RosettaNet: Hardly a Dead Language

XML-based Partner Interface Processes are rolling out into the "real world"

It's a small step for each supply chain partner but a giant leap for supply chain management: RosettaNet announced in October that the majority of RosettaNet board members have put the organization's standards into practice.

More than two years' efforts from big industry muscle - such as Cisco, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, and IBM - have been funneled into RosettaNet's goal to more easily enable transfer of meaningful business data among supply chain partners. Those efforts have begun to produce results, with several of RosettaNet's XML-based Partner Interface Processes (PIPs) now ready for prime time, and some in use.

Other similar standards, namely OASIS and UN/CEFACT's ebXML and Microsoft's BizTalk, appear to be lagging far behind. Laura Walker, executive director of OASIS, characterizes her organization's ebXML as an 18-month program on track for release in May 2001. According to Hollis Bischoff, VP of e-business strategies at Meta Group, "BizTalk is mostly vaporware."

"Cisco Systems reached a production milestone a week ago on October 3 by sending a RosettaNet-based XML message to one of our key contract manufacturers," said Mike Campi, VP of global supply management at Cisco. The PIP was a forecast notification. "The next step will be to implement PIP 4A5, which is basically a forecast response coming back to us from our supply base, where we'll get the RosettaNet XML back into the Cisco environment," he continued.

The significance of that first transmission may be obscured by the mundane nature of its purpose, as well as the suggestion that receiving the response will take some time.

"The reality is that it's hard work. It was very sexy when the first announcements were made and it's not as sexy anymore," says Bischoff. Nevertheless, the overall promise remains undiminished: RosettaNet PIPs will make connecting business processes among partners easier.

Although the difficulty and cost of using the first PIP is high, "the incremental cost of doing the second, third, fourth, and so on, is lowered very quickly," Bischoff says. And the value to the company of adding each PIP gets higher.

By the way, that initial cost is very high: "We're talking in the multimillion dollars to do the first one," says Bischoff. The cost can include extensive integration efforts and business process reengineering (BPR). The legions of former ERP consultants who spent so much effort on BPR in the mid-1990s may soon find themselves in that market again.

She adds that the cost is more dependent on how well your systems are integrated, not on the back-end systems themselves. "It doesn't matter if it's SAP or Oracle or some other ERP system or even a legacy system, as long as the information is integrated."

Campi said Cisco has not analyzed its expenditure on implementing RosettaNet standards, but commented that any such analysis should take into account what the cost of a commensurate EDI effort would be. Of course, with EDI, you don't get the incremental cost reduction inherent in XML-based standards.

But what about competing standards? Will it be more difficult to exchange data with partners using alternatives such as ebXML or BizTalk?

The hope is that the answer will eventually be "no." OASIS's Walker concurs with RosettaNet CEO Jennifer Hamilton, who describes ebXML and RosettaNet as complementary - RosettaNet being more vertically focused, and ebXML being more horizontal. Walker points out that ebXML will support ubiquitous business services such as messaging. In contrast, RosettaNet focuses on higher-level business processes. And RosettaNet and OASIS do work cooperatively, sharing what Bischoff calls a "friendly rivalry and competition."

Walker says an OASIS board member "has been involved with RosettaNet for years." Joint efforts will, "at a minimum," help users decide how to architect their systems for interoperability. As for BizTalk, Bischoff is skeptical that it will be compatible with both ebXML and RosettaNet. —Jeanette Burriesci