Data Synchronisation
If you already know about Master Data Management and Global Data Synchronisation and want to know how Detail4Retail can help, click here [requires hyperlink]. If you need to know more first, read on.
For even the smallest businesses, the organisations that they trade with expect them to be IT-literate. At the very least everyone is expected to be on email, but with the growth of EDI (Electronic Data Interchange), increasingly the expectation is that orders, invoices and other product-related information should be transferred electronically.
The premise of Global Data Synchronisation is that life would be ‘easier’, and there would be far fewer errors between trading partners, if there was one consistent version of the data about any given product, that was used by all trading partners. . Traditionally businesses have struggled to ensure that common product information is available throughout the supply chain, despite the fact that they all seem to have ‘got there in the end’. Enabling this ‘one version’ approach electronically is what GDS and the Global Data Synchronisation Network (GDSN) seek to achieve.
In simple terms, GDS enables product information from one trading partner, such as a supplier, to be made available to any chosen trading partner, such as a retailer, using a standardised process, via the GDSN. The GDSN consists of a global network of ‘certified data pools’ that enable product information to be captured and exchanged in a secure environment, all conforming to global standards. The standards-body that governs the GDSN worldwide is GS1; GS1 UK governs the UK market. The GS1 UK ‘Data Crunch’ report, published in September 2009, revealed that retailers and suppliers in the UK alone stand to benefit from savings of an estimated £1 billion as data inconsistencies across the industry are ironed out. [Link to data crunch report].
At Detail4Retail we have a good working relationship with GS1 UK and the major data pool providers, and we can:
- Help you navigate your way through the GDS ‘treacle’
- Explain how and why you can benefit from GDS
- Review your existing Master Data Management in relation to the benefits from GDS
- Advise on what you should be looking to do, with whom, why and when, based on your supply chain, your customers, your business
- Work closely with GS1 UK and all of the major data pools operating in the UK market