P&G Starts Using Transora Data Catalog

For the first time, Proctor & Gamble has published product data to an industry-wide
data catalog being created by e-marketplace Transora. The creation of a standard,
synchronized data catalog for the consumer packaged goods (CPG) industry is
a baseline requirement for emerging business-to-business applications between
CPG vendors and their retailers. Without such a catalog, product information
is exchanged manually and often plagued by transcription errors, timing issues
and significant administrative costs, as reported by IntenetWeek. A standard
data catalog will also help fuel more advanced apps, such as CPFR, or collaborative
planning, forecasting and replenishment.

Launched last summer, the Transora catalog today stores just 16,000 items,
but support is growing from vendors including P&G, Reckkit Benckiser, Kraft
Foods and others. The Transora catalog is built on standards being developed
by UCCnet. It is based on that group’s Global Registry service, which is used
to validate the information entered by Transora customers.

Moderator Comment: What do you expect the exchange
landscape to look like in five years?

With talk of mergers/alliances and debates over private
vs. public, clearly, there is further tumult heading the way of the exchanges
serving the retailer marketplace today. Experience tells us not to bet on any
one but to expect that the strongest of the current models or hybrids of existing
businesses will emerge as front runners in the next stage of the exchange’s
development. [George
Anderson – Moderator]

• P&G
  Starts Using Transora Data Catalog – InternetWeek