Two new concepts are beginning to enter the IT lexicon: Web Services and Service Oriented Architecture.
Both represent new ways for companies to integrate the business software applications they use to manage their front office and back office operations, especially with trading partners.
That’s why several leading warehouse management (WMS), manufacturing execution (MES) and transportation management (TMS) vendors are in the process of rewriting their solutions to play in this emerging space. So just what are these new concepts?
Web Services are applications with business or process functionality that are accessible over the Internet. They can stand on their own, like a WMS that has been rewritten as a Web Service. Or, they can be linked together with other applications to create a new application and manage a process.
The best example in the supply chain might be linking together order management (OMS), warehouse management (WMS) and transportation management (TMS) systems to get seamless visibility across an order fulfillment process. This could happen even if the OMS is at an outsourced call center, the WMS is at a third-party logistics provider, and the TMS is in your own department.
