From paper to procurement effective catalogue creation and ...

F R O M P A P E R T O P R O C U R E M E N T 

E F F E C T I V E C A T A L O G U E C R E A T I O N A N D M A N A G E M E N T 

> 

F O R B U Y E R S A N D S U P P L I E R S

© Commonwealth of Australia 2004 

This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced by any 

process without the prior written permission from the Commonwealth. Requests and inquiries concerning reproduction and 

rights in this publication should be addressed to: 

Manager, 

Public Affairs, 

Department of Communications, Information Technology & the Arts 

GPO Box 390, 

Canberra ACT 2601

C O N T E N T S 

INTRODUCTION 5 

ALIGNING TECHNOLOGY AND BUSINESS NEEDS 7 

WHAT IS AN ELECTRONIC CATALOGUE? 9 

Why do you need an electronic catalogue? 10 

THE BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT 11 

The Business Problem 11 

Why Should Catalogues Interoperate? 13 

What is Interoperability? 13 

Where Does Interoperability Occur? 15 

— Hosting Solutions 15 

— Electronic Marketplaces 15 

— Supplier Hubs 15 

— Resellers 15 

— Data Synchronisation 16 

— Suppliers’ Catalogue 16 

— “Punch-out” 16 

EXTRACTS FROM REAL CASE STUDIES 17 

MAKING YOUR ELECTRONIC CATALOGUE 21 

Step 1 – Developing the business case 22 

— Template for the Measurement of eCatalogue Costs and Benefits 22 

Step 2 – Scoping the buying environment 27 

— Standards 28 

— Global Product Standards 28 

— Standards Organisations 29

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Step 3 – Mapping your business processes 30 

Step 4 – Developing your catalogue 31 

— Catalogue development steps 31 

— Product categorisation 32 

— Customising your Coding 32 

— External links 33 

— Product Images 33 

Step 5 – Making your catalogue available to buyers 34 

— Supply Chain / Inventory Integration 34 

— Buyer hosted content 34 

— Supplier Hosted Content 35 

— Electronic Marketplace hosted content 35 

— Supplier Hub Hosted Content 35 

Step 6 – Getting assistance 36 

APPENDIX I 37 

APPENDIX II 67 

APPENDIX III 73

This guide is designed to help you, an Australian supplier, publish and maintain electronic catalogue 

data in a format suitable for electronic procurement. 

The guide provides practical advice on: 

• reducing the effort of maintaining catalogue data electronically 

• minimising the commercial and technical risk of complying with the different e-procurement 

technologies used by buyers 

• the cost-benefit of maintaining an electronic catalogue 

The guide is the product of a joint government-business initiative. It was funded through 

the Information Technology Online (ITOL) grants program, which is managed by the Federal 

Government’s Department of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts (DCITA). 

The initiative involved the following organisations: 

• Acumen Alliance 

• Australian Procurement and Construction Council 

• Australian Retailers Association 

• Commonwealth Bank of Australia 

• Cyberlynx Procurement Services 

• Cyberlynx Supplier Hub 

• LogicaCMG 

• New South Wales Department of Commerce (Smartbuy) 

• Sensis Pty Ltd 

• South Australia Department for Administrative and Information Services (DAIS) 

I N T R O D U C T I O N 

• South Australia Department of Further Education, Employment, Science and Technology (DFEEST).

6 | 

This spread of organisations means the initiative involved organisations representing: 

• buyers from both the private and public sectors that utilise different purchasing strategies and 

different electronic procurement technologies 

• service providers with experience in e-catalogue creation and hosting capabilities 

• industry and government associations to ensure trust and independence in the development of 

this guide 

The buyers engaged in this initiative nominated a range of suppliers of various size, industry and 

geography. Their catalogues were enabled against a range of “real world” e-procurement situations. 

Their experiences are documented in the case studies found in the appendix. It also means the 

information presented here is practical and based on actual experience.

Getting Past the Hype 

As electronic commerce between businesses has evolved, new technologies have entered the 

marketplace which claim to be able to “automate your supply chain”, or “run your business at 

lightning speed”, or “automate your business processes”. 

The “dotcom” boom, however, and subsequent crash has brought home to technology providers and 

consumers that these technologies need to deliver real business benefits, rather than hype. 

The fundamental e-procurement messages that have developed in the “real world” are 

straightforward business imperatives including: 

• selling more, more quickly; 

• minimising data errors; 

• reducing set-up costs; 

• tracking; 

A L I G N I N G T E C H N O L O G Y A N D B U S I N E S S N E E D S 

• getting paid for sales more promptly; 

• improving maintenance efficiencies; and 

• minimising non-core business activities (i.e. minimising time wastage on data entry and 

administrative processes). 

These priorities need to be the drivers in implementing e-commerce technology. All of these 

priorities hinge on the efficient interchange of data electronically both internally, within 

organisations, and externally, between the organisation’s trading partners and systems. One example 

is getting products into a warehouse and out again.

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To make these systems work together effectively they must have 

and share high quality core data. Importantly, data being sent 

between systems will need to be in a format that is understood 

by both the receiving and sending systems. This includes: 

• data to do with inventory and customer details; 

• data which forms the basis of the interaction with a trading 

partner, and which can be easily utilised by these “mindless” 

machines to do seemingly straightforward tasks like sending 

an invoice or receiving a purchase order. 

It’s when these systems don’t agree with each other because they 

use different languages to describe the core data, for instance, 

that simple tasks like sharing information can become almost 

impossible. 

Core data, therefore, represents the key component of any 

product catalogue. Sometimes called “item master data,” it can 

include: 

• product identification codes / skus 

• product descriptions; 

• trading partner identification codes; 

• stock/volume; and 

• pricing, 

This guide attempts to cut through the hype and provide you 

with practical advice on how you can put your product catalogue 

online to open up a new sales channel while helping your buyers 

to also move to online purchasing. 

Assisting you to make educated decisions about creating and 

utilising this core data is what this guide aims to address.

W H A T I S A N E L E C T R O N I C C A T A L O G U E ? 

It is common for all suppliers, such as yourself, to have a list of products or services that are for 

sale incorporating a price list. For ease of reference, we refer to this as a “supplier’s catalogue”. 

When a supplier’s catalogue is made available online, it has the potential to become more than 

just a list of products and services available for purchase. In order to conduct efficient electronic 

business to business transactions, electronic catalogue requirements differ greatly from their 

print counterparts in that the structure of information in the catalogue needs to be “Consistent” 

(ie; organised into an explicit and extensible set of product related categories and subcategories) 

“Complete” (products well described), “Comprehensive”, and “Enriched”. 

Enriched catalogue content refers to additional information in the catalogue - information other than 

text for describing products and services. In an electronic purchasing based environment catalogue 

products can be linked to website URL’s, with rich desriptions that are normalised and standardised, 

additional images, Adobe PDF files, Word documents, 3D files such as Multimedia files, AutoCAD or any 

other MIME compatible file with the aim of providing product content for buyers to find, compare and 

buy in a more interactive, intuitive and easier way than paging through print orientated publications. 

In transforming these catalogues online and into an electronic format they have the potential to 

become more than just a list of products and services available for purchase. 

For example, by linking this catalogue to a buyers’ purchasing system it will become a living part of 

the purchasing and selling process. In this way the buyer will be in the position to select products 

automatically or manually from the supplier’s catalogue, include these in a purchase order, and 

then seamlessly send the order electronically to the supplier. Simultaneously, on receipt of the order, 

the supplier would be able to upload the buyer’s order(s) into their sales, inventory and financial 

systems. In the complete purchase-to-pay-cycle, the supplier would then dispatch the goods to the 

buyer; send an electronic invoice to the buyer; who would be in the position to do a three-way data 

match (purchase order, goods receipt, invoice) and make an EFT payment directly to the supplier 

while automatically uploading the tax invoice into their financial system. 

As demonstrated above, online catalogues have the ability to become powerful enablers in reducing 

the cost and time of buying and selling.

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W H Y D O YO U N E E D A N E L E C T R O N I C C A T A L O G U E ? 

A supplier’s catalogue is often the central reference for many other business processes within an 

organisation. A company who sells car parts, for instance, would find it difficult, if not impossible, 

to operate without a list of those parts. Concurrently, it would find it difficult to survive without 

having access to its suppliers’ catalogues on which it would rely for inventory, stock availability and 

pricing information. 

As a supplier, if your catalogue data is not available electronically then you will not be able to link with 

external systems, for example a buyer’s e-procurement system. The buyer will be forced to enter your 

company’s data manually into their purchasing system(s) which could pose a major effort given the 

size of some catalogues and the number of suppliers that a buyer typically deals with. 

The management of core data – from a simple over-the-counter sales system to a fully-fledged 

e-business trading system - is a prime consideration when trading electronically. Central to the 

process is the use of recognised national and international standards (see page 28). The application of 

recognised standards will make your e-catalogue far more flexible and scalable: ie. your data will be in 

a better structure to be able to be transformed and read by the numerous e-procurement technologies 

used by buyers, resellers and e-marketplaces. 

Fig 1. Illustrates the relationship within a typical buying organisation between the electronic 

catalogue and other business systems 

Accounting Systems 

Costs and controls 

Pricing and product info 

Catalogue Context 

Pricing and products 

Catalogue 

Master Data 

(eg Products) 

Requests for info 

Product information 

Transaction 

information 

Purchasing Systems 

Product updates 

Product information 

Reporting Systems Sales Systems

T H E B U S I N E S S P R O B L E M 

This paper is designed to assist you in making informed decisions about the creation and publishing 

of a master electronic catalogue. The decision to proceed with this task can be particularly difficult 

if your trading partners are large organisations as the choices that they make could have a strong 

influence on your electronic catalogue system selection. 

A scenario that demonstrates this issue could go something like this: 

Small Supplier 



45% 

35% 

“You must create 

an Electronic 

Catalogue” 

Still using 

faxes 

Large Customer 

1 


2 


1 


2 

T H E B U S I N E S S E N V I R O N M E N T 

A small supplier creates and sells a particular 

range of products, in which it specialises. 

Two large customers make up 80% of the sales 

for that supplier 

Large ‘Customer One’ decides to implement an 

electronic buying system. It sends a letter to 

all suppliers giving them a deadline to become 

systems compliant by providing their catalogue 

data in a prescribed format.

1 2 | 

: 


“But it’s not 

the same” 

Electronic 

Trading 

: 

Still using 

faxes 


Electronic 

Trading 

“You must trade 

electronically with my system” 

“If I say no I lose 

35% of my business” 

: 

E-enabled 


1 

: 



2 

: 

E-enabled 


1 

The small supplier, afraid to lose 

its biggest customer, puts in the 

system requested by ‘Customer 

One’. The supplier invests several 

thousands of dollars in creating an 

electronic product catalogue that 

can be read by the ‘Customer One’s’ 

buying system. 

Large ‘Customer Two’ decides to 

trade electronically also and issues 

a similar letter to its suppliers. 

However it has chosen a competing 

system that requires catalogue data 

in a different incompatible format. 

Small supplier is faced with a 

difficult choice. 

The supplier is now forced to: 

• make an additional investment and develop a system compatible with Large Customer Two; 

• invest in upgrading its existing system so that it will work with both customer systems; or 

• risk losing its second biggest customer. 

: 

E-enabled 


2 

“But I can’t afford 

to say yes” 

Even if Large Customer Two is not lost, it is likely they will pay slower and order less than they used 

to simply because faxing for them is no longer their preferred method of business. Worse still, they 

may begin to purchase from a competitor who does interact with their system. 

Another scenario could be that the Large Customer Two will require the supplier to maintain an 

extra list of their product directly on the buyer’s own system (eg via a website) or though a hosted 

solution. This would mean that the supplier would be forced to maintain multiple copies of their 

own product information perhaps across multiple platforms. This would pose a nightmare when it 

came to updating and re-keying data creating a breeding ground for errors.

W H Y S H O U L D C A T A L O G U E S I N T E R O P E R A T E ? 

In the online world suppliers who want to maximise the use of their electronic catalogues can 

publish their catalogue in a variety of locations to reach the widest possible customer base. You can: 

• publish your catalogue on your web site; 

• publish your catalogue on your resellers’ websites; 

• publish your catalogue on an external electronic marketplace; 

• distribute your catalogue electronically to your buyers so that they can import it into their own 

procurement systems; or you can make your catalogue available to your buyers as part of a 

supply chain management initiative. 

A key problem in achieving this is the fact that buyers tend to use different purchasing technologies, 

formats and standards from each other as well as from their suppliers. The cost of recreating and 

distributing catalogue data to suit the different purchasing technologies, formats and standards 

used in the marketplace, therefore, can be prohibitive, especially if you are a small business. 

Resellers, in turn, face a similar level of complexity. For instance, they may wish to obtain catalogue 

content from their client base and present a combined product list in a catalogue established to 

their own standard. Naturally, to achieve this would require the reseller to contribute considerable 

time and effort in “cleaning” the data from the various sources. 

Not surprisingly, supplier catalogues can also vary significantly making cross-referencing difficult. 

For instance, you probably prescribe to a different way of entering your data in your catalogue 

compared to your competitors, your own customers and even your own suppliers. A classic example 

is units of measure: is it “e”, “ea”, or “each”? 

This is where catalogue interoperability comes in. 

W H A T I S I N T E R O P E R A B I L I T Y ? 

Interoperability is the capacity to move data between different software applications, for instance, 

in the case of financial and office management applications where sales systems may need to link 

with Microsoft Excel spreadsheets. 

A high level of interoperability means that a catalogue developed and published in one application 

can be accessed and read by a different application automatically. A low level of interoperability 

means catalogue updates, orders, change requests and so on, must be manually entered across 

applications. This is sometimes called the “swivel chair” effect in which a supplier will receive an 

order using one technology (eg. web site, fax machine, e-mail) and must re-key the information into 

a back-office application in order to initiate the business process. 

Put simply, interoperability enables the translation of catalogue content from one standard to 

another. A highly interoperable system knows, for example, that “ea” in one catalogue equals “each” 

in another. 

F R O M P A P E R T O P R O C U R E M E N T – E F F E C T I V E C A T A L O G U E C R E A T I O N A N D M A N A G E M E N T F O R E N G A G I N G B U Y E R S A N D S U P P L I E R S | 1 3 

THE BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

1 4 | 

Because different catalogues can be made to “interoperate”, suppliers can maintain their catalogue 

content in their chosen standard, and publish the same content across different catalogues that 

follow alternative standards used by buyers, resellers or other electronic systems. 

The critical issue is the ability to manage catalogue item master data while simultaneously having 

the flexibility to exchange your catalogue with your trading partners confidently and securely. 

W H E R E D O E S I N T E R O P E R A B I L I T Y O C C U R ? 

Catalogue product content may be found in a variety of locations, all of which could benefit 

from the exchange of content via interoperability. The model below exhibits actual examples of 

interoperability. This model has been adopted by the companies represented in the case studies 

attached to this paper. 

Figure 1: Catalogue content hosting and sourcing 

Marketplace 

Punch-out 

Buyer ERP eProcurement 

Catalogue Content 

Catalogue 

Punch-out 

Punch-out 

Supplier Hub 

Data Synchronisation 

Hosting Solutions 

Suppliers Catalogue 

Resellers

Hosting Solutions 

There are a number of services available that host catalogue content for suppliers, such as yourself, 

and who will make this available to buyers. The catalogue hoster may require you to provide data in 

a prescribed format. 

An example of a hosted solution is Westpac Qvalent. These catalogue hosters typically have their 

own standards that suppliers can use and may include a range of services which includes catalogue 

development, product categorisation and data cleansing. 

Electronic Marketplaces 

There are a number of online marketplaces in Australia that bring buyers and suppliers together. 

These can take the form of closed marketplaces, such as smartbuy used by New South Wales 

Department of Commerce (www.smartbuy.nsw.gov.au) or industry-focused marketplaces, such as 

some of those in Marketboomer (http://www.marketboomer.com/). 

Similarly to catalogue hosters, e-marketplaces may require suppliers to provide data in a prescribed format. 

Supplier Hubs 

Supplier hubs provide a hosted Supplier managed catalogue interoperability service. Also known as 

content aggregators, they take catalogue content from a variety of suppliers, clean it and translate 

it into the standard of other catalogues, before making this data available to those catalogues. An 

example of this model is the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub (www.supplierhub.com.au). 

Resellers 

Resellers sell products from a variety of manufacturers or wholesalers often in a retail setting. As 

a result, resellers will usually develop their own uniform catalogue that brings together all their 

products, from their various suppliers, into the one catalogue location. 

For a supplier who sells through resellers, making it easier for their resellers to receive and display 

their catalogue content, therefore, will increase their potential sales. 

As a reseller may sell products on behalf of multiple suppliers it is important, if you are considering 

using a reseller, that your product catalogue can be easily translated into the format required. The 

reseller will then be in the position to use interoperability to translate your catalogue content, as 

well as the content of other suppliers, into their own standard for their own catalogue. 


THE BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

1 6 | 

Data Synchronisation 

Some buyers may have sophisticated e-procurement systems 

capable of storing content from their suppliers. The variety of eprocurement 

systems available to buyers means that there will be 

a corresponding diversity in the catalogue formats required. 

This is where data synchronisation comes in. Data synchronisation 

means that all changes made to a supplier’s “Catalogue Item 

Master File” will be automatically picked up, translated into the 

appropriate standard, and sent to the other supply chain trading 

partners where synchronous changes will be automatically made. 

While there are various solutions and organisations that can 

assist with this synchronisation effort, –EANnet (www.ean.com. 

au) provides an excellent example. 

Suppliers’ Catalogue 

Suppliers, such as yourself, can host their own catalogue content 

and have their buyers access the content directly online. This 

access can be automated, or alternatively, suppliers can enable 

buyers to access their catalogue system via a log-on process. 

An example of one of the better-developed supplier catalogues 

or transactable websites is Corporate Express (www.ce.com.au), 

which has a business-to-business Internet ordering connector. 

“Punch-out” 

A term originally coined by Ariba, “punch-out” is now a 

commonly used term in electronic procurement for gaining 

access to catalogue data. In this situation, a buyer will use the eprocurement 

module located within their financial system or ERP 

where they will be able to “punch-out” to an externally hosted 

supplier catalogue. Once in this external catalogue, they will be in 

a position to browse and search for what they want to buy before 

putting the product in (an electronic shopping cart) and returning 

this information to their financial system; attaching it to their 

requisition, and using their own purchase order process.

A number of e-procurement scenarios that suppliers typically deal with in everyday operations were 

reviewed as part of the development of this guide. These scenarios included: 

• presenting e-catalogue through a hosting service; 

• presenting e-catalogue through a marketplace; 

• presenting e-catalogue direct to a buyer e-procurement system; and 

• remote shopping by a buyer. 

E X T R A C T S F R O M R E A L C A S E S T U D I E S 

What the suppliers engaged in the development of this guide learnt was that they could publish 

interoperable catalogues. In particular, they found that a catalogue published by a supplier to 

the South Australian Department for Administrative & Information Services (which use Qvalent 

technology) could also be read by a different buyer, the Commonwealth Bank (which use Ariba 

technology and the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub). They discovered that interoperability demonstrated the 

benefits of online catalogue development, catalogue interoperability, and online purchasing. 

Below is a summation of the experience of the suppliers. Full case studies are detailed in the appendix. 

• The Commonwealth Bank of Australia successfully utilised supplier catalogues from multiple, 

disparate sources including the NSW Department of Commerce smartbuy TM and the Westpac 

Qvalent marketplace. By utilising the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub to exchange Suppliers’ catalogues, 

the CBA was able to acquire the content in a format suitable for use within their eProcurement 

system (Ariba). Suppliers who participated in this project included Citisoft (a SA Government 

supplier), Interface (a NSW Government supplier), and three CBA promotional suppliers (Rave 

Marketing Services, Novel Innovations, and Image-On). The supplier catalogues were made 

available to the Bank’s staff, for the purposes of sourcing items which would become bank 

branded products for use in CBA promotional campaigns (eg; Umbrellas, Caps, Golf Balls, etc). 

The sourced items would then form the basis of a requirements specification which would then 

be forwarded to the Bank’s design house for the purposes of creating a request for quotation 

(RFQ). Access to the supplier catalogues on Supplier Hub were also made available to the design 

houses to verify product specifications and requirements prior to posting out the RFQ.

1 8 | 

In this instance, interoperable catalogue content between the South Australian Qvalent catalogue, 

smartbuy New South Wales catalogue, and the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub, provided the Bank with 

a wider range of suppliers and product. The Commonwealth Bank of Australia was able to aquire 

electronic catalogues from suppliers in the required format without having to undertake manual 

manipulation. 

There were benefits to both the Bank and suppliers in this process. Suppliers, for instance, were able to 

place accurate and detailed product information before key decision makers and potential new buyers 

while buyers were able to identify products with a greater level of accuracy, consistency and efficiency. 

• Commander Australia, a supplier to the South Australian Government Department for 

Administrative and Information Services (DAIS), previously managed its catalogue via a 

spreadsheet emailed to buyers. Commander developed its online catalogue with the assistance 

of Sensis. Once developed, this catalogue was successfully uploaded into the Westpac Qvalent 

system, which is used by DAIS for their online purchasing. Buyers in DAIS were then able to 

place purchase orders with Commander using the online catalogue content made available, via 

Westpac’s B2Buy portal. 

In this case the catalogue interoperability capabilities of Sensis and Westpac Qvalent enabled 

Commander’s products to be available to Government buyers. 

The trial demonstrated that DAIS buyers preferred to use the online catalogue rather than the old 

spreadsheets, which simultaneously led to greater use of electronic rather than fax or telephone 

orders. Commander also found that their orders were easier to manage and that there were benefits 

in invoice payment times and fewer invoice errors. 

• In South Australia, Aish Data and Design, a drafting and printing supplier also had their 

catalogue developed with the assistance of Sensis. Their catalogue was then made available to 

the Westpac Qvalent system for purchasing by the South Australian Government (DAIS). Aish 

found the development of the catalogue was relatively simple and that it was easy to amend 

prices and other changes. Aish has subsequently seen a reduction in telephone communications 

with DAIS and increased accuracy of orders. 

• In NSW, the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub was used to translate supplier catalogues that had been 

exported from the NSW Government smartbuyTM Marketplace. The Cyberlynx Supplier Hub was 

used to prove that suppliers, who created electronic catalogues for one environment, including 

extensive product attributes and UNSPSC Codes, could take advantage of the Hub’s capabilities to 

convert the catalogue into different formats that were suitable for use in other buyer purchasing 

systems and Marketplaces.. 

The trial demonstrated that electronic catalogue interoperability could be achieved between 

catalogue hosting providers which in turn, provided suppliers with the benefit of creating their own 

catalogue content once for distribution across multiple catalogue based systems. 

• The South Australian Government’s Westpac Qvalent system and New South Wales Government’s 

smartbuy system, successfully trialled a “punch-out” process. Using the Open Catalogue 

Interface (OCI), this enabled a user logged into smartbuy to “punch-out” to the Westpac 

Qvalent catalogue, browse, search and select items for inclusion in a shopping cart. The user was

then able to add these items to a shopping cart in smartbuy while simultaneously enabling the 

purchasing workflow to continue. 

• Similarly, South Australian Government buyers in Westpac Qvalent were able to “punch-out” 

to the smartbuy catalogue, capture product information, and return it to a shopping cart in 

Westpac Qvalent to create a requisition and purchase order. This demonstrated that for ad hoc 

purchasing, buyers could access product information from a variety of catalogues and integrate 

that information as part of their normal purchasing process. This demonstrated another way for 

suppliers to have their catalogue content hosted in one location and made accessible to a wide 

range of buyers from other electronic procurement systems. 

• Cyberlynx Supplier Hub and Westpac Qvalent successfully exchanged catalogue content in 

both directions. Cyberlynx provided Westpac Qvalent with a catalogue for the supplier Novel 

Innovations. The catalogue was exported in a format complying with the Westpac Qvalent 

template and when Westpac Qvalent took the template it converted it into an XML file 

automatically and loaded it into the Westpac Qvalent system. 

The Cyberlynx/smartbuy catalogue content exchange going both ways, and the Cyberlynx/Qvalent 

content exchange going both ways, demonstrates that interoperability between catalogues is not 

only feasible but can occur across different standards. 

Understandably, some of these pilots were easier to complete and required less manual intervention 

than others. What they all demonstrated, however, is that catalogues can successfully interoperate, 

saving suppliers time and money in catalogue management, while at the same time enabling their 

catalogues to be exposed to more buyers in a wider range of markets. The trials also demonstrated that 

following or adhering to certain standards and formats facilitated the sharing of data across systems. 


EXTRACTS FROM REAL CASE STUDIES

2 0 |

Steps and Checklists 

Let’s assume that as a supplier you would like to develop an electronic, interoperable product 

catalogue and make it available online to buyers. In achieving this, some common questions that 

you will need to ask and answer include: 

• How should I go about doing this? 

• What will be the cost of development and maintenance? 

• What products should I include? 

• How should I display these products? 

• How do I get to new buyers with the least investment? 

• How confident can I be that I will attract customers through this channel? 

• Will the development of an electronic, interoperable catalogue be worth it? 

• What external sites can I use to display my content? 

• What catalogue standard should I choose? 

The methodology described below provides ways to answer these questions. The methodology 

follows the following steps: 

Step 1 – Developing the business case 

Step 2 – Scoping the buying environment 

Step 3 – Mapping your business processes 

Step 4 - Developing your catalogue 

Step 5 – Making your catalogue available 

Step 6 – Getting assistance 

M A K I N G Y O U R E L E C T R O N I C C A T A L O G U E

2 2 | 

S T E P 1 – D E V E L O P I N G T H E B U S I N E S S C A S E 

When embarking on any new commercial endeavour, you should undertake a market survey. In so doing: 

• ask your major customers if they are intending to implement or have already deployed an 

internal e-procurement system; 

• canvass your smaller customers and find out if they would be interested in creating and 

managing a catalogue of your products for distribution via a supplier hub or over the Internet; 

• check out the tender proposals requested by buying organisations; 

• ask the question “would I have a better chance of new business if my catalogue was e enabled?” 

You may be under pressure from a key existing customer to set up an electronic catalogue. 

When setting up your electronic catalogue, focus on the existing market and also look for 

interoperability options. The principle is that if you can set an electronic catalogue up for one 

environment, it should be easily ported to another as long as you have touched the necessary bases. 

In order to determine whether there is an economic benefit of developing an electronic catalogue, 

you should always undertake a business case first. 

Template for the Measurement of eCatalogue Costs and Benefits 

Context 

In this section you will need to develop a best practice approach that will help you reduce the cost 

and complexity of establishing and managing a dynamic electronic catalogue. 

In particular, you will need to demonstrate that you can cost-effectively create and maintain a 

single master catalogue and publish it across different buying systems. 

Purpose of this Exercise 

The purpose of this exercise is to identify and measure the costs and benefits associated with use 

of electronic catalogues. The objective is to identify and measure the cost that you will incur when 

dealing with your customers prior to the use of such a catalogue. These costs will then need to 

be compared with those costs incurred after the implementation of the catalogue. The benefits of 

using an electronic catalogue in terms of cost saving and other factors can then be measured.

Items to Measure 

As far as the cost and benefits associated with use of the electronic catalogues are concerned, the 

following items need to be measured: 

1. the cost of developing and maintaining your catalogue(s) or other mechanism(s) to advise 

customers of product information. This should include: 

− the time, effort and other costs involved in developing and maintaining your existing 

catalogue(s) or product information mechanism(s); and 

2. the time and effort and other costs involved in developing and maintaining an electronic 

catalogue(s). The methods of advising customers include: 

− the cost of distributing your existing catalogue or operating an alternative product 

information mechanism (eg verbal advice by sales person); and 

− the cost of publishing an electronic catalogue that customers access. 

3. The costs of processing orders before and after the use of your electronic catalogue needs to be 

considered including the number of errors (eg incorrect item description or price). 

4. Marketing costs associated with dealing with a new customer, including time and effort of 

informing buyers of the items available also requires consideration. 

Collection of Data 

To evaluate and measure the impact of introducing an electronic catalogue, you will need to collect 

information both before and after its introduction. Where possible this should include quantitative 

measurements that can be expressed in dollar terms (e.g. staff time, printing, postage costs) as well 

as qualitative measurements including customer satisfaction. 


MAKING YOUR ELECTRONIC CATALOGUE

2 4 | 

To assist you, we have developed the following template which was designed to capture the data 

necessary to undertake this type of analysis: 

Data Collection Template 

Company Name 

Current Operations 

Primary 

State of 

Operation 

Secondary State 

of Operation 

Number of Customers in that State (1) Number of Customers in that State (1) 

Number of buyers in the Customers (2) Number of buyers in the Customers (2) 

No of orders received per annum No of orders received per annum 

No of Items sold to Customer No of Items sold to Customer 

Are items maintained a catalogue Yes No 

If No, what alternative form does product or service offering to the customer take? For example; narrative on 

web site or brochure, or non-document – verbal advice by Sales Person. Describe form of advising customer: 

What is cost of maintaining alternative form of advising the customer of the product or service offering? 

Staff time 

Printing 

Postage and Distribution 

Other 

Total 

Is the catalogue electronic Yes No 

If no, describe the form of the catalogue 

$

What is cost of maintaining the non-electronic catalogue? 

Staff time 

Printing 

Postage and Distribution 

Other 

Total 

What is cost of existing electronic catalogues? 

Staff time 

Hosting 

Other 

Total 

Process of Orders Under Current Arrangements 

Time spend processing customer orders 


$ 

$ 

Time Cost $ 

Processing Errors No. Cost $ 

Incorrect Price 

Incorrect Item Description 

Other 

Total 


2 6 | 

Customer Rating of Current Arrangements 

Identification of Products and Services 

Advice of changes to product or service 

descriptions or prices 

Interface of catalogue, if any, to Buyer’s 

procurement system 

Customer Rating of Current Arrangements 






Revised Arrangements 

Very 

Poor 

Very 

Poor 

What is cost of maintaining new electronic catalogue? 

Staff time 

Hosting 

Other 

Total 

Poor Adequate Good 

Poor Adequate Good 

$ 

Very 

Good 

Very 

Good

What is cost of interfacing electronic catalogue with other catalogues? $ 

Staff time 

Translation 

Other 

Total 

Customer Rating of Revised Arrangements 






Very Poor Poor Adequate Good 

S T E P 2 – S C O P I N G T H E B U Y I N G E N V I R O N M E N T 


Very 

Good 

Despite the hype, moving into online catalogues and sales is not the panacea for opening new 

markets and reaching new customers. You need to start this process by thinking of your existing 

customer base, and considering how they might move from manual to virtual. In doing this, you 

should consider the following questions: 

• How would you need to modify your current business processes to cater for this (eg logistics 

and fulfilment)? 

• How would you want to relate to your suppliers online? 

In scoping your business environment, you should also look at the following areas: 

• Sales channels: 

− buyer access to the online catalogue information; and 

− how your buyers will purchase from you. 

• Logistics and fulfilment questions should relate to: 

− warehousing; 

− shipping; and 

− invoicing. 


2 8 | 

These are the same areas you should have already considered in terms of your existing business. 

However, there are differences when you move into the online environment as one of the areas you 

will need to consider are the standards your buyers use in the online world. 

Standards 

Standards are important in determining how to put your catalogue online for your buyers. Without 

such standards, everyone would adopt their own way of doing things making it almost impossible 

to work easily with trading partners. Standards are important for transformation and portability of 

content from one system to another and for scalability, flexibility and re-use. 

However, as demonstrated in the section on “The Business Problem”, differing standards can cause 

pain for suppliers. So where does this leave you, the supplier? With multiple standards, multiple 

buyers asking suppliers to provide data conforming to “their” standard, and with multiple flavours 

of standards (cxml, xml, ebxml for example) it is understandable that many suppliers continue to 

use paper-based catalogues. 

It is difficult to justify the cost of reworking the same catalogue data again and again to service 

different customers and requests when, more often than not, there is no definable benefit in doing so. 

Nevertheless, it may limit your ability to open up new channels or to better serve existing sales channels. 

It is a question of “if” and “then”. As a supplier, you may ask: “if” I were able to provide my catalogue 

data once and have it accessible to customers through a range of channels would it “then” result in 

additional sales? 

Global Product Standards 

Using nationally and internationally recognised standards in constructing your electronic catalogue 

will provide your catalogue with more portability and re-useability. For example, you can use the 

ABN to identify a trading partner or EAN-UCC for identifying a product. 

There are a number of common standards used for electronic catalogues. In particular, you will need 

to determine which standard your buyers and suppliers use and how best to approach catalogue 

interoperability with them. The most common standards are: 

UNSPSC 

The Universal Standard Products and Services Classification (UNSPSC) system is an open global 

coding system that classifies products and services. The UNSPSC system is used extensively around 

the world in electronic catalogues, search engines, procurement application systems and accounting 

systems. 

eCl@ss 

Although still evolving, eCl@ss is a product classification system that intends to be used as an 

industry standard between suppliers and their customers. eCl@ss features a hierarchical, four level 

classification key with a keyword index containing 14,000 items.

EAN/UCC 

EAN is well known for setting the standard for bar coding. The primary objective of this system is to 

make possible the identification of all trade items, processes, services, shipments, assets, companies 

and locations to facilitate communication, data collection and exchange of information in the 

interest of trading partners. 

EPC 

Electronic Product Code (EPC) is the new standard for product numbering for RFID (Radio Frequency 

Identification). EPC numbers are embedded into the RFID tags and will become the unique 

identifiers for all products carrying RFID product labels. EPC standards are administered by EPC 

Global, a division of EAN International and the Uniformed Code Council. 

(RUS) Requisite Unifying Structure 

A global product classification system comprimised of catagories and attributes that describe 

products and services. RUS is a flat, non-hierarchial for organising content and enabling finding and 

ease of content maintenance. 

RUS supports over 14,000 catagories, 1,500 attributes, is available in 16 languages and maps to all 

major classification standards. 

More information on these product standards is included in the appendices. 

Standards Organisations 

Similar to the standards themselves, there are also multiple standards organisations which are 

often industry focused and independent of any one manufacturer, supplier or buyer. Perhaps the 

most widely know standards organisations are the: 

• United Nations Centre for the Facilitation of Procedures & Practices for Administration, 

Commerce & Transport (UN/CEFACT) which champions both UN/EDIFACT and ebXML; 

• The Electronic Commerce Code Management Association (ECCMA) which champions the NATO 

Codification Service (NCS); 

• the Electronic Open Technical Dictionary (eOTD); 

• the United Nations Development Programme (which owns all the rights to the UN/SPSC and 

which is managed by the Uniform Code Council (UCC)); and 

• EAN International and the Uniform Code Council that champions the EAN (barcode) system 

(the UCC also manages RosettaNet and the EPCglobal us standards for RFID) EAN Australia and 

RossettaNet became affiliated in 2004 and formed RossettaNet Australia. 

• EPC Global administer the EPC numbering standards for use in RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) 

tags. EPG Global is a division of EAN International and the Uniform Code Council (UCC). EAN 

International and the Uniform Code Council have recently merged into a single standards organisation 

to be called GS1 (Global Standards 1). 



3 0 | 

S T E P 3 – M A P P I N G YO U R B U S I N E S S P R O C E S S E S 

In developing an electronic catalogue, a key principle to consider is the integration of your 

catalogue’s data with existing business processes as much as possible. This will help you to reduce 

duplication and “reinventing the wheel” scenarios. 

A business process can include: 

• marketing; 

• channel selection; 

• product listing and pricing; 

• sales; 

• fulfilment; 

• post-sales activity; 

• invoicing and financial management; and 

• managing partner organisations. 

Each of these activities involves a business process (a series of linked steps also called “workflow”). 

Most businesses know these processes intuitively, and many have rarely thought about them or 

documented them. 

When moving from a shopfront or paper-based work environment to an online work environment, 

you need to think about your business processes and how they would operate in an online world. At 

this stage, there is an opportunity to change your business processes by removing those steps that 

do not add any value. If you don’t have a business process in place, you will need to draw a flow 

diagram of how catalogue management works in your business now. 

It is wise to remember that a catalogue is not a stand-alone feature but that it should be totally 

integrated into the way you do business. In particular, it should be linked to the way you deal with 

your suppliers, inventory management, sales management, customer relationship management and 

related activities. 

Businesses that sell goods or services will normally have existing ways of listing products and prices. 

As far as possible, this should be the same for both manual and online catalogue management, 

and based on existing practice. (There are differences of course, for example, placing a photo of the 

product online rather than on display in a store.)

S T E P 4 – D E V E L O P I N G YO U R C A T A L O G U E 

Catalogue Development Steps 

There are three steps in catalogue development: 

1. Content creation and enablement – creating the catalogue and making it able to be put online in 

a way that is capable of browse, search and ad hoc purchase, or automated purchase. 

2. Publishing – making the catalogue available online via the models identified on pages 34-35. 

3. Maintaining – keeping the catalogue up to date, including data synchronisation. 

The process of creating, enabling, publishing and maintaining a catalogue can be quite a complex 

task and there are a number of critical decisions that you will need to make regarding: 

• catalogue structure; 

• product classification standards (eg UNSPSC, EAN etc); 

• pricing; 

• product attributes; 

• product identification codes; 

• product display (including images); 

• customer specific catalogues; 

• contract related catalogues; 

• buyer access; and 

• security. 

Catalogues may also need to address issues such as trading partner identification, trading partner 

registration, data quality and cleansing, item master file management, messaging standards, GST 

management, and related issues. 

Trading partner identification is particularly important because the way you identify your partner in 

your financial system may be different from the way your trading partner identifies themselves in 

an online environment. For instance, you may need to “map” your vendor master file to your trading 

partner identifiers (eg. their SKU’s) to gain access to catalogue content. 

Addressing these issues can be done in conjunction with an existing catalogue service provider. (See 

Step 6 – Getting Assistance) 

As a supplier, you should already have a catalogue. Most likely if this is in electronic form, it will be 

tabular such as a spreadsheet or a database table. Such tables are readily exportable and could become 

the basis of an electronic catalogue. They will however, probably not contain all of the information that 

an electronic catalogue will require such as supplier identification codes that your buyers give you. The 

advantage, however is that such codes and information can be added when an electronic catalogue is 

produced. Two types of information will need to be added to your existing catalogue including: 

• product categorisation; and 

• external links. 

F R O M P A P E R T O P R O C U R E M E N T – E F F E C T I V E C A T A L O G U E C R E A T I O N A N D M A N A G E M E N T F O R E N G A G I N G B U Y E R S A N D S U P P L I E R S | 31 


3 2 | 

Product Categorisation 

If you browse the aisles of your local hardware store you will find all of the tools in one area, the 

fasteners in another, etc. This has been done so that it makes it easy for buyers to find what they 

need by browsing. An electronic catalogue should be no different with products coded so that 

the buying system can automatically sort them into common areas, to make it less difficult for 

cybernetic buyers to browse. Any coding system, however, needs to have a degree of universality in 

order to be able to be created by a multitude of suppliers and read by disparate systems. 

You will need to add codes to every item in your catalogue. The trick is that if your catalogue items 

already follow a classification pattern; match this to the classification pattern of your chosen 

coding system, and the job is done. 

“Semantics and Quality of Content Standards” 

In the field of e-Procurement catalogue management, catalogues are often graded based on some 

or all of the following quality attributes: 

• Normalisation - This involves ensuring the consistency of data. Do units of measure map to 

ANSI or EDIFACT standards? Do country codes map to existing ISO standards? Normalising 

also involves the expansion of any abbreviations and converting descriptions with all “caps” 

descriptions into mixed case. 

• Rationalisation - This process involves reordering item descriptions so that the most descriptive 

noun appears first followed by modifiers. For example the description “Blue Ballpoint Pen” would 

become “Pen, Ballpoint, Blue”. 

• Enrichment - This is the process of adding images, additional long descriptions, technical 

specifications, Material Safety Data Sheets, etc to the base catalogue data. 

• Categorisation (or Classification) - This is the process of attaching an item to a taxonomy 

structure like UN/SPSC. The common issues here are not that an item has been assigned to a 

valid category, but rather has the item been assigned to the right category. For example, consider 

the item “Screw, Pan Head” being assigned to the category kitchen utensils instead of hardware.” 

Customising Your Coding 

Basic universal coding may not meet all of your requirements or those of your customers. For instance 

in the UNSPSC commodity group 14-11-18 ‘business use papers’ there are only a few business functions 

that relate to forms (08 — ‘accounting’, 09 — ‘bill of lading’, 10 — ‘personnel’, 11 — ‘sales’, and some 

others) with most forms for business functions needing to be classified as 06 — ‘business forms’. If you 

are assembling a catalogue for a business with a high administrative focus, it will be essential to further 

sub-categorise. This involves adding additional digits to allow for the subcategories. When you do this, it 

has to be with the agreement of your customers and possibly in accordance with the specifications of a 

major customer. The result can reduce the portability of your catalogue.

External Links 

External links relate to images and data sheets. Every image provided as part of, or in conjunction 

with a catalogue, must be referenced in that catalogue. These links can be generic as a simple script 

and can translate them into the format required by your individual customers or hubs. 

Product Images 

Images can be used in a display that includes a “shop-front” to attract buyers to a particular product 

or product groups. They can also be displayed in a list to aid a buyer’s decision, or on a confirmation/ 

data sheet page where the buyer is able to confirm exactly this is the product they want. 

Thus, with images there are horses for courses. Generic, and in some cases banner images, will be 

required to head product categories. A generic image will include a range of items or even a stylised 

flagship product. However, for individual product identification, a single image of the item with a size 

scale is desirable. Using the example of sticky tape, a group photo showing various sizes and types 

of tape would be useful to attract buyers to adhesive tape or adhesives as a stationery category. 

However a buyer of tape is interested in whether or not it will fit their dispenser. Stationers describe 

tape in terms of its function and its width by length of the tape on the roll eg. 18 x 33 means 18 mm 

in width, 33 metres in length with no mention of a dispenser spindle diameter made. 

Thus an image of the product itself can be essential for buyers to confirm what they are ordering. 

Images may also need to meet the size and compression requirements of the particular buying 

system that will display them. 

Moving images are not recommended. They attract interest but also distract buyers from other key 

information, and perhaps another static image with the actual product of interest. Moving images 

can also cause bandwidth issues. 

Images also need to be low impact i.e. small in file size. For web-based delivery all images should be 

of .jpg or .gif format. Using medium definition (520 x 390 pixels, approx 40 kb) enables your images 

to be used as a presentation graphic if required, or compressed for a thumbnail display. 

Data sheet displays are a very effective way to tie images and other product information into the 

confirmation aspect of product selection. This involves the catalogue linking to an external (intranet 

or internet) website. There you can provide full product details if required (note that in the case 

where a customer’s intranet (internal internet) is to be used for data sheets, electronic data sheet 

details will need to be provided to the customer). 



3 4 | 

S T E P 5 – M A K I N G YO U R C A T A L O G U E A V A I L A B L E T O B U Y E R S 

Once you have developed an electronic catalogue, there are a number of ways you need to consider 

that allows your buyers to access this information, depending on their particular e-procurement 

infrastructure. 

The cost of making your catalogue available to as many buyers as possible across a range of sales 

channels should not negatively impact your potential revenue provided that the data is correctly set 

up in the first place. It is this last point that catalogue interoperability seeks to address. 

Catalogue interoperability facilitates the accessibility of information to a greater number of buyers 

by conforming to specific published and understood standards. A supplier’s catalogue data, for 

instance, can be aggregated to as many markets or through different channels as the supplier 

believes will generate revenue. With minimal costs to add an additional product attribute, be it a 

specific code or class (EAN or UN/SPSC code for example), will enable the goods and services to be 

accessed by a far wider range of buyers than would otherwise be possible. 

You will need to decide which way(s) will best meet your customers’ needs whilst maintaining your 

costs and the integrity of your catalogue content. If your catalogue is interoperable, it will reduce the 

overall cost of maintaining your content for multiple customers. Where you ultimately decide to have 

your catalogue hosted will probably depend on what your larger customers would like you to do. 

The primary models for allowing buyer access to your catalogue include: 

Supply Chain / Inventory Integration 

In case of supply chain/inventory integration, the buyer will want to link their purchasing system 

directly with your system – including linking directly with your catalogue for manual or automated 

access. In some instances the buyer may even want to interrogate your inventory system. 

This model usually applies to the level of ineroperability offered and e-enabled large customers 

with the exchange of item master data with trading partners the key component of this model. 

Management of trading partner identification data is important and in this instance, bar coding 

data can be included. A good example for this model is EANnet (www.ean.com.au). 

Buyer Hosted Content 

Buyers may want to take your catalogue content and host it in their own catalogue for internal use. 

This model is common where the buyers have an e-procurement module in their finance system, 

linked to their own stock or inventory management arrangements. Whilst interoperability makes this 

model more feasible, to save potential errors further down the supply chain, if you plan to adopt 

this model, you will need to be careful about the accuracy and currency of the catalogue content 

you provide to your customers. A good example of this is the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub.

Supplier Hosted Content 

You can host your own catalogue, either on your own web site or via a catalogue hosting service 

provider. There are a number of providers who will develop, host and maintain catalogues for you 

(eg Westpac Qvalent, Cyberlynx Supplier Hub). 

In this instance, the buyer would need to go to your site to access your catalogue content. You can 

then provide access via automated connections within the buyer’s e-procurement system. 

Through such a system, buyers will be in the position to access your catalogue via the Internet 

for ad hoc purchasing. Such access can often be implemented via connections in the buyer’s eprocurement 

system enabling the buyer to log onto your catalogue, browse and search, select and 

put data into a shopping cart, pull down the shopping cart and attach it to a purchase order in their 

financial system. This is “punch-out”. 

Making your catalogue compliant with major national and international standards developed 

by industry and/or vendor consortia will assist this process should you wish to use this model. 

Examples include OCI and OBI, although there are no mandated standards. Supplier Hubs will 

automatically convert your content between different standards to meet the buyer’s requirements. 

Electronic Marketplace Hosted Content 

A number of marketplaces will take your catalogue content and publish this for buyers. 

Examples of these are vertical marketplaces that relate to a particular industry, or horizontal 

marketplaces with a wide range of suppliers, such as government marketplaces 

(eg West Australia’s GEM and New South Wales’ smartbuy). 

There are also public commercial marketplaces available for suppliers 

(eg Yahoo Store - http://au.store.yahoo.com/), although the commercial arrangements for these 

marketplaces can vary significantly. 

Supplier Hub Hosted Content 

A number of catalogue vendors provide the catalogue classification structure and services that 

receive content from multiple suppliers, provide the catalogue classification structure and translate 

the content to multiple formats for distribution to other catalogues with little effort on the 

Supplier’s part. 

An example of this is the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub. 



3 6 | 

S T E P 6 – G E T T I N G A S S I S T A N C E 

As a supplier, you may find this whole process daunting. Help is at hand. There are a number 

of service providers who can assist you to work through these processes. Some of the services 

provided include: 

• business process reform; 

• business case development; 

• catalogue development; 

• data cleansing and classification; 

• catalogue e-enablement; 

• catalogue hosting; 

• catalogue interoperability; 

• e-procurement advice; 

• integration with existing systems; 

• supply chain management; and 

• technology advice. 

Examples of these service providers include: 

• EAN ( www.ean.com.au ); 

• Sensis ( www.sensis.com.au ); 

• Cyberlynx Supplier Hub ( www.supplierhub.com.au ); 

• Qvalent ( www.qvalent.com.au ); 

• GXS ( www.gxs.com ); 

• Singtel/Optus ( www.optusmarketsite.com.au ); 

• Congex ( www.congex.com ); 

• Marketboomer ( www.marketboomer.com ); 

• Acumen Alliance ( www.acumen.com.au ); 

• Australian Retailers Association ( www.ara.com.au ); and 

• LogicaCMG ( www.logicaCMG.com ). 

This list is not complete. In turn, the service providers listed above are recommendations only and 

do not comprise a definite inventory.

A P P E N D I X I 

C A S E S T U D I E S 

– C O N T E N T S 

NSW DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE CATALOGUE INTEROPERABILITY 

CASE STUDY 40 

Background 40 

Revised arrangements 40 

Establishing and maintaining the catalogue 41 

— Punch-out trials 41 

— Catalogue interchange trials 42 

Immediate benefits 42 

— Punch-out 42 

— Catalogue interchange 42 

Next steps 43 

— Punch-out 43 

— Catalogue interchange 43 

CITISOFT SOFTWARE-2-U CASE STUDY 44 

Background 44 




Next steps 45 

CASE STUDY FOR CYBERLYNX INTEROPERABILITY WITH THE 

WESTPAC QVALENT AND NSW DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE 

SMARTBUY CATALOGUES 46 

Cyberlynx’s interoperability with smartbuy 46

3 8 | 

— Background 46 

— Establishing the catalogue 46 

— Benefits 47 

— Conclusions and next steps 47 

smartbuyTM interoperability with Cyberlynx 

(see also the Department of Commerce case study) 47 

— Background 47 


— Summary and conclusions 48 

Cyberlynx Supplier Hub & Westpac Qvalent: Supplier Hub to Westpac 48 


— Comments and summary 48 

Cyberlynx supplier hub & Westpac Qvalent: Westpac to Supplier Hub 49 


— Summary and conclusions 49 

CASE STUDY FOR COMMONWEALTH BANK PROMOTIONAL ITEMS 50 

Background 50 


Benefits 51 

CASE STUDY FOR NOVEL INNOVATIONS 52 

Background 52 




Next steps 54 

CASE STUDY FOR DEPARTMENT FOR ADMINISTRATIVE 

AND INFORMATION SERVICES (DAIS) SOUTH AUSTRALIAN 

GOVERNMENT 56 

Background 56 

System objectives 56 

How E-Purchase SA Works 56 

— Requisitions: 56 

— Purchase orders 57 

—Receiving goods 57 

—Invoices 57

—Advantages of E-Purchase SA 57 

—DAIS perspective on the suppliers chosen 58 

—Supplier enablement 58 

—Immediate benefits to DAIS 59 

Summary 60 

CASE STUDY FOR AISH DATA & DESIGN (AISH) 61 

Background 61 




Next steps 63 

CASE STUDY FOR COMMANDER AUSTRALIA LTD 64 

Background on dealings with DAIS (SA Dept. of Admin. & Information Systems) 64 




Next steps 65 

CASE STUDY FOR IMAGE-ON PTY LTD 66 

Background 66 




Next steps 66 


APPENDIX I

4 0 | 

N S W D E P A R T M E N T O F C O M M E R C E C A T A L O G U E 

I N T E R O P E R A B I L I T Y C A S E S T U DY 

Background 

smartbuyTM is NSW Government’s secure online government-to-business e-procurement platform, 

allowing NSW Government departments and other eligible organisations to browse, select and 

purchase goods and services online from approved government suppliers. 

A key objective of smartbuy TM is to promote the economic development of NSW by: 

• Facilitating growth in the efficient and effective use of electronic commerce. 

• Providing open and equitable access to Govt procurement markets. 

A key component of the smartbuyTM e-marketplace is the smartbuyTM catalogue. The smartbuyTM catalogue is one of the most comprehensive government e-marketplace catalogues in Australia, 

incorporating approximately 85,000 line items and 2,500 suppliers and associated resellers across 

New South Wales. 

An extensive and authoritative electronic catalogue is a foundation stone for any viable electronic 

procurement system. 

Preparing and maintaining an electronic catalogue has an attendant cost for a supplier. While 

there are benefits that can offset those costs, the net benefit depends on the volume of business 

generated compared to the cost of establishing and maintaining an electronic catalogue. Catalogue 

management costs can quickly exceed the benefit if suppliers are required to prepare and maintain 

their content in multiple systems. 

It is thus important to ensure that the content prepared by a supplier for one catalogue can 

be made available in a controlled manner for use in other catalogues without need for manual 

manipulation. This can be described as catalogue interoperability. 

Catalogue interoperability saves suppliers money by eliminating duplicated effort and lowers risk by 

reducing the cost and errors associated with the manual data modifications. 

Interoperability between catalogues can be achieved in a number of ways including: 

• Allowing a user in one system to connect to and browse a catalogue hosted by another system 

(this is generally referred to as “punch-out”). 

• Making the data in one catalogue available for electronic upload into another (this is described in 

this document as “catalogue data interchange”). 

To demonstrate the viability of the above approaches a number of trials have conducted by the 

Department of Commerce and various partner organisations. These trials are described in detail in 

the remainder of this document. 

Revised arrangements 

The ability to allow a user to punch-out to an externally hosted catalogue was implemented in 

smartbuy during the earliest stages of system development. The functionality is based on OCI

(Open Catalogue Interface) standard defined by SAP. 

Setting up a link from smartbuy to an externally hosted OCI compliant catalogue is 

straightforward. Details defining access to the externally hosted target system need to be entered 

into smartbuy through a system administration screen. 

These details include the: 

• smartbuy TM buying organisation requiring access to the external catalogue. 

• External catalogue URL. 

• smartbuy TM return URL. 

• Logon and password to the external catalogue. 

When these details have been entered, a catalogue link referencing the externally hosted catalogue 

is created in smartbuy. When users select this link they are transferred to the externally hosted 

catalogue where they can continue to search and browse for products. Items can be selected from 

the externally hosted catalogue and stored in a list generally referred to as a shopping cart. 

For the purposes of the punch-out trial, demonstration catalogue punch-out links were created and 

made available in smartbuy. A user would then be able to log into smartbuyTM , click on the link 

to access the external site, browse and select items, and then return the external shopping cart to 

smartbuyTM as a requisition. 

When the user completes their selections from the external catalogue, a shopping cart containing 

details of the selected items is returned to the original system as a standard OCI message. The 

process of creating a requisition and ultimately a purchase order then continues in their local 

system as if the items had been selected from the local catalogue. 

For the catalogue interchange trial, catalogue data was exported in a pre-defined format from 

both host systems - Cyberlynx’s Requisite catalogue and the smartbuy TM catalogue. The exported 

catalogue items were then exchanged via email and uploaded into the destination catalogue. Users 

were then able to select the uploaded items onto requisitions from the destination system. 

Establishing and maintaining the catalogue 

Punch-out trials 

The Qvalent catalogue operated by the South Australian Government is an OCI catalogue. In May of 

2003 a demonstration catalogue punch-out link was created and made available in smartbuy. 

Once all the OCI parameters had been correctly entered, a user logged on to smartbuy and 

selected the demonstration punch-out catalogue link. The user was then connected via OCI punchout 

to the Qvalent catalogue and was thus able to browse and search that catalogue and select 

items for inclusion in a shopping cart. 

At the end of the session the shopping cart was returned to smartbuy TM and the punch-out OCI 

message was used to automatically create a smartbuy requisition. 


APPENDIX I

4 2 | 

Catalogue interchange trials 

In October 2003 the feasibility of electronic data interchange was tested in a trial conducted 

between smartbuy and Cyberlynx’s Requisite catalogue. The trial validated interchange in both 

directions, with data being extracted from smartbuy and then loaded into Requisite, and data 

being extracted from Requisite and loaded into smartbuy. 

To affect the trial both parties met to discuss protocols for the exchange of data. It was agreed 

that data would be presented as ASCII text files, formatted as comma separated values (CSV) and 

exchanged using email over the Internet. 

At the meeting the data fields of both systems were also discussed. Although the two systems 

supported different data structures, the essential data elements to support product identification, 

selection and electronic procurement were present in both. A simple field mapping exercise was 

conducted and agreement reached on the fields to be included and field order to be used in the 

exported data files. 

Files for interchange were exported from each system, in the agreed format, by running standard 

SQL inquiries against each catalogue database. The resultant files were exchanged over the Internet 

via email and loaded into the destination system using standard SQL import statements. The process 

was successfully completed at both systems without any need to re-key catalogue data. 

Immediate benefits 

Punch-out 

The trials confirmed the viability of OCI punch-out as a catalogue interoperability mechanism. 

Provided that the two systems being connected have been built to support OCI messaging, the 

process of configuring a link, punching-out and returning a shopping cart proved to be a simple 

and reliable mechanism for achieving catalogue interoperability. Since the original trial, smartbuy 

users access externally hosted catalogues using OCI punch-out as a routine production activity. 

In this instance OCI parameters defining connection to the smartbuy catalogue were provided 

and entered into Qvalent. An end-user was then able to select, browse and search the smartbuy 

catalogue, create a shopping cart, return the shopping cart to Qvalent and create a requisition and 

purchase order locally. 

Because both the Qvalent and smartbuy catalogues support OCI messaging, the process was 

simple, effective and efficient. 

Catalogue interchange 

Once the catalogues were loaded into the destination systems, it was possible to browse and search 

the additional items, select them for inclusion in a requisition and to create a purchase order. 

Overall, the process of exchanging catalogues was simple and efficient although some points are 

worth noting: 

• As the exchange was limited to a trial of the feasibility of electronic interchange, certain 

compromises were accepted in the range and mapping of data. In a production application,

planning the mapping between two systems would be a more time consuming and expensive 

activity. The use of common standards such as UNSPSC for item classification and the reduction 

of data to (atomic) elements are essential to make data mapping a manageable problem. 

• The use of email was a pragmatic solution to the interchange of data for the purposes of this 

trial. In a production application, security, bandwidth and reliability issues may dictate the need 

to consider other transport mechanisms. 

Next steps 

Punch-out 

Although the punch-out arrangement has proven to be a simple, effective and efficient mechanism 

for expanding the range of goods and services available for purchase, such arrangements do put a 

number of issues out of the direct control of the host system. 

When considering connection to an externally hosted catalogue the following criteria need to be 

carefully assessed: 

• Does the operator of the externally hosted catalogue guarantee acceptable service levels 

including system availability and an effective help desk for problem resolution? 

• Will variations in the user interface become a training problem for end users? 

• Is the necessary functionality to control the range of goods and prices offered to local end users 

available via the externally hosted catalogue? 

• Do data standards for item classification such as, item identification and units of measure, meet 

the requirements of the local e-procurement system? 

Catalogue interchange 

Despite some minor presentation issues, the trial demonstrated that electronic data interchange 

is a viable mechanism for affecting catalogue interoperability. The minor problems concerning 

presentation in the destination systems could be resolved for production application as required, 

through additional data mapping. 

The trial did however underscore the importance of data standards and the reduction of data to its 

most atomic form as essential elements to effective electronic data interchange. 


APPENDIX I

4 4 | 

C I T I S O F T S O F T W A R E - 2 - U C A S E S T U DY 

Background 

The Department for Administrative and Information Services (DAIS), in South Australia purchases 

a wide range of computer software from Citisoft Software 2 U. The computer software purchased 

ranges from operating system software and tools to end-user based products required by its 

business units. The software purchased from Citisoft is outside of the software covered under the 

SA Government’s Microsoft Select Agreement (i.e. arrangements that cover the purchase of all 

Microsoft licensed/owned products). 

Prior to the creation of the electronic catalogue, DAIS buyers would either phone or send an 

email to Citisoft requesting the availability and price for specific pieces of software. Citisoft would 

determine the price and availability of the software and then send this information to DAIS by email 

or by making a phone call. DAIS would then use the E-Purchase SA system and manually enter the 

product information and send a purchase order by facsimile to Citisoft. Citisoft would then source 

the software and deliver it to DAIS and then send a paper invoice to DAIS for payment. 


Under the new method DAIS logs on to E-Purchase SA and accesses the Citisoft catalogue on the 

marketplace to find the piece of software that they are looking for. If the piece of software that DAIS 

wants to purchase is not listed on the catalogue they will then send an email or telephone as previously 

done. This can happen as DAIS may wish to purchase a piece of software that Citisoft has never 

sourced, but because of Citisoft’s wide range of software contacts can still be sourced on DAIS’s behalf. 

Once DAIS has found the software they need on the catalogue or by manually typing the product 

information onto the purchase order, the order is sent electronically to the order processing section of 

the marketplace and Citisoft receives an email alert that a new order has arrived. A staff member then 

accesses the marketplace and views the order. This order detail is then entered into Citisoft’s internal 

Sybiz accounting system and the software is sourced (if not already in stock) and delivered to DAIS. 

Delivery of the item triggers the creation of the invoice for DAIS. This invoice is printed out and 

Citisoft then accesses the marketplace to send an electronic invoice. To do this, the order associated 

with the invoice is found, the invoice template is selected, the specific invoice details entered and 

an electronic invoice is sent back to the E-Purchase SA system. 


Citisoft’s existing accounting system, Sybiz is the source of all product and pricing information for 

the software that Citisoft sells. Citisoft and a local IT consultant, Mr Ken Sellick, worked with Sensis 

to understand the product information and data loading formats required by the marketplace. Mr 

Sellick then used an ODBC connector to extract the required product information from Sybiz into a 

spreadsheet format specified by the marketplace, allowing this product information to be imported 

directly into the marketplace. This allows for quick and easy updating of the product information on 

the marketplace whenever Citisoft requires. Citisoft envisage that this would probably happen on a 

monthly basis.


The following intangible benefits from the revised system have been identified and quoted by 

Citisoft: 

• DAIS buyers can look at the catalogue and see if the item that they want to purchase is already 

listed or not. If not, they will then call or email as discussed above, but this is now the minority 

of transactions. 

• DAIS send the order to the marketplace where it can be viewed on-line instead of receiving the 

order by facsimile. 

• When the order arrives they can be easily entered into Citisoft systems because the product 

codes are known and are correct as they originated from the catalogue information. 

• “The catalogue update process has been enabled to allow us to quickly and easily download the 

product information from internal systems into the correct format to update the list of products 

and prices”. 

• Citisoft can use the on-line invoice capability to return an electronic invoice to DAIS’s E-Purchase 

SA system. If prices have not altered and the requested goods have been delivered, the order will 

be passed automatically into the buyer’s financial systems for payment. (Electronic invoices do 

not get lost in a buyer’s or accounts payable staff member’s in-tray). 

The following tangible benefits have been achieved and quoted from Citisoft: 

• The catalogue has reduced the number of telephone calls between DAIS and Citisoft as the 

majority of items requested can be immediately found on the electronic catalogue. “Some 

telephone calls are still required as not all the software DAIS requires is immediately available 

on our catalogue. One of the small problems that we have encountered is with the accuracy 

of software pricing which is due to the nature of the software business. Prices and versions of 

software change frequently and often the current pricing for specific software is not known until 

the order is placed”. 

• The ability to receive purchase orders electronically has some benefits as it reduces the volume 

of orders received by facsimile which would lead to cost savings in facsimile consumables and 

paper. This would be only a tiny benefit to Citisoft at this stage but if more customers could 

transact in this way the savings would grow. 

Next steps 

At this stage there are minimal further steps that Citisoft would consider taking. DAIS is currently 

the only SA Government buyer using the E-Purchase SA system. If this was to grow and other 

clients started to use similar systems, Citisoft would consider undertaking some further activities. 

For example, Citisoft is already extracting product information from Sybiz to load into the 

marketplace catalogue. The next stage would be to look at further enhancing Sybiz to enable orders 

to be automatically entered and for the system to generate invoices to be sent directly back to E- 

Purchase SA without the need to use the marketplace. 

With regard to the catalogue itself, Citisoft already have an on-line catalogue allowing the general 

public to purchase software. This system does not have the punch-out capability in-built. Citisoft 

could consider enhancing or redeveloping the catalogue to include this functionality. 


APPENDIX I

4 6 | 

C A S E S T U DY F O R C Y B E R LY N X S U P P L I E R H U B 

I N T E R O P E R A B I L I T Y W I T H T H E W E S T P A C Q V A L E N T A N D N S W 

D E P A R T M E N T O F C O M M E R C E S M A R T B U Y C A T A L O G U E S 

This paper discusses the results of the interoperability project which test the feasibility of 

exchanging supplier catalogues between different systems, namely the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub, the 

Westpac Qvalent System, and the Department of Commerce’s smartbuyTM marketplace. For each 

content interchange, the content format, the supplier account activation, the content load process 

and handling images are discussed, before providing comments and an overall conclusion. 

Cyberlynx Supplier Hub’s interoperability with smartbuy 

Background 

smartbuy provided Cyberlynx Supplier Hub with a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, containing 

catalogue content from a supplier named Interface. The spreadsheet was an extract from the 

smartbuyTM system, and contained smartbuyTM specific content attributes (both common and 

category-specific). The catalogue contained one category, CARPET TILE, and 17 SKUs. The supplier 

information that smartbuyTM provided for the supplier was sufficient to activate an account for 

that supplier on the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub. The interface content was categorised as ‘CARPET TILE‘ 

– this category was mapped to the Requisite Unifying Structure (RUS), category of Tiles – the RUS 

definition is “a tile is a small, typically flat, piece used in quantity to cover a surface for aesthetic 

or protective purposes. Inclusions: floor tiles, wall tiles, ceramic tiles, and carpet tiles”. This was a 

satisfactory match. 

RUS is a product classification standard that provides mappings to standards such as UNSPSC and 

NATO. 

Establishing the catalogue 

Cyberlynx loaded the spreadsheet provided by smartbuyTM , and utilised the mapping functionality of 

the supplier hub to map the smartbuyTM content attributes into the supplier hub content attributes. 

There were also ‘category specific’ attributes present in the file. These are attributes that relate 

specifically to the category of ‘CARPET TILES’. These were mapped into the RUS category-specific 

attributes. There were additional RUS category-specific attributes that were left blank (such as 

Thickness) as there was no data provided. 

There exists the possibility that there will be category-specific attributes provided by smartbuyTM that 

do not match the category-specific attributes provided by RUS. These could be handled as follows: 

• The new attributes could be suggested as new attributes in the RUS schema and after a review 

by subject-matter experts, the attributes may be added to the RUS schema. 

• The attributes could be loaded onto the hub as ‘supplier-specific’ attributes. 

• Product updates, deletions and additions can be handled by smartbuyTM generating a spreadsheet 

containing changes and additions, and specifying deletions that can then be processed by the 

Cyberlynx Supplier Hub.

Benefits 

Content was loaded into the Supplier Hub as categorised content – using the Tiles category – the benefit 

of loading categorised content is that product aliases, UNSPC codes, UNSPSC commodities, and categoryspecific 

attributes are all automatically appended by the Supplier Hub to each product – this increases 

the richness and utility value of the content for end users in buy-side and sell-side environments. 

Additionally, by mapping the smartbuyTM category to the RUS category the supplier’s catalogue is 

now in a format that can be automatically mapped to other industry standard catalogue schemas 

– such as UNSPSC, eCl@ss, NATO, RosettaNet, PIDS, and NACS. This is beneficial to the supplier 

as it opens up multiple opportunities for syndicating content with little additional effort or labour 

required. 

Conclusions and next steps 

A supplier catalogue was successfully exchanged between the smartbuyTM system and the Cyberlynx 

Supplier Hub. Manual intervention was required to map the smartbuyTM category with the Cyberlynx 

category. Because smartbuyTM uses proprietary categories that do not correspond to any accepted 

standards or schemas, it would be difficult to automate this mapping, though this could be 

investigated further through the use of a well-defined consistently attributed content style guide. 

The degree of effort is minimal, and will vary depending on the number of categories utilised in a 

supplier’s catalogue. Images were included in the exercise. Department of Commerce are currently 

addressing the loading & support of images in smartbuyTM . 

smartbuy TM interoperability with Cyberlynx 

(see also the Department of Commerce case study) 

Background 

Cyberlynx provided the Department of Commerce with a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, containing 

catalogue content for Novel Innovations. The spreadsheet was exported from the Cyberlynx Supplier 

Hub and adhered to the RUS schema (with RUS categories, common attributes and categoryspecific 

attributes). The catalogue contained four (4) categories (Appointment Books, Picture Frames, 

Note Pad Holders and Name Badge Holders) and 52 SKU’s. 

smartbuyTM required additional attributes to create a supplier account. Some of the attributes 

required were internal attributes and could not be provided by an external party, such as smartbuyTM ID, Det Supcode, etc. The Supplier Hub uses the company name to identify a supplier. smartbuyTM also requires the trading name, which is not typically required or collected when activating a 

supplier on the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub and as such had to be determined. 


As the supplier was new and the items they supplied fell into new categories, both categories and 

category specific attributes had to be manually created in the smartbuyTM system. The Department of 

Commerce created their own custom categories and attributes that necessitated the mapping between 

the RUS categories and attributes and the newly created smartbuyTM categories and attributes. APPENDIX I 

F R O M P A P E R T O P R O C U R E M E N T – E F F E C T I V E C A T A L O G U E C R E A T I O N A N D M A N A G E M E N T F O R E N G A G I N G B U Y E R S A N D S U P P L I E R S | 4 7

4 8 | 

Summary and conclusions 

Content was exported from the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub and loaded into the smartbuy TM system. 

Manual effort was required by the Department of Commerce to create their own categories and 

category attributes and then map the provided Cyberlynx RUS category and category attribute. 

For existing categories, the Supplier Hub could feasibly export content in the required format and 

with the appropriate categories and category attributes populated however, for new categories, 

smartbuyTMneeds to develop these categories and attributes and as such, they would not be 

available for Cyberlynx Supplier Hub to map to. 

Cyberlynx Supplier Hub & Westpac Qvalent: Supplier Hub to Westpac 


Cyberlynx provided Westpac Qvalent with a catalogue for the supplier Novel Innovations. The 

catalogue had (four (4) categories (Name Badge Holders, Note Pad Holders, Picture Frames, and 

Appointment Books) and 36 SKUs. 

The catalogue was exported from the Supplier Hub in a format complying with the Westpac Qvalent 

template. Qvalent utilise the UNSPSC code to assist with categorisation – the Supplier Hub exports 

catalogues with the UNSPSC code automatically assigned against products. 

Supplier information required by Westpac Qvalent matched the supplier information stored by 

Cyberlynx Supplier Hub. Due to the sell-side nature of the Qvalent solution, further supplier interaction 

would typically be required to fully enable the supplier account – for example, suppliers would upload 

supplier logos, modify the look and feel of their catalogue, undergo training, enable transaction 

management, etc. All of these activities occur outside the process of catalogue management. 

Westpac Qvalent took the template provided by Cyberlynx, converted it to an XML file (an 

automated process) and loaded the resulting file into the Westpac Qvalent system 

Comments and summary 

The supplier catalogue was exported from the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub in a format meeting the 

Qvalent catalogue template. Due to the way in which categories were handled in Qvalent (categories 

were created by the supplier, a code assigned to these categories, and products were then assigned 

these codes to denote their category) some manual intervention was required to assign category 

codes against products rather than category name. 

As suppliers are able to create their own categories, and there is no mandatory requirement to meet 

an existing category standard, the RUS categories as exported from the supplier hub were used as 

the Qvalent categories. Further investigation is required to determine how Qvalent handles product 

additions, modifications and deletion. 

Supplier catalogues were successfully exchanged between the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub and the 

Westpac Qvalent system. Manual intervention was required to assign codes against categories and 

then assign these codes against products.

Cyberlynx Supplier Hub & Westpac Qvalent: Westpac to Supplier Hub 


Westpac Qvalent provided Cyberlynx Supplier Hub with a catalogue for the supplier Citisoft 

(Software 2/U). The catalogue had nineteen (19) categories, (Web Development, Utilities, Scanners, 

Reference, General, Publishing, Programming, Printers, Music, Macintosh, Linux, Licensing, Learning, 

Languages, Freight, Educational, Consumables - DAIS Prices, Books, Australiana) and 282 SKUs. 

Cyberlynx provided Westpac with a content template that detailed the attributes utilised in the 

supplier hub, along with their data type, length restrictions and a definition. Westpac exported 

the catalogue for Citisoft from the Qvalent system in a format complying with the Supplier Hub 

template. Supplier information provided by Westpac Qvalent was sufficient to activate a supplier 

account on Cyberlynx Supplier Hub 

Cyberlynx took the template that was completed by Qvalent and loaded directly into the Supplier 

Hub. No additional mapping or manipulation of content was required. 

The Westpac Qvalent content was loaded onto the supplier hub as ‘uncategorised’. This meant that 

product aliases, UNSPSC codes, UNSPSC commodities and category specific attributes were not 

automatically assigned against products. The categories utilised by Westpac Qvalent were mapped 

to the ‘supplier category’ attribute on the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub. 

Summary and conclusions 

A level of data cleansing would be required to ensure that the content meets the minimum 

standards for the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub. 

Westpac Qvalent was able to export content in the format required by Cyberlynx Supplier Hub. 

The content was loaded without any manual intervention 

Content was loaded as ‘uncategorised’ – loading as ‘categorised’ would confer additional 

advantages but would also require manual intervention. 


APPENDIX I

5 0 | 

C A S E S T U DY F O R C O M M O N W E A L T H B A N K P R O M O T I O N A L I T E M S 

Background 

The Commonwealth Bank of Australia has one of the largest internal e-procurement systems in 

Australia, with 6,000 registered users making a peak of 200 concurrent connections twice a day, 

creating 14,000 orders at a value of $50M per month. The Bank uses Ariba and software from 

Requisite technology. 

There are eight online catalogues: 

1 Generic stationery; 

2 Bank branded products; 

3 Rubber stamps and name plates; 

4 Business cards; 

5 Office equipment; 

6 Bank equipment; 

7 Information Technology; and 

8 Telecommunications. 

These catalogues in conjunction with related systems cover nearly 100% of the goods and services 

Bank staff require to do their day-to-day work. Related systems cover: 

• Travel; 

• Temporary labour and consultants; 

• Corporate wardrobe; 

• Expenses; and 

• Promotions and marketing collaborative commerce sourcing. 

With the exception of the Bank branded products catalogue, catalogues are either developed by 

suppliers to the Bank’s specifications, or provided via the Cyberlynx Supplier Hub. The Bank branded 

products catalogue covers goods that are designed for bank specific purposes, sourced in bulk, then 

warehoused on the Bank’s behalf by Linfox. Sourcing is for the most part handled via a collaborative 

commerce system (PrintCafé). Bank staff use a custom database to produce this catalogue internally. 


As part of the e-catalogue interoperability (eCatalogue) project, the Bank using the Cyberlynx 

Supplier Hub successfully exchanged supplier catalogues between the participating buying 

organisations’ systems (NSW Department of Commerce (DoC) – smartbuyTM and Westpac’s Qvalent 

marketplace). New catalogues from Rave Marketing Services, Novel Innovations, and Image-On 

developed as part of the eCatalogue project were downloaded from Supplier Hub and taken into the 

Bank’s catalogue environment. 

The products involved were promotional (for example caps, umbrellas, and golf balls ). After being 

sourced the products are branded and then either distributed as part of a campaign and/or warehoused.

They could not be made available on the Bank’s e-procurement system. Instead the new process 

meant making available the product details to a select user group responsible for choosing items and 

specifications about products for inclusion in the Bank’s marketing campaigns. This was seen as valuable 

and time effective when gathering requirements and styles for the creation and eventual sourcing of a 

bank branded item by the design houses. 

To this end the catalogues were loaded into a Requisite software search tool, and made available to 

Bank’s marketing and warehouse buying staff on the Bank’s intranet. The same supplier catalogues were 

also made accessible to the Bank’s external design houses via the Internet on Cyberlynx Supplier Hub. 

Benefits 

The new catalogues have provided those responsible for developing and satisfying the Bank’s 

product marketing, the ability to review available promotional items with a greater level of accuracy, 

consistency and efficiency due to referenceable images and enhanced descriptions as highlighted in 

the diagram below. This was seen as valuable and time effective when gathering requirements and 

styles for the creation and eventual sourcing of bank branded items by the designers. This service 

has been well used with a number of bulk purchases being made from catalogue-featured products 

in the test period. 

When the catalogue-featured promotional items were sourced and stocked in the Bank’s branded 

product warehouse the catalogue information was then able to be used to populate fields in the 

Bank’s warehouse catalogue. 

Detail of product information available for online review. 

“The result has been useful for the Bank in facilitating access to product information and 

streamlining the process of catalogue data capture. In the process our suppliers have been afforded 

the opportunity to place accurate and detailed product information before our key decision makers 

and potential new buyers on the supplier hub.” 

John Howells (Commonwealth Bank) and Jeff Felsinger (Cyberlynx Supplier Hub) February 2004 


APPENDIX I

5 2 | 

C A S E S T U DY F O R N O V E L I N N O V A T I O N S 

Background 

Commonwealth Bank (CBA) made extensive investigations to review the price and delivery 

structure that Novel Innovations used when dealing with corporate companies. They were also very 

interested in the types of clients Novel had and also the internal staffing of the company. Novel 

dealt with many members of the CBA team and they all took an active interest in the Novel people 

not just the price and product. This indicated that the staff at CBA focused on learning about the 

people within the company which then enabled a much greater perspective on the services of the 

company. 

Over the course of the year various products are on contract with CBA. The majority of purchases 

are for small gadgets and give aways for those items. There are however a significant number of 

purchases for items that are not on contract. These purchases can be for any of the thousands of 

product items that are available from the sourcing team within Novel. 

Under the previous arrangements the CBA buyers were provided with a spreadsheet detailing prices 

and other attributes of the contracted items. Revised spreadsheets were emailed periodically to the 

buyers detailing price and other changes. 

As far as order processing was concerned, the usual practice was for the buyers to call Novel to 

confirm the price and other details of the items prior to placing the order by facsimile. In the case 

of the ad hoc orders it was necessary for the buyer to speak to a Novel sales representative in every 

instance. This could involve numerous telephone calls between CBA and Novel per day. 

Revised Arrangements 

Novel Innovations keeps buyers informed in a number of ways. Prices are transparent in that retail 

and wholesale prices are publicly available. CBA achieve prices that are at or below the wholesale 

price and as such Novel is always able to keep them informed of changes in line with fluctuations 

in wholesale prices as well as the exchange rate. These changes when they apply are sent via email, 

fax or letter. 

Under the revised arrangements the CBA buyers place orders using their purchasing system. The key 

feature of the arrangement from Novel ‘s perspective is that the buyers are viewing the electronic 

catalogue that has been uploaded into the Buyer’s system. The catalogue details all of the necessary 

attributes of the items including the price. The orders are placed into the portal where they are 

accessed by the Novel sales staff. 

Internal structures at the CBA seem streamlined in that purchase orders are raised centrally and 

people are always available to communicate with the team at Novel.

Establishing and Maintaining the Catalogue 

The catalogue was developed with the assistance of Sensis. From Novel ‘s perspective this was a 

relatively simple exercise. Sensis developed the catalogues using spreadsheets provided by Novel. 

Over the 50 days that the catalogue was developed, Novel staff were only required to provide 

approximately 10 hours effort in preparing the data, and another 10 hours input in general 

discussion and reviewing the catalogue that Sensis developed. 

It is not possible to quantify savings from electronic Catalogue development, as development of the 

previous catalogue was not costed. However, the previous Catalogue took a couple of hours a week 

to maintain – and while Sensis developed this new catalogue for this project it is taking a similar 

amount of time to maintain. 

The only costs incurred by Novel in developing the catalogues were labor costs and support from 

Novel’s IT staff to assist in the implementation. This effort is estimated at around 7-10 days. Labor 

costs involved with maintaining the catalogues have been minimal. 

The catalogue development process was excellent as Novel was fully informed of process 

requirements, and what the expectations were. The depth and detail has been very encouraging. 

Novel uses a dedicated account manager when working on CBA jobs. Training days consumed about 

5 days last year when CBA were implementing their new procurement facility. Otherwise the entire 

internal infrastructure was already in place which minimised Novel’s costs. 

Immediate Benefits 

Novel did not see any errors during the process. However, early changes were made in the process 

which enabled Novel to preview or play with samples before jobs were quoted. 

The benefits of the system are still to be reviewed. However, from what we have seen the catalogue 

has displayed the Novel items as well as in depth descriptions of the products and features. 

From Novel’s perspective the new e-catalogue system is simple effective and harmonious. 

The following intangible benefits from the revised system have been identified: 

• The CBA buyers have stated that they like the look and feel of the catalogue. They much prefer to 

use the catalogue rather than the old spreadsheets; 

• Novel is very impressed with the functionality and ease of use of this catalogue and the website; 

• The catalogue has facilitated the use of the system by the CBA buyers. This has in turn 

facilitated the use of electronic orders rather than faxed or telephone orders; and 

• The catalogue is easily amended to reflect the latest prices and other changes. 

Novel are very keen to continue with this catalogue and the system, as the benefits to CBA, Novel 

and hopefully in the future more clients, are significant. 


M U L T I - C H A N N E L D E L I V E R Y

5 4 | 

The following tangible benefits have been achieved: 

• A key benefit to Novel is obviously the reduction in the time it takes for invoices to be paid 

and a reduction in the number of invoices with errors. Invoicing in the system ensures that the 

invoices are always correct, and also enables CBA to pay invoices automatically - and quickly. 

“Even though CBA is traditionally very good at paying invoices, I expect this puts money in our 

bank 2 to 5 days earlier. This has an immediate positive impact on our business.” 

• The eCatalogue has already reduced the frequency of telephone communication between the 

buyers at CBA and Novel, and has definitely increased the accuracy of orders. “We now spend 

less time quoting and confirming pricing for CBA - while it is only minimal at this stage; this 

makes a real positive impact on our day-to-day productivity. Our challenge moving forward is 

obviously to expand the catalogue to encompass all the products we sell, and have a simple way 

to manage the catalogue. Savings of around 1 hour a day are already being achieved even with 

a limited catalogue.” 

• It is difficult to quantify hard dollars saved because the old catalogue was also electronic – Excel 

format, so there was no printing or distribution costs. “Cost of processing orders is now higher 

from our perspective, at this stage we still need to enter the orders into our sales system- this 

is manual; so whether the order comes via fax or via the Qvalent system, makes no difference 

to us – the main benefit of this at this stage is that orders do not get lost. Faxing is generally 

unreliable, this system enables us to acknowledge orders and we never have the issue of a 

“missing” faxed order. There is some double handling in relation to the Qvalent system from our 

perspective at this stage, as we have to manually enter orders into our system, and we have to 

invoice them initially in our system, and then again on the Qvalent system – but we are planning 

to upgrade our systems in future to hopefully eliminate some of the double handling.” 

Next Steps 

The next step will involve the presentation of the catalogue to another buying organisation. This 

may be the South Australian and/or a NSW Government Department. This is a technical exercise 

designed to prove that a catalogue developed by Cyberlynx can be presented to buyers using other 

systems (i.e. Qvalent or Intershop). The options for this presentation process include: 

• Cyberlynx will present the catalogue to other buyers on behalf of Novel; 

• the catalogue may be processed by Sensis on behalf of Novel and the other buyers; 

• Novel may simply provide another catalogue to the buyers for loading into their systems. 

The key issue in the next step is to identify the advantages and disadvantages, and the costs for 

each of the options. 

It is noted that the use of the catalogues and the related benefits of the FMIS system give rise to 

the possibility of further streamlining of processes. These include: 

• Automation of the loading of purchase orders in the Novel orders processing system.

The fact that the buyers are using the Novel data to populate the orders ensures that items are 

properly described and the correct prices are used. There is no need for human intervention in the 

data entry of orders. 

• Automation of the process of loading data into the catalogue. 

“At this stage the process of updating the catalogue content, while it is manual, it is fairly simple 

to do online, and while the current Catalogue has only a very limited number of items this is 

OK. When/if we increase the number of items in the catalogue we will definitely need to look at 

automating the process of updating the catalogue”. 

• Presentation of the catalogues to other buyers. 

Novel is working with Sensis to make the catalogue available to other buying organisations and 

their e-Catalogue providers. The intention is to make the catalogue available to the buyers using the 

Smartbuy eMarketplace and Cyberlynx. 


M U L T I - C H A N N E L D E L I V E R Y

5 6 | 

C A S E S T U DY F O R D E P A R T M E N T F O R A D M I N I S T R A T I V E 

A N D I N F O R M A T I O N S E R V I C E S ( D A I S ) S O U T H A U S T R A L I A N 

G O V E R N M E N T 

Background 

The Department for Administrative and Information Services (DAIS) South Australia has 

implemented an electronic procurement system known as ‘E-Purchase SA’. DAIS has lead agency 

status for the implementation of electronic procurement within the SA Government and therefore 

there is potential for this system to be adopted right across the SA Government. 

System objectives 

There are 3 major objectives for implementing electronic procurement into DAIS (and across the SA 

Government). These objectives are: 

1 Allow DAIS to collect and analyse detailed information about procurement activities. 

2 To improve the efficiency of existing procurement to payment processing. 

3 To be a catalyst for the deployment of electronic procurement systems in SA. 

The system selected needed to be capable of integration with existing financial management 

systems (that do not have existing e-procurement capability) and must allow DAIS to buy from any 

supplier regardless of their e-procurement capability. 

DAIS does not want to internally host all supplier catalogue information (due to the wide range 

and large number of suppliers used) and therefore the system must allow ‘punch-out’ capability to 

access suppliers via existing electronic procurement capability. 

How E-Purchase SA Works 

The E-Purchase system’s characteristics are as follows: 

Requisitions: 

• Requisitions can be prepared in a number of ways: 

• Where a supplier has an established electronic catalogue that allows ‘punch-out’ capability, 

buyers will use E-Purchase SA to access the supplier’s catalogue, identify the goods they wish 

to purchase and these items are then bought back into the E-Purchase system to populate a 

requisition. 

• Where a supplier does not have an established catalogue, the buyer will use an electronic form 

and manually enter the details of the items to be purchased onto the form, which is then 

included onto the requisition. 

• For regularly purchased items, buyers can copy previous requisitions or create templates to 

enable rapid generation of items on to requisitions.

Purchase orders 

Once the requisition is completed, the system then uses automated workflow to route the order 

to the appropriate supervisors for approval. Once approved, the requisition is converted into a 

purchase order which is then automatically sent to the suppliers. 

Purchase orders are sent to suppliers in several different ways again depending on their capability: 

• Where suppliers can receive orders in a complete electronic format (i.e. EDI PO) then orders are 

sent using message routing to deliver the orders to these suppliers. 

• Where suppliers wish to receive orders via email, the supplier provides an appropriate email 

address and the system delivers orders as an attached word document to the email address. 

• For suppliers with no electronic capability, the system automatically delivers orders to the 

supplier by facsimile. 

Receiving goods 

Once orders have been delivered, the buyers access E-Purchase and acknowledge the goods as received. 

Invoices 

Where suppliers have the capability to return an electronic invoice, the suppliers can post an 

electronic invoice in a specified format to a location known by E-Purchase SA. The 

E-Purchase SA system will then retrieve these invoices, match them against the original purchase 

order and then apply 3-way matching rules which match the purchase order and goods receipt to 

the invoice received. Where invoices match, they are automatically passed for payment. Exceptions 

or mismatches are flagged and addressed by appropriate staff to accept or reject the variations. 

Where suppliers do not have this capability, they will continue to send paper-based invoices, which 

are processed manually into the E-Purchase SA system. 

Advantages of E-Purchase SA 

Where suppliers have the electronic catalogue capability, then both DAIS and the suppliers benefit 

from the efficiencies of trading electronically. 

The majority of transactions processed use the manual order entry process and these orders are 

faxed to the supplier. This situation arises because the majority of suppliers do not have this eprocurement 

capability. Therefore, the supplier will receive the order, send the goods (deliver the 

services) and return paper invoices for payment. 

The benefit here is that both the electronic transactions and manual transactions are all trapped in 

the one system. By looking at the purchasing trends, DAIS can then identify regular transactions 

and approach supplier’s receiving large volumes of transactions about developing electronic 

capabilities (as well as formalising trading relationships). 

This is the opportunity DAIS has exploited for this project. Using purchasing trends, 4 suppliers 

(Commander, Protech, Aish Data and Design and Citisoft Software2u) were identified for this trial. 

The purchasing statistics show that DAIS currently processes enough transactions to warrant 

working with these suppliers to develop electronic catalogue capability. 


APPENDIX I

5 8 | 

DAIS perspective on the suppliers chosen 

Commander and Protech 

The SA Government has a Whole of Government contract for the supply of personal computing 

equipment. Commander and Protech are 2 of the suppliers that are on this contract and at the time 

of analysing transactions, DAIS was purchasing personal computing equipment from both of these 

suppliers. 

Therefore in the case of these 2 suppliers, the catalogue only needed to include items that were 

part of the SA Government’s contract. This contract specifies a range of pre-configured computers 

allowing for a range of computing power such as base, intermediate and advanced user machines. 

This range of computers is then further refined as an agency will choose to buy intermediate 

machines specifically configured with Microsoft Windows XP in alignment to DAIS’s standard 

desktop environment. Therefore, the initial catalogue was loaded with all contracted items and this 

was then ‘profiled’ to allow DAIS buyers to view only the contracted computers that comply with 

DAIS’s standard operating environment. 

Further to these contracted and profiled items, DAIS then require the supplier to deliver the 

machines with a standard operating environment loaded and for the machines to be asset tagged 

before delivery to DAIS sites. Therefore, these extra items were also added into the DAIS’s profiled 

view of the catalogue. 

Citisoft Software2u 

Analysis of purchasing trends shows that DAIS buys a wide range of computer software from 

this company. These purchases are made on an ad-hoc basis and DAIS does not have any formal 

relationship with this company. This company already had a back-end system and web site 

application (which was not punch-out compliant) and the necessary skills to enable them to easily 

extract the products to be loaded into the catalogue environment. Because DAIS purchases are adhoc, 

it is not possible to identify specifically the items DAIS would purchase and therefore all items 

have been loaded. 

Aish Data and Design 

Aish Data and Design is a successful local supplier that supplies specific items for large scale 

printing equipment. DAIS has no formal arrangements with this supplier and purchases are made on 

an ad-hoc basis from a wide range of buyers across DAIS. 

Supplier enablement 

The chosen suppliers all worked with DAIS and Sensis to deploy the supplier catalogues onto the 

Westpac Marketplace. The Westpac Marketplace is operated by Qvalent Pty Ltd, which also supplies 

the E-Purchase SA software to DAIS. 

The Westpac Marketplace was chosen as this system can be immediately shopped via ‘punch-out’ from 

E-Purchase SA and the system has in-built capability to upload and deploy profiled catalogues. The 

system allows suppliers to receive electronic purchase orders from the buyers and allows the supplier 

to return an electronic invoice (and other order status messages) back to the E-Purchase SA system.

The Westpac Marketplace provides the suppliers with an on-line, wizard based tool kit allowing 

them to establish their company details on the marketplace. This toolkit allows them to tailor the 

company details to reflect the company’s own image by loading of company logos and adjusting 

the layout in accordance to a range of pre-defined layouts. The suppliers can also choose to enter 

product information directly into the catalogue tool kit or can use macro driven spreadsheets to 

load product data. 

The alternative to the Westpac Marketplace would have been to develop an electronic catalogue 

and order receiving, invoice sending capabilities from scratch (or to convert any existing capability). 

It was decided that this was not an appropriate approach for this trial due to the time lines for 

completion of the project and cost. 

At the completion of the project, suppliers will have to make a judgement as to the benefits of 

using the marketplace and their choices would include: 

• Deciding to continue to use the marketplace, requiring them to pay on-going fees and charges. 

• Choosing to develop their own capability that is compliant to one of E-Purchase SA’s punch-out 

standards. 

• They may decide that the volume of sales does not warrant the cost of either staying on the 

marketplace or developing their own capability and therefore they may require us to return to 

manually creating orders for their services. 

Immediate benefits to DAIS 

This trial has had a number of benefits for DAIS: 

• Purchases are made by selecting items from the on-line catalogue; 

− In the case of Commander/Protech purchases were previously made by manually entering 

product information into the manual order form. The product information was supplied by 

spreadsheets to the buyers on a monthly basis and they would find the required items and 

retype the information onto the order form. 

− In the case of orders from Citisoft and Aish Data and Design, buyers would need to call the 

company to discuss and identify product information from the supplier. This would then be 

entered manually onto the order form and faxed to the supplier. 

• Suppliers can maintain product information and product prices by accessing the marketplace and 

altering the prices of goods on-line (or via uploading a new product file by spreadsheet). 

− This allows buyers to ensure purchases are at current prices and reduces price mismatches 

once orders/invoices are received. 

• Suppliers can receive the purchase order as an electronic order in the marketplace. 

− Saving the cost of faxing the order. 

− Allows the supplier to send back purchase order acknowledgement and advanced shipping 

notices to the buyer. 

• Suppliers can then return an electronic invoice (based on the original detail in the purchase order). 


APPENDIX I

6 0 | 

− Once the invoice is returned it is automatically matched against predefined matching rules in 

E-Purchase SA. If the invoice matches, it automatically delivers the invoice into the accounts 

payable system for payment. 

− The error rate of mismatches between the invoice and the purchase order is significantly 

reduced because of the accuracy of product prices selected from the on-line catalogue 

(maintained by the supplier). 

− Data entry of the invoice information into the accounts payable systems is avoided saving 

significant resources. 

• The use of electronic catalogues allows DAIS to further refine the information collected in the 

procurement system. “This information allows DAIS to further analyse procurement trends and 

purchasing activities. This information is then used to target our procurement activities to create 

new and refined contractual arrangements with suppliers”. 

• Where contractual arrangements exist, the catalogues reflect the contractual arrangements 

and the analysis of purchasing trends can include the verification that suppliers are charging 

contracted rates. 

Summary 

This trial has further expanded DAIS’s knowledge of e-procurement implementation issues, costs 

and benefits. DAIS will continue to identify further suppliers and work with these companies to 

become e-procurement enabled. 

The work done to make catalogues ‘interoperable’ has shown the difficulties faced by suppliers 

as they try to prepare information about the goods (and services) that they sell for use by the 

different customer groups. DAIS continues to prefer that suppliers develop Internet based electronic 

catalogues that can be accessed using ‘punch-out’ standards as DAIS does not have the resources 

to implement, manage and maintain internal catalogues (or to pay for these services) for the wide 

range of suppliers that provide goods and services to DAIS.

C A S E S T U DY F O R A I S H D A T A & D E S I G N ( A I S H ) 

Background 

Aish Data & Design Pty Ltd has been supplying various drafting supplies, wide format printers, paper 

(media) and ink to government departments for in excess of 10 years. There are no contracts in place 

between Government and Aish. However, some 30 departments place around 360 orders per year. 

Aish is known as South Australia’s premier wide format printing and supply business. Accordingly 

their position in the market, stock levels maintained and product knowledge resulted in enquiries by 

phone, fax and email to generally check what product was required at the user (government) end. 

This was followed by a formal order invariably by fax with accompanying purchase order number. 

Occasionally employees would call in and purchase a supply item using a Visa Card. Data entry of 

this information would take Aish staff around 1 minute per order. 

In regards to larger items (eg wide format printers) Aish would advise the relevant department of the 

correct printer needed to fulfil their requirements and would quote for the item in the normal process. 

The quote may or may not be successful. At this stage the use of the catalogue does not appear to 

have improved the quality of the information in the Request for Quotations. However this seems to 

stem from a lack of awareness within departments. Requirements do not appear to be better specified 

as a result of the buyers being able to see the items on the catalogue. Currently no substantial savings 

have resulted and in fact now there is additional work so costs could have risen slightly. 

Any price changes would become apparent at the discussion stage and are either accepted or renegotiated 

between the department and Aish sales person. 

The sale process was similar to many transactions processed on a daily basis and as such did 

not raise any specific efficiency issues. Aish as a company has become far more aware of how it 

processes and manages orders and controls inventory and has been undertaking internal efficiency 

changes in this regard. The use of the catalogue has definitely been a catalyst in raising process 

awareness. The project has prompted Aish to review its internal processes and look to ways to 

take advantage of the catalogue and the related technology. In addition Aish’s data was not in a 

particularly useable state, and since the beginning of this trial staff have been cleaning the data in 

preparation for further e-commerce ventures. 

There have neither been special costs nor regular processing error issues under the old 

arrangements other than occasions where Aish processed orders without recording the purchase 

order number. The low level of purchase order errors is due to the fact that everything was 

confirmed in discussions before the order was sent. However this accuracy can come at a cost 

with the sales person spending time on the phone with the buyer. Processing of an order generally 

takes less than a minute due to previous discussion with the sales representative. Under the 

new arrangements, this same time is required to process an order through the catalogue but 

also requires the operator to log into the catalogue and acknowledge the order making it a 

slower process. At this stage we have not seen any orders appear through the catalogue that the 

representatives were not aware of through phone conversations. 


APPENDIX I

6 2 | 


SA Government buyers are using the catalogue however Aish still get phone calls and faxes. This 

could be expected, as buyers have not yet been fully trained in the use of the system. While it is 

hoped that the number of phone orders and enquires would eventually be substantially reduced, 

the items sold by Aish generally are not regular purchases so Aish staff may still need to provide 

guidance on what is required. 

At this stage there has not been any business increase or cost reduction evident. Aish believes it is 

too early to judge the system – nevertheless the overall experience has been a positive one as Aish 

have learnt much throughout the development process. 

With over 3,000 stock lines, the catalogue needs to easily amend prices and other changes. 

Currently while uploading price changes to the electronic catalogue, all links to the pictures are lost. 

Therefore any modification needs to be on a line-by-line basis. It is expected that this process will 

be refined over time. 

“We envisage for regular (repeat) orders the efficiency of the catalogue will be excellent and errors 

non-existent. However, where advice is required it is still likely a phone call will precede the order”. 


The catalogue was developed with the assistance of Sensis. From the Aish perspective this was a 

relatively simple exercise. Sensis developed the catalogues using raw data provided by the primary 

supplier. Over the catalogue development period Aish staff provided approximately 5 hours effort 

in communicating with its supplier and preparing the data and another 20 hours input in general 

discussion and reviewing the catalogue that Sensis developed. Other than a time investment Aish 

have not incurred development costs. 

Aish have not previously produced a catalogue this being their first venture into e-commerce. 



• Buyers have stated that they like the look and feel of the catalogue. They much prefer to use the 

catalogue rather than the old system. 

• Aish is very impressed with the functionality and ease of use of this catalogue and the Qvalent 

website; 

• The catalogue has facilitated the use of the Qvalent system by the DAIS buyers. This has in turn 

facilitated the use of electronic orders rather than faxed or telephone orders. 

• While the catalogue is not easily amended to reflect the latest prices and other changes this 

situation is expected to be rectified. 

The following tangible benefits have been achieved: 

• A key benefit to Aish is obviously the reduction in the time it takes for invoices to be paid and a 

reduction in the number of invoices with errors. Invoicing in the Qvalent system ensures that the 

invoices are always correct, and also enables DAIS to pay invoices automatically - and quickly. 

This has an immediate positive impact on the business.

• The e-catalogue has the capacity to reduce the frequency of telephone communication between the 

buyers at DAIS and Aish, and has definitely increased the accuracy of orders. If Aish staff spend less 

time quoting and confirming pricing for DAIS – the e-catalogue will ensure a real positive impact 

on day-to-day productivity. The challenge moving forward is obviously to expand the e-catalogue 

to encompass all Aish product lines and have a simple way to manage the e-catalogue. 

• At this stage no additional financial benefits have been observed. 

• Aish has not in the past marketed to the departments with word of mouth being the main 

method for customers to understand Aish’s capabilities. Aish could expect an increase in business 

from the catalogue as the departments will be able to see the additional lines available that they 

may not have been aware of previously. 

Next steps 

The next step will involve the presentation of the catalogue to another buying organisation. This 

may be the Commonwealth Bank and/or a NSW Government Department. This is simply a technical 

exercise designed to prove that a catalogue developed by Sensis can be presented to buyers using 

other systems (i.e. ARIBA or Intershop). The options for this presentation process include: 

• Presentation of the catalogue to the other buyers on behalf of Aish . 

• The catalogue may be processed by Cyberlynx on behalf of Aish and the other buyers. 

• Aish may simply provide another catalogue to the buyer for loading into their systems. 

The key issue in this step is to identify the advantages and disadvantages, and costs for each of the options. 

Ideally, the presentation of the catalogue to other buyers will not involve any effort on Aish’s behalf. 

One of the outcomes of the project is to demonstrate that once a supplier has developed a catalogue 

using one vendor, it is a relatively simple task to present the catalogue to other buyers using other 

vendor solutions. This is an added reason for developing a catalogue in an electronic form. 


APPENDIX I

6 4 | 

C A S E S T U DY F O R C O M M A N D E R A U S T R A L I A L T D 

Background on dealings with DAIS (SA Dept. of Admin. & Information 

Systems) 

There are 150 items on contract with DAIS. The majority of purchases are for those items. There are 

however a significant number of purchases for items that are not on contract. These purchases can 

be for any of the 25,000 plus items that are on the full Commander catalogue. 

Under the previous arrangements the DAIS buyers were provided with a spreadsheet dealing with 

prices and other attributes of the contracted items. Revised spreadsheets were 

e-mailed periodically to the buyers detailing price and other changes. 

As far as order processing was concerned, the usual practice was for the buyers to call Commander 

to confirm the price and other details of the items prior to placing the order by facsimile. In 

the case of the ad-hoc orders it was necessary for the buyer to speak to a Commander sales 

representative in every instance. This could involve up to 10 telephone calls between DAIS and 

Commander per day. 


Under the revised arrangements the DAIS buyers place their orders using the Qvalent system. The 

key feature of the arrangement from Commander’s perspective is that the buyers are viewing the 

electronic catalogue that has been uploaded into the buyer’s system. The catalogue details all of the 

necessary attributes of the items including the price. The orders are placed into the Westpac B2Buy 

portal where they are accessed by the Commander sales staff. 


The catalogue was developed with the assistance of Sensis. From Commander’s perspective this 

was a relatively simple exercise. Sensis developed the catalogues using spreadsheets provided by 

Commander. Over the 50 days that the catalogue was developed, Commander staff were only 

required to provide approximately 10 hours effort in preparing the data, and another 10 hours input 

in general discussion and reviewing the catalogue that Sensis developed. 

It is not possible to quantify savings from electronic catalogue development, as development of the 

previous catalogue was not costed. However, the previous catalogue took a couple of hours a week 

to maintain – and while Sensis developed this new catalogue for this project it is taking a similar 

amount of time to maintain. 



• The DAIS buyers have stated that they like the look and feel of the catalogue. They much prefer 

to use the catalogue rather than the old spreadsheets. 

• Commander is very impressed with the functionality and ease of use of this catalogue and the 

Qvalent website. 

• The catalogue has facilitated the use of the Qvalent system by the DAIS buyers. This has in turn 

facilitated the use of electronic orders rather than faxed or telephone orders.

• The catalogue is easily amended to reflect the latest prices and other changes. 

Commander are very keen to continue with this catalogue and the Qvalent system, as the benefits 

to DAIS, Commander and hopefully in the future more of our SA Government clients, are significant. 

The following tangible benefits have been achieved and quoted by Commander: 

• “A key benefit to Commander is obviously the reduction in the time it takes for invoices to be 

paid and a reduction in the number of invoices with errors. Invoicing in the Qvalent system 

ensures that the invoices are always correct, and also enables DAIS to pay invoices automatically 

and quickly. Even though DAIS is traditionally very good at paying invoices, I expect this puts 

money in our bank 2 to 5 days earlier. This has an immediate positive impact on our business”. 

• “The e-catalogue has already reduced the frequency of telephone communication between the buyers 

at DAIS and us, and has definitely increased the accuracy of orders. We now spend less time quoting 

and confirming pricing for DAIS - while it is only minimal at this stage; this makes a real positive 

impact on our day-to-day productivity. Our challenge moving forward is obviously to expand the 

catalogue to encompass all the products we sell, and have a simple way to manage the catalogue. 

Savings of around 1 hour a day are already being achieved even with a limited catalogue”. 

• “It is difficult to quantify hard dollars saved because the old catalogue was also electronic 

Microsoft Excel format, so there was no printing or distribution costs. Cost of processing orders 

is now higher from our perspective, at this stage we still need to enter the orders into our sales 

system. This is manual, so whether the order comes via fax or via the Qvalent system, it makes 

no difference to us. The main benefit of this at this stage is that orders do not get lost. Faxing is 

generally unreliable, this system enables us to acknowledge orders and we never have the issue 

of a “missing” faxed order. There is some double handling in relation to the Qvalent system from 

our perspective at this stage, as we have to manually enter orders into our system and then we 

have to invoice them initially in our system, and again on the Qvalent system. However we are 

planning to upgrade our systems in future to hopefully eliminate some of the double handling”. 

Next steps 

It is noted that the use of the catalogues and the related benefits of the system give rise to the 

possibility of further streamlining of processes. These include: 

• Automation of the loading of purchase orders in the Commander orders processing system. The 

fact that the buyers are using the Commander data to populate the orders ensures that items are 

properly described and the correct prices are used. There is no need for human intervention in 

the data entry of orders. 

• Automation of the process of loading data into the catalogue. “At this stage the process of 

updating the catalogue content, while it is manual, is fairly simple to do online, and while the 

current catalogue has only a very limited number of items this is OK. When/if we increase the 

number of items in the catalogue we will definitely need to look at automating the process of 

updating the catalogue”. 

• Presentation of the catalogues to other buyers. Commander is working with Sensis and Qvalent 

to make the catalogue available to other buying organisations and their e-catalogue providers. 

The intention is to make the catalogue available to the buyers using the smartbuyTM emarketplace 

and Cyberlynx Supplier Hub. 


APPENDIX I

6 6 | 

C A S E S T U DY F O R I M A G E - O N P T Y L T D 

Background 

“Image-On is a small promotions company specialising in the custom, design and printing, assembly 

and packaging of products which are used by our clientele for corporate golf or tennis days, direct 

mail campaigns, loyalty or gift with purchase programmes, and individually personalised gifts”. 

Traditionally sales have been derived by personal presentation and referrals. A brief is then provided 

by the client with details and logos for the project. Samples and quotations are then submitted by 

Image-On for evaluation and consideration. 

As every enquiry is often a complete new project it has been very time consuming and expensive to 

present new and original ideas. 

“Because of the constantly changing requirements of our clients, it has been difficult to produce a 

printed catalogue, as it could not possibly show all the variations that can be produced to suit an 

individual client’s budget and target market”. 


“With the advent of an on-line catalogue the client can quickly see our standard stock products that 

are available for corporate customising. These items can then be changed to suit their particular 

ideas. This greatly reduces the time taken with each enquiry and sale”. 

No longer is it necessary to forward samples (involving couriers or relying on mail services) or make 

personal presentations. The time involved in preparing each special project for clients has therefore 

been greatly reduced. 


The catalogue has been developed on-line by Cyberlynx Supplier Hub with minimal involvement 

from Image-On so far (7 hours to date) 

As new products are constantly being developed for clients, it is a very simple matter for Image- 

On staff to add these to the catalogue using just a browser to access the Supplier Hub Platform. 

(Previously the only way to display new products was to print a new catalogue, which is a very 

expensive exercise.) 


“The major benefit of an on-line catalogue to our clients, is the speed with which they can see the 

items required, or the items we have suggested. As most of our clients are ordering for a particular 

campaign, golf event, or marketing event, time is always of the essence to meet the deadline required”. 

It also provides a greater level of accuracy for our customers when gathering specifications and ideas 

for new items that wish to brand for campaigns and promotions. 

Next steps 

“We feel the success of an on-line catalogue is of vital importance to the growth of our company 

and look forward to the expansion of the project to further organisations”.

A P P E N D I X I I 

C L A S S I F I C A T I O N S T A N D A R D S 

– C O N T E N T S 

UN/SPSC 68 

ECL@SS 69 

EAN 70 

RUS 71 

EPC 72

6 8 | 

U N / S P S C 

UNSPSC® (United Nations Standard Products and Services Code) is owned by the United Nations 

Development Programme (UNDP) and managed by the Unified Code Council (UCC). 

The Universal Standard Products and Services Classification (UN/SPSC) is an open global coding 

system that classifies products and services. The UN/SPSC is used extensively around the world in 

electronic catalogues, search engines, procurement application systems and accounting systems. 

The UN/SPSC schema includes the ECCMA Global Commodity Identifier (EGCI) and the ECCMA 

Global Commodity Classification (EGCC). 

The primary purpose of the UN/SPSC hierarchical classification (EGCC) is to avoid duplication and 

to provide a tool for those responsible for classifying products and services to easily identify the 

appropriate code within the UN/SPSC table. The most important feature of the UN/SPSC schema 

is that there should only be one occurrence of a commodity title or definition and each title and 

definition should be capable of being easily differentiated from all others. 

UNSPSC coding is hierarchical; each level contains a two-character numerical value yielding a basic 

10-digit (AA.BB.CC.DD.EE) number separated by periods: 

• 1 AA Segment — The logical aggregation of families for analytical purposes. 

• BB Family — A commonly recognised group of inter-related commodity categories. 

• CC Class — A group of commodities sharing a common use or function. 

• DD Commodity — A group of substitutable products or services. 

• EE Business Function — The function performed by an organisation in support of the commodity. 

The following screenshot is taken from an actual procurement solution that uses the UNSPSC 

classification schema. In this particular case, only 8 digits are utilised (to level DD). Here as each category 

is chosen, the following category is displayed allowing the user to drill down to the commodity level. 

You can find our more about the coding system by visiting www.unspsc.org. 

1 Why Coding and classifying products is critical to success in electronic commerce Granada Research October 2001

E C L @ S S 

Although still evolving, eCl@ss is a product classification system that intends to be used as an 

industry standard between suppliers and their customers. eCl@ss features a hierarchical, four level 

classification key with a keyword index containing 14,000 items. 

The hierarchy levels are: 

• Segment. 

• Main Group. 

• Group. 

• Commodity Class. 

Two positions are available for each of the four levels. The system provides a structure for 

classifying all materials and services, with a degree of detail that is well suited to the requirements 

of the industry. The comprehensive keyword index allows classes to be found without the user 

having any detailed knowledge of the hierarchy. This ensures that eCl@ss can be used as a standard 

means of communication across sector and company borders, which makes it ideally applicable to 

the e-marketplace environment. 

In order to be able to process electronic business transactions using the eCl@ss numbers, eCl@ss 

provides various sets of attributes. These characteristics and sets of attributes were prepared from 

many different sources and material groups and are stored and maintained within the eCl@ss system. 

The following screen shot is taken from an actual procurement solution that employs the eCl@ss 

classification schema and illustrates the generation of attributes depending on the categories. 


APPENDIX II

70 | 

E A N 

The primary objective of the EAN/UCC system is to make possible the identification of all trade 

items, processes, services, shipments, assets, companies and locations to facilitate communication, 

data collection and exchange of information in the interest of trading partners. 

There are three distinct components of the EAN/UCC system: 

1. Standard numbering structures for the identification of goods, shipments, assets and locations. 

2. Data carriers to represent the identification numbers in machine readable formats. 

3. Messaging standards to transmit the captured data between trading partners. 

In this document (and the whole project), the primary interest resides around the first function 

– the numbering structure and numbering schemes. The main element of which is Global Trade Item 

Number (GTIN). 

There are two common types of GTINs for retail trade items: 

1 EAN/UCC-13, represented as an EAN-13 bar code. 

2 EAN/UCC-8, represented as an EAN-8 bar code. 

In the early deliveries of the e-marketplace implementation, logistics functions and operation of the 

supply chain are not a primary focus. However, from a catalogue perspective, it is important to look 

at the ability to accommodate the EAN/UCC numbering standards used for the unique identification 

of logistical (i.e. transport and/or storage) units. 

It is important to emphasise that in the real world, the same product can have more than one GTIN 

code assigned to it, which arises from different formats, distributors, and product substitutions. The 

mapping process to resolve these numbers to a unique identifier in the Master Catalogue Construct 

is managed by exception in this process, to ensure that these assignations remain accurate.

R U S 

RUS (Requisite Unifying Structure) is a product classification standard comprised of categories and 

attributes that describe commodities and services. RUS forms a common language of e-business 

used to enhance end-user finding and content management across diverse buy-side and sell-side 

platforms. RUS categories and attributes also provide a structure upon which mapping of catalogue 

content to major classification standards and translation to multiple languages is accomplished. 

With this standard classification structure, electronic catalogues can be unified in an e-procurement 

environment, making it much easier for users to find, compare and buy the products they need, 

thus completing transactions while driving end user adoption and ROI. 

To address the challenges of product classification, Requisite developed (RUSTM ) the Requisite Unifying 

Structure, an open global system for organizing product and service information for e-business. 

The main features of RUS include: 

Ontological methodology 

A consistent and defined methodology for developing and maintaining RUS. The primary tenet of 

RUS methodology is the “is-a” model of product classification. 

RUS Structure 

RUS includes: 

• Categories 

• Category Attributes 

• Common Attributes 

• Aliases 

• Category and Attribute definitions 

RUS Community Portal and Community Participation 

The Portal allows Requisite customers to view and download RUS for use in their e-business 

initiatives, as well as participate with Requisite in the development of RUS. In this way, industry 

experts can influence the development of RUS and ensure their specific requirements for product 

classification are met. 

Taxonomy Platform 

Support for multiple, arbitrary classification standards and hierarchies such as UNSPSC, eCl@ss, 

NATO, Rosetta Net, EAN etc. 

Internationalization 

RUS is available in 16 languages. Requisite customers can check on the status of RUS development, 

including supported standards and languages, by visiting the RUS portal at http://rusportal.requisite.com/. APPENDIX II 

F R O M P A P E R T O P R O C U R E M E N T – E F F E C T I V E C A T A L O G U E C R E A T I O N A N D M A N A G E M E N T F O R E N G A G I N G B U Y E R S A N D S U P P L I E R S | 71

7 2 | 

E P C 

The EPCglobal Network is comprised of five fundamental elements: 

EPC 

The Electronic Product Code (EPC) is the next generation of product identification. Like the 

U.P.C. (Universal Product Code) or bar code, the EPC is divided into numbers that identify the 

manufacturer, product, version and serial number. But, the EPC uses an extra set of digits to identify 

unique items. The EPC is the only information stored on the EPC tag. This keeps the cost of the tag 

down and provides flexibility, since an infinite amount of dynamic data can be associated with the 

serial number in the database. 

EPC Tags and Readers 

The EPCglobal Network is an RFID-based system that uses radio frequency to communicate between 

readers and tags. The EPC (a number for uniquely identifying an item) is stored on a special tag. 

These tags will be applied during the manufacturing process. In turn, using radio waves, the tags 

will “communicate” their EPCs to readers which will then pass the information along to a computer 

or local application system. 

Object Name Service (ONS) 

The vision of an open, global network for tracking goods requires some special network architecture. 

Since only the EPC is stored on the tag, computers need some way of matching the EPC to 

information about the associated item. That’s the role of the Object Name Service (ONS), an 

automated networking service similar to the Domain Name Service (DNS) that points computers to 

sites on the World Wide Web. 

Physical Markup Language (PML) 

The Physical Markup Language (PML) is a new standard “language” for describing physical objects. 

When finalized, it will be based on the widely accepted eXtensible Markup Language (XML). Together 

with the EPC and ONS, PML completes the fundamental components needed to automatically 

link information with physical products. The EPC identifies the product; the PML describes the 

product; and the ONS links them together. Standardizing these components will provide “universal 

connectivity” between objects in the physical world. 

Savant 

Savant is software technology designed to manage and move information in a way that does not 

overload existing corporate and public networks. Savant uses a distributed architecture, meaning 

it runs on different computers distributed through an organization, rather than from one central 

computer. Savants are organized in a hierarchy and act as the nervous system of the new EPCglobal 

Network, managing the flow of information. 

In Australia the EPC standards are administered by EPC Global Australia, a division of EAN Australia 

(www.ean.com.au). 

(source www.epcglobalinc.org)

A P P E N D I X I I I 

G L O S S A R Y O F T E R M S 

T H E F O L L O W I N G T E R M S H A V E T H E F O L L O W I N G A S S O C I A T E D 

M E A N I N G S : 

Term Definition 

ASCII American Standard Code for Information Interchange. 

B2B Business to business. 

B2C Business to consumer. 

B2G Business to government. 

Category 

A group of items with common properties are grouped together to form a 

category (for example “screws” are assigned to the “fastener” category). 

Classification Process by which product items are assigned to a suitable class or category. 

CSV Comma Separated Variables (or Values). 

DNS Domain Name Service (points computers to certain locations on the Internet). 

EAN European Article Number (or Numbering) this is a code assigned to product items. 

EDI Electronic Data Interchange. 

Encryption 

A security measure entailing the conversion of data to a form that cannot 

be understood by unauthorised people. 

e-procurement Business to business related purchasing over the Internet. 

EPC Electronic Product Code (numbering system for RFID tags). 

ERP Enterprise Resource Planning. 

Exchange Online marketplaces through which suppliers and buyers transact.

7 4 | 


Firewall 

Flat File 

A security measure that protects the resources of a private network from 

users from other networks. 

A flat file is a file containing records that have no structured 

interrelationship. The term is frequently used to describe a text document 

from which all word processing or other structure characters have been 

removed. A CSV file is a form of flat file. 

FTP File Transfer Protocol. 

GIF Graphics Interchange Format (an Image file format). 

Hosting 

Hosting (also known as Web site hosting and Web hosting) covers the 

housing, serving, and maintaining of files for one or more web sites. Using 

a hosting service lets many companies share the cost of a fast Internet 

connection for serving files. 

HTML Hyper Text Markup Language. 

HTTP Hyper Text Transfer Protocol. 

HTTPS A version of HTTP that provides increased security for information exchange. 

Interoperability The ability of a system or a product to work with other systems or products. 

ISO International Standards Organisation. 

JPEG Joint Photographic Experts Group (an Image file format). 

MIME Multi-Purpose Internet Mail Extensions. 

OAG Open Applications Group. 

OBI Open Buying over the Internet. 

ONS 

Ontology 

Object Naming System (Plays a similar role to the Domain Name Service, 

but for EPC). 

An explicit fomal specification of how to represent objects, concepts and 

other entities that are assumed to exist 

PDF Portable Document Format. 

PML Physical Markup Language (An XML protocol for use in the EPC system). 

Procurement 

Systems 

Procurement systems generally refer to corporate purchasing systems that 

automate the purchasing process. The marketplace environments for these 

Procurement Systems are commonly referred to as “e-procurement” hubs.


Punch-Out 

Punch-out refers to a user being transferred from an exchange or the 

user’s own systems environment to an external site (for example a 

supplier’s website) for the purposes of accessing catalogue information 

and, in some cases, also conducting transactions. 

RFID Radio Frequency Identification 

SCM Supply Chain Management. 

SKU Stock Keeping Unit (a distinct or unique product item). 

SME Small to Medium sized Enterprise. 

SMTP 

SSL Secure Sockets Layer. 

Syndication 

Taxonomy 

UN/SPSC 

User Interface 

Simple Mail Transfer Protocol. The Protocol associated with sending and 

receiving email. 

Process of exporting, publishing or transferring content from one systems 

environment to one or more external systems environments. 

Taxonomy (from Greek taxis meaning arrangement or division and nomos 

meaning law) is the science of classification according to a pre-determined 

system. For example applying product classifications within a product catalogue. 

United Nations Standard Product and Services Classification 

(an internationally recognised classification standard). 

Typically everything a user encounters when operating or interacting with 

an information device - including the display screen, keyboard, mouse, and 

even the appearance of a desktop and help messages. 

URL Uniform Resource Locator–a web address. 

WYSIWYG What You See is What You Get. 

XML Extensible Mark-up Language. 

Zipping 

The process of packaging a set of files into a single file that is called a zip 

file. Usually, the files in a zip file are compressed so that they take up less 

space in storage. 


APPENDIX II

7 6 | 

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