The Graduate Students Bazaar:
Presentations of eCommerce Prototypes
17th Bled eCommerce Conference“eGlobal”
Bled, Slovenia, June 21-23, 2004
Use Of Oracle Exchange eMarketplace For Trading Processes: Case Of Pharmaceutical Company In Slovenia
Andreja Pucihar, Petra Jurglič, Maja Papež, Urška Zupančič
University of Maribor, Faculty of Organizational Sciences, Kidričeva cesta 55a, 4000 Kranj, Slovenia
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Problem Definition
Internet growth and new electronic commerce technology create opportunities as well as challenges for doing business faster, cheaper and more efficient electronically. Today, organizations need to be competitive in a global market. This demands new technology and new business models. One of these models is the eMarketplace that allows suppliers and buyers to exchange information and to carry out business transactions. eMarketplaces are becoming more and more interesting also for companies in Slovenia that are looking for opportunities to enter new markets and achieve more efficient trading.
Within 4-months project period (January – May 2004) a group of students of the Faculty of Organizational Sciences, University of Maribor was using Oracle Exchange eMarketplacesolution as a hosting service provided by Oracle. The aim of the project was to discover opportunities of using Oracle Exchange eMarketplace for trading processes for Lek - Novartis, a pharmaceutical company in Ljubljana. Company was interested in gaining new and cheaper in order to achieve more efficient procurement.
Project Description
In this project Oracle E-Business Suite 11-i technology for eMarketplaces was used as a hosting solution for prototype development. At eMarketplace the following scenario was used for prototyping the procurement processes.
In this trading case, supplier creates a catalogue, where buyers search for products and services. The buyer (in our case Lek – Novartis Company) creates request for quotation for several possible suppliers. Then suppliers send their offer. Selected suppliers are than invited to participate at auction with their offers. After the auction is closed, buyer awards the supplier and the bidding process is started. This is followed by ordering and the supplier takes care of order fulfillment. The trading processes are shown in Picture 1.
Picture 1: Trading processes
Project resutls
The result of the project was 3-hours long presentation and discussion session for 23 purchasing managers of the company Lek – Novartis attending the presentation. With the prototype we have shown the possibilities to use eMarketplace for more efficient procurement. The company also had an interest in exploring the opportunities to enter Asian market. Therefore we have studied several operating eMarketplaces that could be suitable for company to enter. At the presentation also most suitable eMarketplaces, chosen on the basics of company’s criteria, were presented to the company. For evaluating of operating eMarketplaces the eMarketServices portal ( –the leading international source of information on B2B eMarketplaces, co-funded by EC/DG Enterprise was used. The aim of the portal is to make it easier for companies in Europe and around the world to use eMarketplaces for international business.
After the presentation, the company established working group that will start to use sourcing software, which is available to all companies in Novartis group, for negotiation with their suppliers. This working group will also continue with studying the opportunities to enter existing eMarketplaces in Asian market for achieving more efficient trading processes.
References
*We would like to express our thanks to Oracle Slovenia for enabling us the use of Oracle Exchange hosting solution for prototype development.