SAP EDI, Cloud Computing and Business Networks

SAP currently serves the largest network of businesses in the world. Over 89,000 organizations utilize SAP technology to run their businesses. Upwards of 70% of the world’s economy is executed by organizations running SAP Applications. I am impressed.

IDC's Research Director of Enterprise Applications, Albert Pang stated, "We have reached a stage where a number of tech vendors, including SAP, have amassed enough of a base of customers and business partners that could really reshape how companies are going to be implementing the next generation of business applications.

SAP II (SAP Information Interchange by Crossgate) is a very intriguing concept. It is a centralized EDI and B2B hub that all SAP users worldwide can connect with to exchange EDI and other electronic business documents.

SII has similarities to Linkedin. Individuals do not need to understand the technology underneath the covers, rather they simply invite other people to connect with them. That is the vision and reality of SII. Companies can simply subscribe to the service and invite their trading partner communities to connect via SII to exchange EDI and other electronic data files.

The power of a connected business network is immense. Each time a new company connects a business process to SII it adds to the global repository. These connections are saved, published and made available to the rest of the SAP community. This, of course, removes the decades old problem that has plagued EDI. That is the problem of no reusability of maps or connections.

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Author: Kevin Benedict
Principal Consultant/Founder
SAP EDI, Mobile Enterprise Computing and Web 2.0 Marketing Consultant
Netcentric Strategies LLC
http://www.netcentric-strategies.com/
www.linkedin.com/in/kevinbenedict
http://b2b-bpo.blogspot.com
http://kevinbenedict.ulitzer.com/
http://mobileenterprisestrategies.blogspot.com/
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