This white paper will discuss some of the different technologies in use today for the exchange and representation of business data and how The Boomi Exchange Series can help businesses get ahead of the aforementioned challenges and get back to focusing on their core business. The flow of information between enterprises is crucial to e-commerce. Regardless of its flavor, data must be communicated in a fast, reliable and secure manner between trading partners. As the number of trading partners increases, the demands placed upon the enterprise to provide a means of communication to its partners can become increasingly complex. Before the emergence of the Internet as a viable means of exchanging data, a typical solution to the problem of exchanging data was the use of a VAN, or Value Added Network.
VANs typically offer a secure, reliable and traceable means to exchanging data between partners.
The down side is that VANs can be expensive to set up and use and they exist outside the enterprise, making business reliable on third parties for the management of mission critical data. The high cost of a VAN's services present an obstacle to maintaining competitiveness in the e-commerce arena and can make it impractical for smaller partners to use. In recent years, some solution providers have proposed the creation of trading partner communities, set up and managed by proprietary solutions that leverage the power of the Internet to facilitate the exchange of data. While within the constructs of this solution lies the promise of a manageable exchange of data, the down side is the inability, within the constructs of such a solution, to leverage this technology in the creation of dynamic trading partner relationships, in which the ability to accommodate rapid change is one of the keys to success. Trading partner communities inhibit the growth of an enterprise's circle of trading partners, since by definition any potential partner who is not currently implementing the proprietary solutions established by the existing set of partners faces a technical hurdle which must be tackled before trade can be established.