Cable television companies will shortly be offering their subscribers so-called "Set-top boxes," which will enable consumers to, among other things, order products electronically. The Cable Company collects the orders and passes them on to a supplier, which takes care of the delivery to the customer. To this end, agreements are made over how the information will be electronically passed on. When a second supplier joins, the parties will again sit around a table to determine the contents of the files. By the third supplier, the same, and on and on. In doing this, they are actually repeating the whole standardization process! In EDIFACT, UNSMs already contain the information the parties should be exchanging.
There is a clear role for EDI on the Superhighway. When discussing communication between applications, the first thought should be "EDI." When a computer must be able to process the transaction, EDI is the only way to do it. When someone goes through an electronic catalogue on the Internet to order products, he sees the information in HyperText Markup Language (HTML). The basic data such as packaging, number of units, and other technical specifications are given in text, and, if possible, the catalogue is enriched with pictures, images and sounds. This gives humans the possibility to process the information, but the same information must be in EDI format for an application to process. When someone decides to order a product, a chain of events is set in motion. In the first place, the product supplier must process the order. He really only needs to know which article number is involved, the quantity and who the client is. Secondly, the in-house application needs to know that the order has been made --- internally, several things have to be taken into account: warehouse space must be made available, Shipping \& Receiving must know and accounting has to be made aware. EDI is the only way to do this well.
This means that information on the Internet must be available not only in HTML but also in EDI format. If electronic catalogs are compiled on the basis of the data model incorporated in the UNSM, it is guaranteed that they are universally applicable. The EDI format itself is of secondary interest, so long as it contains the same information, in a structured, generally accepted format. Until a better alternative presents itself, EDIFACT will serve here quite nicely. Internet servers should be equipped with the possibility to generate not only HTML, but also EDIFACT. A lot of products are now becoming available which can generate HTML. A flexible EDI converter such as the EDI-TIE Translate & Construct does this as well, and of course generates the EDIFACT too.
It seems obvious to send orders and other messages via Internet to the supplier, but there we run into a number of difficulties with Internet. The problem on which the whole Internet world is now focused seems to be: Security. The Internet is, quite simply, not secure. Anyone can intercept and read all the data that can be sent via the Internet relatively easily. There is virtually nothing that can be done to improve the situation. It is inherent in the structure of the Internet. Those searching for a solution believe they have found it in the encryption of the file by the sender in such a way that only the recipient can decipher it. A number of systems have been developed to accomplish this, based on complicated mathematical algorithms designed to withstand years of computer analysis. Time after time, though, the exponential increase in computing power has meant that coding systems once thought secure have been cracked. This problem will one day, once and for all, be solved, but that is still ahead of us.
A second problem is the reliability of the connection itself --- there is no guarantee that a message sent via Internet actually arrives. The Internet is a collection of linked networks. There is no "owner" of the Net --- no single organization can take the responsibility to ensure that a message arrives. For business applications this is unacceptable; companies which exchange important business documents need the guarantee that messages arrive in a timely fashion. That is the strength of the Value Added Network Services (VANS) which have been used for years for EDI. A VANS provider can make a "Service-Level Agreement" with the users, in which he takes responsibility to deliver all messages securely, completely and timely to addressees.
Market structure Over the last decade many companies have established electronic links between their applications. The Internet has become quite popular. This first of all drew much more attention to doing business electronically; however nobody seems to know how. There are so many different ideas that nobody know which one is the winner. When reading the press, EDI seems to be discarded as "Legacy" technology that did not make it in the past. And this is where they are wrong: EDI is not a technology, but a business driven way to make connections between applications in different companies --- whether or not the Internet is used or VANS to make the physical connection, the problem of aligning business processes remains. This is something that the bigger companies understand and are now more than ever going for. To them the Internet is rather scary: it proposes they do business in a new way, using unproven technology that is unreliable and --- most of all --- not secure.
The Electronic Commerce market today is very much in its early development. A few Visionaries are picking up innovative products as break through technologies that will bring great savings to the Visionary's companies. EDI used to be in this phase of the Technology Adoption Life Cycle, but it has moved into the Mainstream Market. EDI is no longer attractive to the Visionaries --- the Internet has taken that role. No longer are benchmarks and product reviews important and one doesn't see these appearing in the press anymore. Instead EDI products just entered the mainstream market and thus taken for granted --- the core product is no longer important, the services around them are. Now the Pragmatists in the market have taken an interest in EDI as something stable, with proven technology, international standards and a broad support and it is strongly endorsed by the Industry analysts.
The Early Market It will be the Visionaries who will pick up different types of products to accomplish their objective. They are people who are driven by their own instincts and self-assurance, they take a greater interest in technology than in industry and are not very price sensitive --- what they hope to accomplish with the product far outweighs its price. They look for products with unique functionality, state-of-the-art performance and architecture. They need highly driven 'Guru'-type salesmen to sell them this product. In fact Visionaries are so sure of themselves, that once they believe in a concept, the product that might bring its implementation may be almost a prototype --- as long as it does the job.
Electronic Commerce products fit this description. Now these products are still in a 'prototype' stage, but they need strong technical innovative attention to turn them into the kind of product the Visionaries want. A lot of resources will have to be devoted to developing the state-of-the-art Electronic Commerce products. What EC products need is to get a high profile and to be internationally accepted. What is needed are generic Internet-based products that have the potential to be used by many companies. This type of product will enable us to move Electronic Commerce into the Mainstream Market when it reaches that stage in the next 2-4 years. This is a particular difficult transition as is aptly described in Geoffrey Moore's book "Crossing the Chasm".
The Mainstream Market EDI is already in the Mainstream Market and it needs to be positioned with a Market driven approach. Here the potential buyers are Pragmatists looking for suppliers with a large installed base, supported by Third Parties and products that are the De facto standard, that have a high quality of support and where the cost of ownership is low. The core EDI product is no longer looked at separately --- instead buyers are looking for a ``Whole" product, where the generic product is augmented by a variety of services and ancillary products.
Today's Mainstream High Tech Market is different from what it used to be in the sense that buyers require a much more individual approach. The days of mass marketing and mass production are over --- buyers do not want to explain their requirements over and over again, but will go to the supplier who understands what they want.
| Visionaries | Pragmatists |
| Intuitive | Analytic |
| Support revolution | Support |
| Contrarian | Conformist |
| Break away from the pack | Stay with the herd |
| Follow their own dictates | Consult their colleagues |
| Take risks | Manage risks |
| Motivated by future opportunities | Motivated by present problems |
| seek what is possible | pursue what is |
The fact that EDI is in the mainstream now requires a market-driven approach. For Electronic Commerce this means it must be clear that this is the way business is done. This must be clear to the Pragmatists, who are basically willing to do whatever will save or bring them money, without having to take risks.
