Enhancing Drop Ship Process Using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal

Rakesh Kumar

Oracle Applications

Confidentiality Statement

This document is provided for information purposes only and the contents hereof are subject to change without notice. This document is not warranted to be error-free, nor subject to any other warranties or conditions. Any other company and product names mentioned are used for identification purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective owners.

Abstract
The drop shipment process provides a competitive edge to the companies doing the business as this saves the expense of maintaining the inventory and/or the distribution centers. This process has been enhanced by the improvements in technology. Oracle Internet Supplier Portal is one of such technological product which has helped companies not only to expand their product offerings but also to better communicate with their suppliers. Oracle Internet Supplier Portal creates a powerful collaborative platform for supplier as well buyer to manage the business transactions. The implementation of this module should enable the suppliers to make secured interactions and fulfill the demand as requested by the buyer. The buyer at the same time should be aware of the demand fulfillment to timely invoice the end customer. This paper is an attempt to simplify the implementation task of Oracle Internet Supplier module.

About the Author

The author has been working for the last ten years in TCS. He has played various roles in Oracle Applications EBS area spanning delivery, practice and pre-sales. He has wide experience in end-to-end implementation, roll-out and support in finance and supply chain domain.

About the Domain

The domain is supply chain management, related to drop ship orders in an ERP environment. It is especially necessary to understand the management of drop ship orders efficiently using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal. The readers of this White Paper should have some background and understanding in supply chain area as well as in Oracle EBS suite. This concept will be useful in implementing the Oracle Internet Supplier Portal module in similar situations. The concept explained in this paper has successfully been used for completing the proof of concept of a large publishing house. The customer is currently under the process of implementing the solution.

Enhancing Drop Ship Process Using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal

CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................................................ 6 FUNCTIONAL OVERVIEW...................................................................................................................... 7 TRANSACTION FLOW ............................................................................................................................. 8 SUPPLIER NOTIFICATION ............................................................................................................................ 8 CREATION OF ASN (ADVANCED SHIPMENT NOTICE) ................................................................................. 9 ASN NOTIFICATION TO BUYER ................................................................................................................ 11 ENVIRONMENT SETUP AND PATCHES ............................................................................................ 13 ORACLE APPLICATIONS SETUP ........................................................................................................ 14 BASIC SETUP ............................................................................................................................................ 14 SUPPLIER REGISTRATION.......................................................................................................................... 15 SECURING ATTRIBUTES ............................................................................................................................ 16 PERSONALIZATION ............................................................................................................................... 19 NOTIFICATION WORKFLOWS ........................................................................................................... 21 HOSTING THE PORTAL TO EXTERNAL PARTNERS .................................................................... 23 CONCLUSIONS......................................................................................................................................... 24 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ....................................................................................................................... 25 REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................................... 26

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Enhancing Drop Ship Process Using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal

Introduction
Companies, instead of keeping its own inventory, have suppliers send certain products directly to the end customers. These products are shipped directly to the customer either because companies don't stock or currently don't have the items in inventory, or because it's more cost effective for the supplier to ship the item to the customer directly. This practice is known as drop ship process. This gives a competitive edge to the companies doing the business as this saves the expense of maintaining the inventory and/or the distribution centers. This process is relatively simpler and smooth now, as technology has enabled this practice. Oracle Internet Supplier Portal is one of such technological product which has helped companies not only to expand their product offerings but also to better communicate with their suppliers. This paper is an attempt to simplify the implementation task of Oracle Internet Supplier module and its integration with the other Oracle Applications modules. This paper will discuss the Oracle Internet Supplier features specific to drop ship processes. This has been organized with the help of following sections Functional Overview of drop ship Process using Oracle Internet Supplier Detail Transaction Flow Implementation Environment and required Patches Oracle Applications Setups Personalization Notifications Workflow Hosting the portal for external partners

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Enhancing Drop Ship Process Using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal

Functional Overview
The entire order process including drop ship activities has following tasks: Receiving the Customer Order (SO) Creating the Supplier Order (PO) Notifying the Supplier about the PO Supplier shipping the requested product to the customer Supplier notifying the company about the shipment Company receiving (virtual) the goods and closing the Sales Order line

The following Diagram shows the drop ship process using Oracle Internet Supplier
Drop Ship Process Flow Using iSupplier

Sales Order line is eligible for drop shipment

Sales Order placed in Oracle ERP

System Creates drop ship PO

Buyer receives notification that ASN has been created

Buyer Receives the items in the inventory

Supplier logs into iSupplier Portal and receives notification about drop shipped PO

Vendor ships material and creates ASN by logging into iSupplier portal Data flows into Oracle ERP as PO receipt and subsequently Sales Order line is closed

Supplier Checks the product availability

Figure 1: Business Process Flow

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Enhancing Drop Ship Process Using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal

Transaction Flow
This section describes the entire drop ship transactions step by step Receiving the Customer Order (SO) Creating the Supplier Order (PO) Notifying the Supplier about the PO Supplier shipping the requested product to the customer Supplier notifying the company about the shipment (ASN) Company receiving (virtual) the goods and closing the Sales Order line

Oracle Order Management and Oracle Purchasing integrate to provide Drop Shipments. Drop Shipments are created as Sales Orders in Order Management. The Purchase Release concurrent program or workflow in Order Management creates rows in the Requisition Import tables in Purchasing. Then the Requisition Import process creates the requisitions which are converted to a purchase order using auto-create process. Drop Shipments are marked with the Source Type of External in Order Management and Supplier in Purchasing. This is how the steps (1) and (2) as given above are taken care of. If we do not use any automated solution, then the step (3) and (5) are to be done manually to exchange the information. In such cases, there is very high possibility of errors. These errors could be due to lost orders, late deliveries or wrong tracking etc. This is where Oracle Internet Supplier adds value by integrating the drop ship information to the portal.

Supplier Notification
Once the drop ship PO is approved, the PO will be visible to Supplier under iSupplier Portal under Notification section as shown in the screen shot.
Navigation > Oracle iSupplier Portal > Home Page > See the POs under Notification (Figure 2)

Figure 2: iSupplier Portal

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Enhancing Drop Ship Process Using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal Creation of ASN (Advanced Shipment Notice)
The suppliers can notify the buyer once they have shipped the products by entering an Advanced Shipment Notice (ASN) through the Shipments tab of Internet Supplier Portal. The suppliers can search the open shipments on this page. The suppliers can navigate through self explanatory steps/pages to create an ASN. This includes selection of shipments, entering specific item quantities, the details such as Shipment Number, Shipment date, freight term, packing code, bill of lading etc. There is also an option to enter the shipment information per shipment line if the shipping instructions differ per line. The details can then be reviewed and submitted. The ASN creation process follows through following steps Select Shipment Enter Quantity Enter Shipment Notice Information Enter Notice Details Review and Submit Once the Supplier ships the product to the customer, he can create ASN by navigating to the Create Advance Shipment Notices link, selecting and adding the shipment to shipment notice.

Create Advance Shipment Notice Step Page

Figure 3: iSupplier Portal

He can enter the quantity based on the actual quantity shipped under shipment details. The details such as Shipment Number, Shipment date and Expected receipt date should be entered under Enter Shipment Notice Information page. The same page also contains the information to be entered for freight like freight term, packing code, bill of lading etc.

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Enhancing Drop Ship Process Using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal

Enter Shipment Notice Information Page

Figure 4: iSupplier Portal

Further, supplier can enter the shipment notice line details like packing slip, bar code label etc. Once these details are completed the ASN can be reviewed and submitted.

Review and Submit Page

Figure 5: iSupplier Portal

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Advance Shipment Notice Confirmation Page

Figure 6: iSupplier Portal

ASN Notification to Buyer

Once the ASN has been submitted by supplier, Internet Supplier Portal uses Oracle Workflow technology in the background to handle the notification process. The Internet Supplier Portal ASN Creation Notification workflow contains the buyer notification process. The buyer can see the notification by navigating through Notification summary link in purchasing module.

ASN notification to Buyer Screen in Purchasing Module

Figure 7: iSupplier Portal

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Enhancing Drop Ship Process Using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal

After the submission of ASN by supplier, the Receiving Transaction Processor program should be executed and the product should be received in Oracle Inventory against the drop ship PO. As per standard drop ship functionality, the receipt and delivery of the product into sub-inventory will trigger the workflow which will close the corresponding sales order line on Oracle Order Management. The workflow associated with the sales order line then takes care of the customer invoicing process.

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Enhancing Drop Ship Process Using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal

Environment Setup and Patches

The concept described in this paper is applicable for Oracle Applications 11.5.9 and higher version. However if someone is on OA 11.5.8 version, then following patches should be applied to make the related functionalities work. Apply Patch 2805401 This patch will resolve the following errors Error while accessing home page of iSupplier Portal Full Access Error WHILE ACCESSING "ISUPPLIER REGISTRATION" PAGE through iSupplier User Management Apply Patch 2687285 This patch will resolve the following issue of ASN creation notification not displaying the proper shipped quantity. Apply Patch 3816716 This patch will resolve the following issue of external supplier getting redirected to internal server and then receiving the unexpected error.

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Enhancing Drop Ship Process Using Oracle Internet Supplier Portal

Oracle Applications Setup

The major setups, used in the concept described in this paper, are given below. For details, please refer to Oracle Internet Supplier Implementation guide. For the purpose of illustration, the main setups for the Oracle Internet Supplier can be divided into three broad categories: Basic Setups Supplier Registration Securing Attributes

Basic Setup
This includes setting up the responsibilities and profile options. Setup Responsibilities At least two responsibility type, one for administrator and another for the supplier, should be created. The number of supplier reasonability can be based on the number of different supplier going to use the Internet supplier portal. The Internet Supplier Portal responsibility for administrator should be created using menu as that of the oracle seeded responsibility iSupplier Portal Full Access. The Internet Supplier Portal responsibility for supplier can be created either using same menu as that of the admin responsibility or it can be trimmed based on functionalities to be provided through the portal. We can create following menu for supplier responsibility the the the the

Menu POS_Supp_APP _MENU

User menu Name iSupplier Portal Supplier Application Menu

Sequenc e 1

Promp t

Submenu iSP HOMEP AGE Menu for iSupplier Portal

Function

Home Page

iSP Home Page

Setup Profile Options The following profile options (to a minimum) should be setup with the above responsibilities. Profile Options GL: Set of Books Name MO: Operating Unit Description Specify your set of books. This option also associates set of books with a responsibility. This profile option controls to which operating unit a particular responsibility corresponds and is used Only if you have installed multiple organization support. This profile options helps to

Personalize Self-Service Defn

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personalize the look and feel of the Self Service Application. It should be setup for the responsibility to be used by the Administrator.

Supplier Registration
The Internet Supplier Registration functionality provides suppliers to self-register on the portal. [OR the implementation team can register the supplier for the first time and supply them the login credentials] In the background, the system checks for the duplicity. After submission of the request, the user profile is automatically defined with the appropriate responsibilities. (Please note that the system will automatically create the user id for the supplier using suppliers email address. The system will not work properly if the supplier user is not created through process.)

Supplier Registration Navigation Screen

Figure 8: Setting up Oracle Applications Navigate to the iSupplier Registration responsibility and click on Supplier Account Registration link. This will open the supplier registration page. Enter all the appropriate details and submit.

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Supplier Registration Screen

Figure 9: Supplier Registration

Securing Attributes
In Oracle Internet Supplier Portal, security is of particular concern because the application is hosted on internet and is open to external partners. Hence it becomes important that supplier has access to the information belonging to his transactions only and should not be able to view the information related to other suppliers. This is managed by securing attributes. The security attributes are used to manage and maintain the security by assigning securing attributes to the user and responsibility definitions. There are three securing attributes that can be used to achieve these user restrictions: ICX_SUPPLIER_ORG_ID ICX_SUPPLIER_CONTACT_ID ICX_SUPPLIER_SITE_ID

Applying Securing Attributes to Responsibilities

Navigate to the Internet Supplier Portal responsibilities created for the suppliers. From the Oracle System Administrator menu, select Security > Responsibility > Define. From the list of values available in Securing Attributes region, select the appropriate securing attribute (ensure the application name is Internet Supplier Portal and not Oracle Self-Service Web Applications)

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Responsibility Setup Screen

Figure 10: Applying Security Attributes to Responsibility

Click on the Values button and assign the corresponding values. You have to get these values from back-end. Applying Securing Attribute Setup Screen

Figure 11: Applying Security Attributes to Responsibility

Applying Securing Attributes to Users

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Navigate to the Internet Supplier Portal users created by the supplier registration step. From the Oracle System Administrator menu, select Security > User > Define. Find the User. (It will be the email id of the supplier.) Check if the Internet Supplier Portal responsibility is assigned to the user. If not, then please assign the responsibility. From the list of values available in Securing Attributes region, select the appropriate securing attribute (ensure the application name is Internet Supplier Portal and not Oracle Self-Service Web Applications)

Figure 12: Applying Security Attributes to Users

Click on the Values button and assign the corresponding values. You have to get these values from back-end.

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Personalization
In Oracle Internet Supplier Portal, the appearance of the Supplier Registration and Portal pages can be modified to certain extent without customizing the application. [If you want to change the look and feel to a large extent, you have to customize the pages though through OA framework.] The following steps will help to do the personalization (a typical example) Set up Steps Profile Options Details a) Setup "Personalize Self-Service Defn" Profile Option as 'Yes' for the Admin User created. a) Log into iSupplier Portal as Admin User b) Click on the 'Personalize' option in the region of the page where the change is needed. c) Personalization Level = Responsibility Responsibility Name = <iSupplier responsibility created for the supplier> d) Perform the changes needed. e) Repeat step b, c and d for iSupplier responsibility created for another supplier a) Click "Personalize Home Page Top Container". Select Responsibility as the Personalization Level. Click Next. Select the responsibility name for the supplier user as the Responsibility Name. Click Next. Remove the link you do not want to show on the portal from Attributes Displayed (for example "Search Invoices" and "Search Payments"). Click Apply. b) Click "Personalize Home Page Right Column". Select Responsibility as the Personalization Level. Click Next. Select the responsibility name for the Supplier user as the Responsibility Name. Click Next. Remove the link you do not want to show on the portal from Attributes Displayed say "Planning", "Receipts", "Payments", "Invoices", "PosHpgGenericImage1", "PosHpgGenericUrl1", "PosHpgGenericUrl1b", "PosHpgGenericUrl1c", "PosHpgGenericUrl1d", "PosHpgGenericUrl1e", "PosHpgGenericUrl4", Comments a) Details present in configuration document under Workbook tab.

Use Admin user to personalize the iSupplier Portal.

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"PosHpgGenericUrl4b", "PosHpgGenericUrl4c", "PosHpgGenericUrl5" and "PosHpgGenericUrl6". Click Apply. c) Click "Personalize Region". Select Responsibility as the Personalization Level. Click Next. Select the responsibility name. Click Next. Replace "FNDSSCORP.gif" with appropriate image file as "Corporate Branding Image" (need to be tested). Click Apply.

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Notification Workflows
Oracle Internet Supplier Portal uses Oracle Workflow technology to mange the processes define for a particular flow. Internet Supplier Portal comes with the following workflows: Internet Supplier Portals PO Acknowledgment Workflow Internet Supplier Portals ASN Creation Notification Workflow Internet Supplier Portals Change Promised Date Workflow Internet Supplier Portals Process Promised/Need-By Date Change Workflow Processes can be customized using the Oracle Workflow Builder. These customizations may be necessary depending upon the implementation need. For illustrating the concept we can take Internet Supplier Portal ASN Creation Notification workflow as an example. The Internet Supplier Portal ASN Creation Notification workflow contains the buyer notification process. In cases where it is required to send notification to a separate set of people other than the (or including) the buyer, following steps can be helpful to achieve this functionality. a) Create a role called ASN_Notification_Receiver b) Subscribe Apps users to this role using the following script Declare v_role_name VARCHAR2(1000) := ' ASN_Notification_Receiver; v_role_display_name VARCHAR2(1000) := ASN_Notification_Receiver; begin apps.wf_directory.CreateAdHocRole ( role_name => v_role_name, role_display_name => v_role_display_name, language => 'AMERICAN' , territory => 'AMERICA', role_description => ' ASN_Notification_Receiver ); commit ; end ; begin apps.wf_directory.AddUsersToAdHocRole ( role_name => ASN_Notification_Receiver, role_users => Receiver_Apps_User1, Receiver_Apps_User2, Receiver_Apps_User3' ); commit; end ;

c) Change the performer in the Suppliers ASN Creation Notification WF

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Figure 13: Notification Workflow

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Hosting the Portal to External Partners

One of the objective to implement a supplier self service application is to deploy the site on internet and open it to the external partners. All other ERP the modules will be restricted to local network use only.
Follow the steps list below to achieve this:-

Set the profiles POS: External URL & POS: Internal URL at site level pointing to external & internal server respectively. Script $POS_TOP/patch/115/sql/pos_upg_usr.sql needs to be executed as apps user Following profile options need to be changed at user level for any new user created for iSupplier o Applications Web Agent o Applications JSP Agent o Application Framework Agent o Apps Servlet Agent Bouncing the external web services and internal AP tier services is required. Following setting change will be required in internet explorer to access iSupplier page o Go to Tool >> Internet Options o Select the ""Security"" Tab and then click on the ""Custom Level"" button o Scroll down until you see the option: ""Display mixed content"". o Select the option ""Disable"" o Click Ok." Virtual host configuration will be required in external web server to use the same server with any other self service application and iSupplier respectively Separate SSL certificate and DNS entry will be required for iSupplier. Also the following profile should be setup at user level o Applications Web Agent o Applications JSP Agent o Application Framework Agent o Apps Servlet Agent

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Conclusions
As seen in the previous sections, that Oracle Internet Supplier Portal provides suppliers a secure web application to directly manage the drop shipment transactions. The use of this application provides the following advantages Single system. No need to develop interfaces to send or receive information and no dependency on other systems - Easier system maintenance Complete end-to-end security: from the web browser, to the web server, through the firewall, and to the Oracle applications server using Oracle DMZ configuration Security at supplier level so that supplier can view purchase orders for that supplier only. Security at supplier level so that supplier can create advance shipment notices against that suppliers PO only. Ability to add additional suppliers into the portal in the future, online ,using Supplier Management feature Personalization of iSupplier portal can be done without any customization.

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Acknowledgements
(A) Sinha, Barun Barun has been working for more than five years in TCS. He has worked in many different areas as Oracle ERP techno-functional consultant. In this project, he worked as an Oracle iSP Consultant and was instrumental the implementation of Oracle iSP. (B) Ghatak, Sukalyan Sukalyan has been working for more than five years in TCS. His expertise helped the implementation of Oracle iSupplier module particularly in the area of Oracle Workflow. (C) Mondal, Rahul Rahul has been working as an Oracle DBA for last four years in TCS. In this project, his expertise helped to resolve many implementation issues particularly the ones related to Oracle iSupplier hosting to external partners.

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References
[1] Oracle Internet Supplier Implmentation Guide [Part No. A95884-01]] [2] Oracle Metalink Note 'How To Limit External Access Only To iSupplier Portal Users'[Note Id 559528.1]

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