There are many factors that drive companies to take on a B2B integration project. Below, I outline the major factors that our customers have told us over the past year.
ERP Implementation
A company's ERP system is the core of their business processes. In order to utilize the investment, it only makes sense to extend its value by interfacing with internal and external systems and partners. Maybe your company converted from an existing ERP, which will require new interfaces to the EDI or integration platform or you just implemented an ERP system and you need to start from scratch.
B2B Consolidation
Companies can have different platforms to handle EDI, B2B, and/or communications. The reasons for different systems could be due to company acquisitions, customer demands, or older software that was used for a single purpose. This practice requires resources to support and develop on each platform and creates multiple failure points. Consolidating to fewer platforms reduces both resource costs and failure points.
Extend Trading Partner Communities
There are multiple ways to reach trading partners from spreadsheets to email to web forms to traditional EDI. All companies have trading partners with varying degrees of competencies, and in order to eliminate paper and reduce processing time, you may need to incorporate some, or all, of these avenues.
Visibility
It has become increasingly important for companies to be able to "see" what is going on with their electronic business transactions and to be able to provide reporting to management and trading partners. Questions such as "Did you receive the purchase order I sent you?" or "When did you send the invoice?" need to be answered quickly and accurately.
Reduce Partner Onboarding Times
A complaint of business departments and trading partners is the amount of time it takes to onboard a new trading partner. Many factors contribute to this such as lack of resources or a complicated setup and testing process. By streamlining the process through fewer setup screens, providing a self-service web portal, or utilizing templates, companies can reduce setup times and increase customer satisfaction.
Regulatory Requirements
Government regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley, HIPAA, and data retention mandates can require companies to make major modifications to their electronic document systems.
While implementing a B2B strategy to satisfy any one of these drivers will provide benefits to your company and trading community, all of these drivers together smell (playing off Charley's blog post a few weeks ago) of integration modernization.
A comprehensive integration suite can satisfy all of these needs and give your company a competitive advantage that will allow you to move quickly and reduce costs.
