Re: vendor managed inventory

>Has anyone had any experience with VMI (Vendor Managed Inventory)?  What
>EDI transactions are you using?  What does the software on the 400 side
>do?
>
>Thanks


We have just implemented two VMI systems over the past 3 months. We are
using mapics XA/3 and its electronic commerce(EC) module. We were able to
incorporate the 852 transaction into EC and have it interface with mapics.
We are utilizing mapics' inventory management (IM) module as well as its
customer order management (COM) module.

The 852 will be sent by your TP into your system. These transactions should
contain information about the item. What was sold. What is on the shelf.
What is broken. Etc...

These 852 transactions are used to increment/decrement or replace the
quantities for that item within mapics. It is also important to retain sales
data for a number of periods by location and item. This information is used
to more accurately determine the replacement quantities.

THe module will send this information to some sort of forecasting system, we
are using an NT based client server forecasting module called GAINS. The
information is then massaged and sent back to mapics and the appropriate
customer order(s) are generated automatically.

The 852 transaction will contain the po number range to use for
replenishment orders. 855 (PO Acknowledgements) are then sent out from
mapics to the customer indicating that an order was placed.

Normal order processing will ship the order and 856 (advanced shipping
nofications) are then sent to the TP. This step is crucial. This is the only
thing that informs the customer location that product is moving to it. The
852 allows the customer to request a quantity to be sent, therefore the 856
will tell it that is on the way.

This in-transit quantity needs to be acknowledged. The 861 (Receiving
Advice) transaction will then be sent from the customer to indicate the
quantity of the shipped order. All of these quantities are tied out to
prevent over-shipping product.

Then the 810 (invoice) is sent to the customer for payment. An 820
(Remittance Advice) transaction could optionally be received for payment
information.

Re-Cap

Customer                                        You
852 --------------------------------------> business application
<-------------------------------------------  855
<-------------------------------------------  856
861 -------------------------------------->
<-------------------------------------------  810
820 -------------------------------------->

VMI has been one of the most requested systems that we have seen in the last
year.



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