This presentation was the keynote delivered at an EDIFICE plenary in Brussels in May 2014. EDIFICE is a European based industry association driving B2B standards across the high tech industry. The presentation discusses how once connected to a global B2B network such as OpenText Trading Grid, how a company can potentially utilise the information flowing across the extended enterprise and hence obtain greater value from a B2B platform, rather than just exchanging transaction based B2B messages. GXS has been a member of EDIFICE for more than 25 years however this was the first time that the attendees had heard of OpenText, so the first few slides provide a high level introduction to the company - Updated May 2014
SPEAKER NOTES
The initial wave of IT innovations focused on structured data leading to the development of back office services and systems.
ERP gave us a great ability to use structured information, and enterprises invested.
Now the vast majority of enterprise information is unstructured – documents, technical drawings, video, social and more. The volume and variety of this info is growing at a staggering rate. Fortunately, our ability to extract value from this information is now rising too, and enterprise IT needs to shift its investment accordingly.
It’s the year 2014 and we live in the time of an unprecedented technologic disruption. While the year 2020 is still over five years out, it is close enough for us to get the idea about the magnitude of changes through which will go our society, our personal lives, and our business environment by the time the year 2020 arrives.
Let’s take a look at those changes and their impact!
SPEAKER NOTES
We are entering the digital age and information is becoming the currency of the digital economy. No longer it is the size, scale, access to resources or geographic presence that drive the competitive advantage of an enterprise. It is the degree to which it can take advantage of information to innovate and grow.
SPEAKER NOTES
We are living in a time of massive disruption where information and the way we use it is changing the rules of business.
Information drives innovation and growth. The recent innovation in technologies ranging from mobile devices, analytics, and social media, to cloud computing and the Internet of Things are breeding innovations that are challenging the established rules of business.
The goal for every organization is to transform itself for the age of digital economy – to become a digital enterprise. In a digital enterprise, the use of information transforms every corporate function and impacts all key stakeholder:
Employees
Customers
Suppliers
SPEAKER NOTES
The way you interact with customers has started changing already. Whether you are selling to consumers or to businesses, your customers are making buying decisions before they ever engage with your sales force. Customers are conducting more and more purchases online across more and more sectors. By the year 2020, we will be buying online even goods that are today considered impractical to sell online such as perishables, cars, and real estate. Marketing will increasingly focus on personalized, relevant, and engaging delivery of message – because everything else will be either noise or illegal.
SPEAKER NOTES
As with the automotive sector, GXS has very good coverage in the high tech industry, partly due to the fact that we have been in business and supporting this industry for more than forty years. We provide B2B services to companies across the high tech value chain from contract manufacturers through to enterprise server companies and semi-conductor manufacturers. Once again many of companies will be using GXS for communications related B2B services and there is a great upsell opportunity to Managed Services. The Far East has been the traditional manufacturing hub for this particular industry but there are also key manufacturing hubs in Eastern Europe and South America, particularly in Brazil.
As with automotive, GXS participates in a number of industry associations. The most active that we are currently participating in is EDIFICE in Europe. This group has been around for more than twenty years and helps to define B2B standards for the high tech industry. They have recently merged with their sister organisation in ASPAC called AsiaB2B and as of 2013 they have established a new EDIFICE group in North America. So EDIFICE has become a truly global industry association and GXS will continue to participate in this particular group.
The high tech industry folder on Sharepoint is shown at the bottom of this slide.
Manufacturing related supply chains have been impacted by many external forces over the years, from the global recession, to human rights issues and strikes in China, from natural disasters to the so called omni-channel effect that is changing consumer buying patterns. Manufacturers have had to build increased flexibility and agility into their supply chains so that they can address these and any future business challenges.
I will go through some automotive case studies in a moment but I wanted to try and illustrate on one slide the importance of GXS in supporting the global automotive industry. What I will show you is what I describe as the automotive B2B – ecosystem, which looks at how each company is related to each other and more importantly the type of GXS solutions they are using.
I originally created this slide for the GEFCO Managed Services project which is currently underway in Europe.
Explain slide
So this slide quite nicely summarises our focus in the automotive sector. Primarily at the car manufacturer or Tier 1, Tier 2 supplier level. In fact late last year we closed a deal with Johnson Controls in North America for $8M, they are a key tier 1 supplier to the automotive industry. Given that there are nearly ten to twenty times as many tier 1 suppliers in the world as car manufacturers these types of companies provide a good opportunity for us, especially as many of these companies, for example Bosch and Continental are already connected to GXS using us for messaging services only.
Trading Partner Enablement Options where the size of the trading partner matches the complexity of the Enabler.
Trading Partner Enablement Options where the size of the trading partner matches the complexity of the Enabler.
When entering a new market, especially one of the emerging countries, there are a number of B2B specific challenges that need to be addressed:
There will typically be very limited B2B knowledge and skills available within an emerging market, GXS has dedicated B2B resources in all the key emerging markets, including on the ground support to help with both implementation and on-going support
Quite often trading partners in the emerging markets will be using manual, paper based processes and therefore to encourage participation in a supply chain it is crucial to offer B2B tools that even the smallest company can use via a simple dial up connection. GXS offers a number of B2B tools, depending on the technical capabilities of the trading partner concerned, from web form solutions through to Microsoft based tools. Ensuring that you can achieve 100% participation in your supply chain activities will either make or break your international expansion plans.
When entering a new market you may be forced to embrace local standards, for example the new e-invoicing standards in Brazil or supporting the many XML based standards that have emerged in China. GXS offers any to any mapping capabilities and we can therefore remove the complexity of supporting numerous document types in different countries around the world.
Finally, one last challenge is trying to get problems resolved quickly as they arise, whether during the implementation phase of a new B2B platform or after the platform has gone live. GXS offers a 24/7 follow the sun multi-lingual support service, so no matter where you are looking to do business you can be assured that problems associated with your B2B platform are resolved as quickly as possible.
When entering a new market, especially one of the emerging countries, there are a number of B2B specific challenges that need to be addressed:
There will typically be very limited B2B knowledge and skills available within an emerging market, GXS has dedicated B2B resources in all the key emerging markets, including on the ground support to help with both implementation and on-going support
Quite often trading partners in the emerging markets will be using manual, paper based processes and therefore to encourage participation in a supply chain it is crucial to offer B2B tools that even the smallest company can use via a simple dial up connection. GXS offers a number of B2B tools, depending on the technical capabilities of the trading partner concerned, from web form solutions through to Microsoft based tools. Ensuring that you can achieve 100% participation in your supply chain activities will either make or break your international expansion plans.
When entering a new market you may be forced to embrace local standards, for example the new e-invoicing standards in Brazil or supporting the many XML based standards that have emerged in China. GXS offers any to any mapping capabilities and we can therefore remove the complexity of supporting numerous document types in different countries around the world.
Finally, one last challenge is trying to get problems resolved quickly as they arise, whether during the implementation phase of a new B2B platform or after the platform has gone live. GXS offers a 24/7 follow the sun multi-lingual support service, so no matter where you are looking to do business you can be assured that problems associated with your B2B platform are resolved as quickly as possible.
One of the main benefits of integrating an ERP and B2B system is that it is then possible to establish what can best be described as a firewall around a company’s ERP system.
The aim of this is to protect the ERP system and ensure that incorrect data does not enter the ERP environment. Whether you are trying to protect your ERP system from information being sent in by customers, distributors, logistics providers, suppliers or financial institutions, integrating to a B2B system can provide a higher level of security around your ERP applications and downstream business processes.
GXS Active Intelligence solution helps to protect your ERP related systems by ensuring that only clean and accurate information that obides by predefined business rules and checking procedures is allowed to enter your ERP environment.
One of the main benefits of integrating an ERP and B2B system is that it is then possible to establish what can best be described as a firewall around a company’s ERP system.
The aim of this is to protect the ERP system and ensure that incorrect data does not enter the ERP environment. Whether you are trying to protect your ERP system from information being sent in by customers, distributors, logistics providers, suppliers or financial institutions, integrating to a B2B system can provide a higher level of security around your ERP applications and downstream business processes.
GXS Active Intelligence solution helps to protect your ERP related systems by ensuring that only clean and accurate information that obides by predefined business rules and checking procedures is allowed to enter your ERP environment.