fetch Solutions V-catalog

fetch Solutions “V-Catalog”

(V for virtual)

V-Catalog is a smart choice for your corporate Website e-Catalog, e-procurement offerings, e-marketplaces, and much more.

V-Catalog is a service for the creation and hosting of electronic online catalog components. V-Catalog revolutionize the way you build and manage electronic catalogs for your Corporate website, e-procurement needs, e-business tools, B2B transactions, data migration to V-marketplaces and much more.

Before deciding your online plans, ask yourself the following

1. Do you currently have a real electronics catalog?

Many of us mix between DATABASE driven e-Catalogs and CDs/PDF Catalogs, and other electronic multimedia illustrations of products and services. Dynamic Electronics catalogs for products are usually built on database platforms. Database structures are essential for handling dynamic data processing including searching, sorting, etc. Furthermore, catalogs based on databases are easily imported, exported and integrated into other electronic systems.

2. Is your catalog ready for e-Commerce, E-Procurement, and other e-requirements?

A catalog built on a solid database, do not necessarily imply that your product information are ready for E-Marketplace integration, E-procurement and E-Commerce. Your catalog structure must comply with industry standards such as BMECat. Further more your catalog must comply with universal classification schemes such as eCL@SS and/or UNSPSC.

3. Do you really need to outsource your catalog component?

You have two options:

1. Either to generate, maintain and invest in expensive in-house software/hardware infrastructures for building a professional real online V-Catalog that fulfill your website needs and other needs related to publishing to third party systems and Marketplaces, or

2. To outsource the “V-Catalog”; the most critical dynamic component of your online presence at a fraction of the cost. By outsourcing you no longer worry about the complexity of building, managing and maintaining this most critical component of your online presence.

4. Are you ready for the dynamic online presence?

The issues raised above are minimum prerequisites for joining the dynamic online business. Today, it is essential for many businesses to have the following as a minimum:

• A Database driven product catalog, complying with industry standards for data exchange in order to fulfill E-commerce and possibly E-procurement requirements.

• Solid and centralized infrastructure for hosting and managing product catalogs backed with powerful Databases.

• A strong mechanism for publishing your product catalog to E-market places, and possibly to third party E-procurement systems of your business partners.

The V-Catalog Platform Solution

V-Catalog is a comprehensive inexpensive turnkey solution for handling your electronic catalog needs. This powerful platform allows companies to have a looking interface through your company domain name while avoiding the cost of complete custom development.

The V-Catalog E-Marketing Sales Tool

The V-Catalog will generate new sales from: guys too small to get your sales guys attention, internet-savvy bigger guys, and from repeat sales as prototype orders go to volume production.

Insert a catalog picture of a product page here in a box

Features:

1. Migration and hosting your V-catalog in a centralized system backed with strong MS SQL Server 2000 database infrastructure

2. Professional and attractive presentation for your products.

3. Compliance with industry standards for electronic catalogs

4. V-Catalog provides you with the ability to frame-out the E-catalog to your own website and to all your sales-chain partners.

5. Possibility of Publishing part or all of your catalog information to E-marketplaces with no additional processing requirements.

6. V-Catalog product variation structure is an excellent container for many types of industrial products that has similar specs but is variable in size, head, and capacity.

Benefits

• Centralized product pool: create a centralized product catalog pool to be used for your own website. You do not have to duplicate the work in conjunction with publishing your electronic catalogs.

• Maximize your return on investment (ROI); by cutting down expensive cost related to the infrastructure needed for in-house handling and publishing E-catalog.

• Your Company Image – What you see is what you get: V-Catalog provides you with the best and most professional online interface for your corporate catalog component. The result you get for your catalog is comparable to V-Catalog powered E-market places. You give excellent impression about your products and company image.

• Ready for your Sales-Chain partners: V-Catalog option gives you the ability to frame out the E-catalog to your sales-partner web sites with the most recent product and service information.

• Integration with online E-marketplaces: your catalog information can be easily integrated to online E-market places attracting an audience of thousands of professional interested in electronic component franchised products.

• Cut down the cost of ownership: you do not have to allocate high initial investment in advance, you only pay as long as you are satisfied with the service without further obligations and commitments.

• Professional support: free support and consultancy from a professional staff of engineers deeply involved in electronic component products configuration who will provide you with practical advice on how to merge clicks and bricks.

• 24/7 Hosting: The hosting will be provided by ATT with redundant back-up.

fetch Solutions SaaS Benefiits to the Strategic Partners

fetch Solutions SaaS Benefiits to the Strategic Partners

Benefits of 'Software as a Service'

Software as a Service (SaaS) is an emergent mechanism of delivering software applications to customers over the Internet. Software as a Service or On Demand software can be implemented rapidly and eliminates the infrastructure and ongoing costs that traditional applications require. cyn.in offers all the following advantages of Software as a Service.

Low cost of entry

As opposed to on premise software, SaaS is delivered to organizations as a subscription model, usually billed on a per user per month basis. This means that the costs are granular in nature and are incurred only as long as benefits are achieved. This does away with the enormously large up front payments and massive annual license fees. cyn.in offers a simple pay as you go pricing with no long term contractual requirements.

Zero Infrastructure - Reduced Overheads

Since the application is hosted by the service provider, investing in expensive infrastructure is no longer required. All large initial investments on hardware, licenses, databases, ongoing overheads of employing and training IT staff, software and hardware maintenance and upgrades are managed by cyn.in. Customers can access and use the application on the Internet through any browser. No local infrastructure meaning; no headache of upgrading aging technology, and a complete protection from unforeseen expense spikes.

Single Instance, Multi-Tenant Efficiency

cyn.in is implements a multi-tenant architecture. This means that the cost of all software, infrastructure and expertise is shared by a large number of customers. This drastically improves implementation speed and cost effectiveness over a standard ASP model.

Cost-effective Infinite Scalability

The pay as you go model of SaaS, gives the customer the freedom to adapt to the changing usage of the software, on demand. For example: You can buy the application for two employees to start with and then after a few months decide to adapt it for a department of 10 people, and on achieving measurable benefits, the software can be provided to the entire organization of say 5,000 users. Software delivered as services provide all of this scalability, without requiring customers to plan for it.

Increased Accessibility and Productivity

Web based applications enable you to save your information on the Internet, hence making it easily accessible from anywhere. Your business knowledge is made accessible to all your knowledge workers increasing collaborative productivity. Geographically separated teams function better with better information availability.

Higher quality offerings at lower costs

SaaS applications that are built to scale pass on potential savings to the customer. As more and more customers are added, the operating cost for each customer continues to drop. This gives the SaaS provider the ability to constantly better the offering while lowering costs.

Easy to implement

Since, the solution is delivered via the Internet; Software as a Service completely eliminates installation and setup at the customer’s end. Users can be up and running very quickly.

Improved Security

Software as a Service providers are in the business of providing uninterrupted reliable services. Vendors understand that data must be backed up religiously, and information security is of fanatic priority. Skilled resources, network redundancies, stand-by power, up-to-date security and intrusion detection are mandatory infrastructure required to provide an enterprise class service. Such level infrastructural investment is usually an overkill for a single organization or team.

Freedom of Choice

The Software as a Service model gives the customer the freedom to easily make the switch from one solution provider to another. This is possible as there has been no locked in investments towards the IT infrastructure of servers, software or security systems. This freedom to easily walk away from a provider, works as a motivator to introduce better features and ensure optimum performance.

Defined Predictable Spends

Service based software operates on agreed pre-defined fixed charges. This enables you to predict the costs and helps you budget for your yearly financial expenses. The low-cost of the package does not drastically affect the figures for unplanned usage of the service.

Platform Independence

SaaS based solutions are hosted centrally with the service provider. No software to be installed at the customer’s premises. The software can be accessed on the Internet via a browser only. On Demand applications can be used by Windows, Linux or Mac users, providing true platform independence.

Focus internal IT initiatives only on direct, line of business technology

SaaS strategy not only eliminates the need for additional IT infrastructure spends, it substantially takes the burden off your internal IT staff. With the SaaS advantage, your staff does not have to manage upgrades, troubleshoot problems for generic software applications. This helps the company to direct limited in-house IT resources towards more business oriented initiatives. These business oriented initiatives are the ones that are usually un-out-source-able and require the focus of internal IT teams

Q -- Taking Advantage of a Downturn

1 Recessions "shuffle the deck" more than boom times do
2 Gains or losses show up early.
3 Gains or losses made during recessions tend to endure.

Five Web Site Features most important to Distribution Customers Wish List

* Up-to-date content
* Availability of technical specifications
* Pricing information
* Product images
* Online catalog searchable by specifications

More SaaS Features/Benefits: SaaS 101

The true sign of SaaS’s arrival is that it has garnered the sincere interest, and better yet dollars, of the investment community. More people in a greater array of business roles are giving SaaS the ol’ thumbs up.

We’ve established that the pursuit of SaaS is on the minds of *almost* everyone, but what is it about SaaS that gives us all the warm and fuzzies? For the most part, SaaS is still a nascent industry. It wasn’t long ago the purveyors of SaaS applications or enablement technologies were referred to as the tech industry’s “lunatic fringe”. Strangely, the benefits of SaaS have emerged and shown a bright light on the future of all those involved in delivering software functionality to businesses. So, what are these benefits? This may read like a SaaS 101 laundry list… but to see where SaaS is going, it might be best to take another look at the fundamentals.

For the Consumer:

• No client/server software installation or maintenance - that’s right, no more 800-page planning and implementation guides.
• Shorter deployment time - potentially minutes as opposed to a phased implementation that could take months (see item #1)
• Global availability - sure the technology exists to make on-premise software available outside of the premises, but we’re talking about functionality that is available from anywhere on the internet natively.
• Service Level Agreement (SLA) adherence - reported bugs can be fixed minus any rollout overhead. Sure the provider actually has to fix the issue, but assuming they’ve deployed a moderately efficient SaaS application the rollout of a patch or fix should happen in the blink of an eye.
• Constant, Smaller, Upgrades - when you use a SaaS application, it is in the best interest of the provider to keep you happy and they can do so by constantly improving the application experience. With SaaS this can come in the form of consistent miniscule changes that add up over time instead of monster patch and upgrades that cost you time and money to implement.
• Ease Your Internal IT Pains - This is a big one. Most of the last several points here highlight that SaaS offloads a great deal of IT pains incurred by software consumers in the traditional client/server model. This leaves IT personnel to focus on improving the day-to-day technical operations of your company instead of being called upon to troubleshoot 3rd party software or maintain aging infrastructure. Which leads to…
• Redistribute IT Budget - by outsourcing software functionality to a provider, the enterprise realizes a cost savings in infrastructure requirements and IT personnel knowledge requirements. This allows the enterprise to focus on core competencies. It also means that the cost savings from using SaaS applications can be flat out saved, or reallocated to boost productivity through other services.

For the Provider:

• Aggregate operating environment - as a provider, you own your domain. No longer are you sending technicians to fix or customize your software because it doesn’t fit into a customer’s highly-specialized (or horribly outdated) infrastructure. You have complete control to optimize an infrastructure to your SaaS application’s specific requirements. This is synergy at its best, and leads to financial savings as well as less headaches.
• Predictable Revenue Stream - the subscription model associated with SaaS means that your customers will pay you on a recurring schedule. If you make this cycle flexible enough, you can get a real handle on forecasting revenues. The payment may be tied to your product (think cell phone plans) where everybody pays according to the same term, or tied to your individual subscribers where some may pay monthly, some yearly, and some quarterly. In my opinion, the more flexible you are with this piece of the offering the better. Either way, because of the scheduled nature of cash inflow, revenue modeling becomes more reliable.
• Predictable Growth - Same as above, but here we’re talking about sheer volume of subscribership. The fact that users hit your site to access the application means that with the right tools you can monitor their usage pretty closely - something that’s not so easy with all your customers running the application on premise.
• Focus On Smaller Upgrades Instead of Monster Patch Rollouts - and while you’re at it, don’t worry about rollout logistics across all of your customer sites either. Your development teams can focus on fixing core application functionality, tackling bugs and enhancing features in smaller incremental rollouts because it’s just easier to do so.
• Sales Becomes Customer Relationship Management - When you are selling a subscribable service, the game of gaining subscribership becomes one of balancing user retention vs. attrition more than a game of landing the ‘big deals’. Sure, it’s important to have a team out there pounding the pavement to sell your application - i.e. getting subscribers in the door - but the real thrust of the new sales and marketing in SaaS is customer relationship management. The equation becomes quite simple - keep retention rates higher than attrition rates and focus on bringing in new customers.

Adoption of the model has been growing at well over 20% year over year, Nick Carr says (paraphrased) that SaaS adoption is set to explode and reports that McKinsey & Co. will release a survey showing that 61 percent of CIOs at North American companies with sales over $1 billion are already planning to adopt one or more SaaS application. Additionally he says that Deutsche Bank projected that the SaaS market will account for half of the application software spend by 2013, Gartner predicts that SaaS will triple in size by 2011 from 2006, Jeff Kaplan thinks SaaS adoption is underrated and the success of companies like SalesForce.com should be enough to convince even the most skeptical, but if all of this is still not enough and you are having trouble convincing your customers, your boss or yourself into adopting SaaS, here is a list of benefits to consider.

fetch Solutions provides SaaS Benefits to the Click Electronics Partners

Benefits of 'Software as a Service'

Software as a Service (SaaS) is an emergent mechanism of delivering software applications to customers over the Internet. Software as a Service or On Demand software can be implemented rapidly and eliminates the infrastructure and ongoing costs that traditional applications require.

Benefits to Click Electronics Strategic Partners. They are:

• Low cost of entry
• Zero Infrastructure - Reduced Overhead
• Single Instance, Multi-Tenant Efficiency
• Cost-effective Infinite Scalability
• Increased Accessibility and Productivity
• Higher quality offerings and a greatly reduced costs
• fetch Solutions will implement the software
• fetch Solutions to provide the Hosting and backup
• Improved Security
• Freedom of Choice
• Defined Predictable Spends
  

Q -- What software services does iMark provide fetch Solutions?

iMark Corporation provides the SaaS (Software as a Service) to fetch Solutions for our Electronic Component Distribution Customers. Cronin Strategic Partners is an Electronic Components Consulting Firm that provide IT Solutions to allow the Mid-Tier Supply-Chain Partners to transfor and iMark are dadadadada


the Internet Technology Applications for Click Electronics. In addition to the e-Catalog software, they also provide the B2B processes, and the Enterprise Specific private Data Base.

Q -- What products will described in the Click Electronics e-Catalog?

Answer -- Click Electronics will provide a list of all the franchised manufacturers that will be invited to be Strategic partners. Click will provide the names and the contact information to Mr. Timothy X. Cronin Jr, Marketing and Sales Director of fetch Solutions. Mr. Cronin will make the initial contact to the Sr. Marketing and Sales Directors of the invited manufacturers. A letter of Introduction will be sent to the Marketing VP asking them to identify those parts that are A moving Items, their description of the parts to be listed in the Click e-Catalog. dadadadada

Q -- Where will the e-Catalog be hosted?

Answer -- The Click Electronics e-Catalog is Hosted at the A.T.T. Enterprise Hosting Center in Watertown, Ma. fetch Solutions will provide the Hosting Service for Click Solutions. There will also be a back-up mirrored Click catalog that will be hosted at i-Mark's Data Center in Hartford, Ct.

Software as a Service providers are in the business of providing uninterrupted reliable services. Vendors understand that data must be backed up religiously, and information security is of fanatic priority. Skilled resources, network redundancies, stand-by power, up-to-date security and intrusion detection are mandatory infrastructure required to provide an enterprise class service. Such level infrastructural investment is usually an overkill for a single organization or team

Q --Where will the e-Catalog be located?

Answer -- The Click Electronics e-Catalog will be located on the Internet adjacent to the distributor's existing web site. There will be a link that the user will click to be taken to the e-Catalog. ( click Electronics)

Q -- What is an e-Catalog?

Answer --An eCatalog (electronic catalog) is a product management system based on a database. The rapid growth of production and sales activities in recent years has meant that suppliers, distributors and buyers have had to deal with increasing volumes of information. It has therefore become extremely important to present up-to-date and well-structured information on products and their features both on the market and, above all, on the Internet. With the help of eCatalogs, text and detaile, product information can be created and constantly kept current. In many cases, the use of eCatalogs represents a decisive competitive advantage.

fetch Solutions

"Why search for all your Global Sales-Chain procurement data when we can fetch it for you"

fetch Solutions Pay as you Go

fetch Solutions will offer 2 payment Options for the Electronic Components Strategic Partners. They are:

• A fixed payment per seat for all Supply-Chain Partners to link to the Robust fetch Data Bank giving 24/7 access to the Enterprise private Data-Base.
• Fetch Solutions will not charge a fee per seat allowing a free hook up, providing the partner signs an agreement that 10% of the Virtual sales-activities is transacted via their
  Virtual Sales Division. fetch Solutions will receive a 5% commission fee on Internet Transactions only which will include the SaaS Bundle. (Hosting, Private Data Base, e-Catalog, B2B transaction) during Stage 1.
  

fetch Solutions World Class Global Hosting Center

ATT Managed Hosting

The Benefits of the Software-as-a-Service Model

By Curt Finch - Mon, 11/07/2005 - 12:18pm.

When the Internet burst upon the scene in the early 1990's, the concept of software as a service (SAAS) seemed an idea whose time had come.

It got hyped along with everything else about the internet and reached a massive peak of inflated expectations in early 2000 as venture capitalists funded dozens of nearly identical companies that provided various SAAS solutions.

As venture funding dried up in mid 2000, the cracks in the SAAS model began to appear. The business plans assumed zero customer attrition, an uncompetitive landscape and IPO's in the absence of revenue. Disillusionment set in and 99 percent of those companies are no longer around. However, the strong did survive, and now, due to the success of companies like Salesforce.com and Rightnow.com, SAAS is back.

Analysts claim that by 2010, 30 percent of new software will be delivered via an SAAS model.

Variously termed "on-demand software", the "ASP" model, or "hosted software", SAAS is where you rent web-based software hosted at the provider's site. For many companies large and small, SAAS is the best way to rollout new technology. SAAS has now proven itself and is here to stay.

The staying power of SAAS has arisen for several reasons:

1. Low cost of entry. Instead of paying lots of money to roll out a complex solution across the entire company, customers can just roll out one test department of 20 people. The risk is very low if it fails, and they don't have to involve their busy IT staff.

2. Onus is on the vendor. If the vendor's software is broken, they won't be getting money from any customer for long. The company is motivated to fix the problem.

3. The vendor works for the buyer. Customers don't have to rely on their IT department to install an application. Everything is running securely at the vendor's location.

4. Less risky investment. Instead of spending $60,000 all at once, for example, customers pay for the software monthly - the monetary risk is lower and less scary.

5. Vendors must provide a secure data environment, or they're out of a job. Most vendors understand that data must be backed up religiously, and security is the top priority. Customer's IT departments are typically pulled in many directions and can't be as focused on one solution. Customers can rest assured their data security is probably better with a hosted solution, not worse.

A number of companies provide software under the SAAS model, but by far, the most successful project aligned technology is in the project tracking and project time management arena. Companies that provide project time tracking via the SAAS model include Journyx, Clockware and Unanet.

Some of these companies provide the software only in the SAAS model, and some provide both installed licensed versions of their software as well as SAAS versions. Companies that provide both enable early rollouts of the software, which let you begin using the software on the hosted site to determine the value first before your IT staff installs it locally. Once you're sure you're getting business value, you can convert the data to run in your local environment.

Not all companies that provide SAAS do so at the same level. Following are questions to ask vendors to make sure you're working with a reputable company:

1. Evaluate how well the vendor has integrated its service operations into its core business.

a. Many software vendors are experimenting with the software-as-a-service model. However, for many, this is an operational change that is inconsistent with their culture as software product providers. Sometimes the processes for how the product and technology resources interact in delivering a service may not be well-developed, mature or agreed upon internally. Where possible, get a clear understanding from your vendor of their internal operational commitments to a software-as-a-service delivery model. The value proposition that touts the advantages of having the same company build and manage the software will be of no value if that sentiment is not accepted and demonstrated across their operations.

2. Where is the computer that will be used to serve my application?

3. Is the data center where that computer is located staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week? What staff is on-site?

4. What physical security measures are in the data center?

5. Is there redundant power, such as batteries and generators?

6. What cooling and fire suppression systems are available?

7. How many Internet service providers (ISPs) do you buy connectivity from?

8. Do you have a disaster recovery plan if your data center becomes unavailable?

9. Are servers dedicated to each customer, or do multiple customers share a single server?

10. What do you back up and how often? How long do you keep backups? Do you store backups off-site?

If you ask these questions, you will go along way to ensure success. Compare the answers to those you get from your own IT staff. You might be surprised which solution is better.

The SAAS project tracking or time management solution may be just what you need. Consider:

It removes much of your IT cost.

It reduces the risk involved in acquiring new software.

It allows you to influence product and service quality via an ongoing relationship with the vendor.

It gives you the flexibility to change usage commitments as business circumstances change.

It allows you to predict more accurately your ongoing expenses as your IT budget is tightened and scrutinized.

The prevalence of hosted project and time tracking solutions is rising, and many companies will be willing to try it out - especially if they understand the clear benefits. After all, all they have to lose is one month's rent.

Curt Finch is the CEO of Journyx (http://pr.journyx.com), a provider of Web-based software located in Austin, Texas, that automates billing, payroll & project management by tracking time, expenses and mileage. Finch is a software industry veteran. In 1997, Curt created the world\s first Internet-based timesheet application and the foundation for the current Journyx product offering. Curt has managed development teams creating enterprise-level software solutions since 1985, with a focus on distributed workforce management.