Boy I would change vans if they didn't offer interconnects. We have 2 major VANs to avoid putting all our eggs in one basket so to speak. We also do direct EDIINT with 5 exchanges, one of which is a VAN, and direct ftp. You have to analyze what makes sense for your business. The VAN definitely has a valuable place in our business because many of our customers have no technical expertise and to support direct connectivity with the low volume, not well versed in EDI users would be a support nightmare!!!! We strategically moved off 5 trading partner to direct connectivity and covered over half our volume with these few high volume, EDI knowledgeable trading partners. We don't have an issue because all the more difficult to support low volume customers all are dealt with through our 2 VANs, and it is value add to us. Support can really add up fast with a lot of really needy customers and centralizing them through the VAN has really helped us keep our support costs under control. We have never had a problem with doing an interconnect through either one of our VANs. If your VAN fees are too high renegotiate, we did and it really gave meat to the Value Add in VAN. We will do direct connectivity for those that are capable and well versed at it, but for others I think we will always use some kind of 3rd party to buffer the costs. Thanks, Dawn
Dawn Field Integration Solutions Team Medtronic Global Business Solutions 3850 Victoria Street NE Shoreview, MN 55126 [EMAIL PROTECTED] (763) 514-7953 [EMAIL PROTECTED] (800) 459-5016 -----Original Message----- From: Earl Wertheimer [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, January 11, 2005 10:58 AM To: Stephen Lee; EDI-L Mailing List Subject: RE: [EDI-L] Is EDI dead? Stephen > The way I look at it is EDIINT is like buying a car and using VAN are like > leasing a car. People try to say one is better than the other in some way > across the board, but in the auto industry people agree that buying or > leasing works in different situations. With the VAN you pay as you go and > your TP management is done by the VAN. With EDIINT you buy software up > front and do you own TP management. Each will come out cheaper depending > on a > number of factors like number of trading partners, personnel costs, response > time needed, etc. Except that some Hubs insist that you only can lease a specific model. Clients that trade with multiple Hubs end up having to register with multiple VANS, because interconnects are sometimes not allowed ;-( How would you feel if you had to lease a Cadillac for one client and a Chevy for all your other clients? Dollar General now has 2 options. AS2 or Sterling. The AS2 option is good, but the Sterling option is not. They are insisting on paying nothing, so that our clients are forced to get an 'associate mailbox' from Sterling (for at least $75.00 per month plus character charges) if they are not already using that VAN. . Please use the following Message Identifiers as your subject prefix: <SALES>, <JOBS>, <LIST>, <TECH>, <MISC>, <EVENT>, <OFF-TOPIC> Access the list online at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EDI-L Yahoo! Groups Links . Please use the following Message Identifiers as your subject prefix: <SALES>, <JOBS>, <LIST>, <TECH>, <MISC>, <EVENT>, <OFF-TOPIC> Access the list online at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EDI-L Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EDI-L/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
