| Abstract: | New release aims to give manufacturers better management of product-related data across the supply chain, including pricing and attribute descriptions that align with those of trading partners. |
| Keywords: | FullTilt, product information management, PIM, master data management, MDM, Perfect Product Suite, GDSN |
FullTilt Solutions, a purveyor of product information management software, has announced the release of Perfect Product Suite 6.0, a software package that aims to provide a unified, comprehensive view of product information across the supply chain.
The Perfect Product Suite is made up of four main components, including Product Viewer, which highlights product differences in side-by-side comparisons; Import Manager, which normalizes disparate data in a centralized repository; Product Manager, which stores user-defined global and product-group attributes and edits; and Export Manager, which exports product information into almost any format and syndicates custom catalogs to meet channel partner/customer requirements.
Supporting modules include the FullTilt Workflow Manager Module, which handles business rules for product lifecycle processes such as new product introductions, campaign launches, and end-of-life efforts for individual products; and the FullTilt Business Process Management System (BPMS), which automates workflow from department to department or entity to entity.
The Perfect Product Suite uses a metadata-driven model that allows users to define and extend data definitions, including definitions specific to trading partners. According to FullTilt, release 6.0 provides improved automation and user control specifically addressing extensible, custom workflow; the ability to conditionally route information; capabilities to develop scripts for comprehensive editing and transformation; the ability to define attributes specific to product relationships; comprehensive price information management; and powerful new reporting capabilities.
One of version 6.0's most significant capabilities, according to the company, was developed in response to customer input: allowing for more flexibility in the management, editing, and reporting of pricing information. This functionality could help a distributor, for example, who receives data from various manufacturers who all apply different definitions to the term "price" when exchanging data among their trading partners, said Andy Fedun, FullTilt's vice president of sales, in an interview with Managing Automation.
Fedun said the pricing features in Perfect Product Suite 6.0 complement the ongoing efforts of the Global Data Synchronization Network (GDSN), an Internet-based system of interoperable data pools and a global registry that companies around the world use to exchange standardized and synchronized supply chain data with their trading partners. The GSDN underscores the need for standardized pricing with a database of case studies describing manufacturers forced to make costly invoice deductions due to pricing discrepancies.
Another new function in the 6.0 release provides data validation and transformation capabilities based on source- and target-specific business rules for optimally processing product data synchronization internally and externally among manufacturers, distributors, and retailers. The GDSN also documents examples of the negative effects of variable product attributes among trading partners -- including key attributes such as height, weight, length, net weight, gross weight -- for which discrepancies can lead to further invoice deductions.
A recent report by AMR Research states that while up to half of the trouble tickets logged by enterprise help desks are traced to master data errors, many companies are still treating data quality issues as isolated, one-time events. The report goes on to stress the importance of an ongoing, overall master data management (MDM) strategy that is integrated into an enterprise's core business processes.
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