup, as it enables the multi-enterprise visibility that is so important in the new B2B network. “But the application is what empowers people it is geared toward responding to changes in a profitable way,” Littleson says. There is a need for speed in this global economy, and a need to know what’s going on with partners. E2open, created seven years ago to solve the supply chain issues in the electronics industry, was built from the ground up as a multienterprise platform. Today, this e-business hub can address any industry. The E2open approach is more along the lines of a delivery service model, much like the phone network. When you have a conversation over the phone, you are leveraging a service provider. The content, however, is kept between the parties on the call. Similarly, E2open’s delivery service approach has five layers. The bottom layer is about integration: “The trick is supporting as many options as possible,” says Lorenzo Martinelli, E2open’s senior vice president. The second layer examines the data to see whether there are any mismatches and then creates exceptions to notify the right people. The third layer takes transactional data and applies business intelligence, providing a performance scorecard. The fourth layer allows document-sharing and collaboration. And the fifth layer, the technical side of things, is focused on keeping the network available and secure. Collecting information is one thing, but measuring, checking, and gaining visibility into exceptions is more important. “The faster you get information that something is going wrong, the higher probability you have of making an adjustment,” Martinelli says. “When people don’t have information, there are risks associated with it.” Step one, Martinelli and others say, is recognizing that you must have a strategy that takes AMR’s PBN model into account. Don’t just automate; collaborate. Manufacturers are beginning to understand the value of the new managed services. “It’s starting to happen, but not in this big, comprehensive corporate-wide initiative where everyone is linked together,” AMR’s Fontanella says. But give it another five years or so, he says, and “people will understand the value and necessity of communicating electronically, and the fact that it is possible.” After all, most companies will take the time to integrate with an important partner or customer. “The dream of B2B is to treat an entire community like you do the most strategic customers,” Fontanella says. s April 36 2008 http://managingautomation.com http://www.managingautomation.com/globalsupply http://www.managingautomation.com/boeing http://www.managingautomation.com/van http://www.managingautomation.com/e2open5 http://www.managingautomation.com/IBM http://www.managingautomation.com/IDS http://www.managingautomation.com/kinaxis http://www.managingautomation.com/sterlingcommerce

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Managing Automation - April 2008 Contents Take 1 Camstar to Introduce Software that Combines Quality, MES, and Intelligence SAP Revamps Maintenance, Raises Fees 29% New TAGSYS Chief Sees Opportunity in Broader Approach Siemens Turns to Security Weaver for Compliance Supply Chain Company Takes Next Step in U.S. Notes Cover Story: The Long Climb Special Report - Undertanding Enterprise Performance Management Caught Between Supply and Demand Taking Off the Blindfold No Room for Error Product Scan Advertiser Index Next

Managing Automation - April 2008

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