Poet to provide automaker's suppliers with common tools to create, maintain electronic product catalogs
Hamburg, Germany October 2, 2003 DaimlerChrysler has tapped Poet Software, a provider of catalog platforms for B2B online trade and supplier relationship management, for an electronic catalog procurement solution.
Starting immediately, Poet will be responsible for preparation and processing of electronic product catalogs as part of the automaker's e-Shop project and will provide services related to catalog content management.
The new catalog solution, Poet X-Solutions, will provide DaimlerChrysler's suppliers with a common software solution for the creation and maintenance of electronic product catalogs.
"Poet X-Solutions offers the optimal functionality for the catalog services that we want to offer to our suppliers," said Klaus Gritsch, head of global e-market management at DaimlerChrysler. "Overall this solution will considerably simplify the topic of electronic catalog procurement for our suppliers."
Gritsch said that moving forward, the car manufacturer will be able to provide its suppliers with a tool they can use to prepare, check and load standardized electronic product catalogs. "This is how we will ensure that only correct, high quality content is provided to our departments," Gritsch explained.
By the end of the year, 70 catalogs with more than 1 million products for the German-speaking region will have been processed using the new platform. The preparation of further catalogs and products is planned for 2004, as is the incorporation of DaimlerChrysler sites abroad.
The order placed with Poet Software includes the technical implementation and operation of the platform, as well as quality assurance activities and the performance of the so-called BMEcat certification, an exchange standard for electronic product catalogs in German-speaking countries. Catalog managers at DaimlerChrysler and IT specialists at suppliers will be trained for work on the catalog platform during a support and training program run by Poet Software. In collaboration with DaimlerChrysler, Poet will hold regular "supplier summits" to familiarize new suppliers with the solution.
