Mercedes Benz's E-Biz Solution: The Factory Delivery Reservation System

The Design of FDRS Contd...

When an order was placed by the dealer on the FDRS system, the data was first stored on the external Domino server, after which it was replicated to the internal Domino server. Then it was replicated to the back-end database via the Lotus Enterprise Integrator. Data replication between the Lotus Notes servers happened every 15 minutes and data exchange with the back-end database three times per day.

There was also a link between the back end database and an IBM S/390¹² mainframe based system located at MBUSA via a T1¹³ line. MBUSA managed the flow of vehicles to Mercedes dealers across the United States.

This mainframe based system, received new vehicle orders (as opposed to factory delivery reservation requests) from individual dealers. The orders were then sent to MBUSI's Baan system and also to the back-end database.

The vehicle ordering and factory reservation data were coordinated with each other when the back-end database uploaded the data to the internal Domino server. This coordinated the production and delivery information.

FDRS Implementation

One of the most challenging aspects of the implementation seemed to be the complexity of the Lotus and Domino scripts. The development team had to group all the information from diverse systems. Commented William Engelke, “There was a substantial amount of very complex coding involved in the FDRS solution. This application involves a lot more than having our dealers fill out a form and submitting it. There are many things the servers have to do for the system to function properly, such as looking at calendars and production schedules. We built a solution with some very advanced communication linkages.”

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12] The IBM S/390 servers offer direct high speed access to the e-business application and are used for Enterprise Computing.

13] A dedicated phone connection supporting data rates of 1.544 Mbits per second. A T1 Line actually consists of 24 individual channels, each of which supports 64 Kbits per second. Each 64 Kbit per second channel can be configured to voice or data traffic.

Case Details

Case Code : ITSY009
Themes: e-Supply Chain Management
Case Length : 06 Pages
Period : 1990-2001
Organization : SciQuest.com
Pub Date : 2002
Teaching Note : Available
Countries : USA
Industry : Information Technology (Electronic Commerce)

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