Architecture

TradeMerit is based on a “Publish and Subscribe” model. In this model, TradeMerit hosts the application on our servers and users can access the information and data as needed. There is no software to install and no hardware to implement; users simply require an Internet connection.

The user defines the supply pipeline including all of the rules and actors that take place in the process. This information remains on the TradeMerit system and then according to the management rules, the system notifies the intended user and role responsible for handling the task.

Open Communication

Before the above process can be executed, the communication channel for each trading Partner connection must be defined. As shown in the diagram there are two main ways that partners can communicate, through electronic means (i.e. EDI, XML) and non-electronic (i.e. fax, telephone, email).

Electronic feeds move through the TradeMerit Pipeline engine and are easily linked with all other partners who use the same technology. Non-electronic feeds can also be handled by either keying the data into the system through the TradeMerit web portal or if some companies continue to use faxes the data can be read off the fax or keyed in by TradeMerit.

In either case, once the data has entered the system, it remains there to be accessed by all those parties that require it. There are no instances where the same data would have to be keyed in by other users. This dramatically cuts down on errors providing high quality data to every role in the process. Finally the transactional data can be brought together so that each user sees beyond simple transactional data to more strategic aggregated metrics that are then presented on fully customizable performance dashboards.