New EDI Approach for SAP NetWeaver® Process Integration Users

This is a very interesting article that describes SAP's new strategy for supporting EDI and B2B requirements in a NetWeaver-centric manner through their investment in Crossgate, an EDI and B2B exchange that SAP now co-owns. This network approach and adoption of cloud computing strategies brings a new twist to traditional EDI.

Atlanta, Georgia, April 7, 2009 –Crossgate Inc., the global expert in business-to-business integration (B2B), continues to grow its customer base by offering an alternative deployment strategy through a fixed-cost EDI and B2B managed service.

In light of recent economic uncertainties around the world, many companies are keeping a closer eye on operating expenses and trimming budgets by finding ways to consolidate business processes. For SAP customers, the clear answer to integrating internal and external processes is SAP NetWeaver Process Integration (SAP NetWeaver PI).

More than 3,000 organizations have decided to use the SAP NetWeaver PI offering as their business-oriented SOA middleware to perform application-to-application (A2A) and business-to-business (EDI and B2B) integration across a business network. It includes an Enterprise Services Repository, an enterprise services bus, pre-packaged integration templates, and technical and application adaptors to support end-to-end process integration.

SAP NetWeaver PI goes beyond a pure technology focus with pre-packaged business integration templates such as integration scenarios, process components, interface description and global data types…etc. to reduce organizations’ integration TCO, enabling customers to focus on the integrated business results.

By leveraging SAP’s existing co-ownership and Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) relationship with Crossgate, SAP NetWeaver PI customers can also choose an on demand EDI approach for B2B integration that does not require additional investments in building mappings, software, servers or hiring staff to maintain trading partner connectivity.

Crossgate B2B360 Services Powered by SAP® opens the door to more than 40,000 business partners that are pre-integrated in Crossgate’s Business-Ready Network. For customers dealing with global customer and government requests, this EDI managed service provides the perfect complement to address line of business initiatives while operating under tighter budgets and hiring restrictions.

Most IT executives are tasked with ‘doing more with less.’ This alternative approach to EDI maintains an SAP-compliant strategy while reducing the current and ongoing costs of supporting ever-changing B2B requirements. Crossgate B2B360 Services Powered by SAP addresses the key issues found with traditional in-house EDI and B2B integration development.

Instead of providing only generic B2B data standards such as ANSI X12 and EDIFACT, along with mapping toolsets, this managed services approach to EDI includes partner-specific mappings, communications, and business processes. More importantly, the interface with Crossgate is fully aligned with SAP NetWeaver and Service-oriented Architecture. And unlike in-house B2B solutions where time and materials costs can quickly skyrocket out of control, Crossgate’s business model offers fixed-price predictability.

B2B360 Services Powered by SAP also provides turnkey service extensions for SAP ERP, SAP Business All-In-One, SAP Business ByDesign, SAP Supply Network Collaboration, SAP Transportation Management, and a variety of other SAP solutions. Crossgate’s fully integrated, fixed-cost solution will help customers improve productivity, address global e-business mandates, and increase organizational agility so they can meet business challenges both now and in the future.

To date, 47 customers in various industries and geographical locations have contracted for Crossgate’s B2B360 Services Powered by SAP, and that number continues to grow. “2.7 new customers every working day choose SAP NetWeaver PI to help them integrate their processes across application and business partner network without being mired in technical integration hurdles,” says Ken Tsai, Director, Enterprise Solution Marketing, SAP NetWeaver PI. “With SAP’s relationship with Crossgate (SAP is a co-owner), customers can continue to enjoy the same benefit of business-oriented integration through a managed services approach to EDI that allows them to simplify partner on-boarding and enablementprocess.”

If you would like to discuss any of these subjects in more detail please email me.
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EDI, B2B Strategies http://www.blogger.com/b2b-bpo.blogspot.com/
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