POS Reporting Feature List

ON-DEMAND INTEGRATION
Entomo partners with leading connectivity vendors like Hubspan to provide turnkey on-demand solutions for channel partner connectivity. These solutions are specifically designed for OEM's wanting to establish direct machine-to-machine connections either between in-house systems that store channel and revenue data or between in-house systems and those of their channel partners.

Unlike traditional approaches to partner connectivity and direct machine-to-machine integration - based on point-to-point and hard-wired connections that are expensive to build, maintain and deploy - Entomo's solution is based on a central integration hub. This eliminates the need for the customer to build and maintain individual connections between their internal systems and those of each partner. Instead connecting their systems and those of all their partners using a hub requires only one connection from the customer's system to the central hub.

Once connected to the hub companies are instantly integrated with all the other internal and external systems that are also connected to the hub - regardless of firewalls, data models, or existing EAI technologies. Also each system can connect to the hub in any way it likes including .xls, csv, XML, EDI, RosettaNet etc. - without the need for anyone to change their internal systems or processes.

In every case, Entomo maps and validates the customer's connection method and data to the processes and protocols of the companies that they connect to. In addition, Entomo stores all transactions that pass through the hub for validation and archiving, routes and manages the data in compliance with business rules, and performs lifecycle monitoring of all transactions.

Supported communications standards include HTTP(S), FTP, FTP(S), S/FTP, EDI VAN, AS2, RNIF 1.1, RNIF 2.0, SOAP 1.1 with attachments and WSDL. Business process and document format standards include XML, EDI, flat file, RosettaNet, PIDX, OAGIS, cXML, XCBL, Punchout, Rountrip, IDOC. Security standards include X509 Certificates, S/MIME, WS Security, PGP.

And because this connectivity is offered on an on-demand basis there is no need to license cost-prohibitive software or expend substantial IT resources to deploy it. Implementations are quick, require minimal IT support, and can be affected in days and weeks rather than months - a small fraction of the time and cost that conventional approaches require.

To deploy the solution quickly and keep it operating, Entomo and its partners take on the entire task - from implementing the connections to your business systems and those of your partners, to managing and monitoring the daily operation of the link including transformation of disparate data formats, validation methodologies, security protocols, routing, and service level agreements.

The result is a turnkey outsourced solution to manage our customer's integration needs allowing them to stay focused on their core business without any need to be distracted by connectivity and integration issues.

OUTSOURCED DATA COLLECTION
For customers who do not need machine-to-machine connectivity, preferring to receive data via more traditional means - including fax, email, ftp and file download from the partner's site - Entomo offers outsourced services for Data Collection, Cleansing, Normalization, Aggregation and Enrichment. Channel data from partners is collected and processed by Entomo on the customer's behalf, then delivered directly into one or more of the customer's business systems including Entomo's on-demand software for further processing.

• DATA COLLECTION AND NORMALIZATION
  For customers who do not need machine-to-machine connectivity, preferring to receive data via more traditional means - including fax, email, ftp and file download from the partner's site - Entomo offers outsourced services for Data Collection, Cleansing, Normalization, Aggregation and Enrichment. Channel data from partners is collected and processed by Entomo on the customer's behalf, then delivered directly into one or more of the customer's business systems including Entomo's on-demand software for further processing.
  
  
• CLEANSING AND TRANSFORMATION
  Daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly sales, inventory, credit and other channel data is collected from partners worldwide. It is accepted in any format the partner chooses including EDI, XML, .XLS, .DOC, .TXT, .CSV, and PDF for example. Once received the channel data is processed automatically by Entomo's proprietary tools and systems, then checked for correctness by Entomo analysts on the channel data team assigned to the customer. If problems arise the Entomo team works with the customer's staff or directly with channel partners to address the issues, including missing and incorrect data, part number mismatches, etc.
  
  Entomo's channel data collection services include normalizing the formats and form of data received from channel partners so that this data can be fed into its on-demand and customer's business systems - in the formats they expect- for further processing and analysis.
  
  
• DUPLICATES AND MISSING DATA
  Entomo's data collection tools also include powerful duplicate and missing files detection capabilities. Duplicate files are detected on source of the file as well as various other considerations including file size, file created or modified date time. Duplicate files can be detected irrespective of file names using CRC32 or MD5 content match algorithms. Missing files are detected based on comparing files received with what was expected including customizable windows and thresholds for delivery.

DATA RECONCILIATION
Receiving data regularly from partners only solves part of the channel visibility problem. The correctness of the data must be verified. This is especially true if customers rely on this data for revenue recognition, channel incentive disbursement, sales commissions etc. Entomo's data collection service offers data reconciliation and correction as an additional optional capability that can be added to the base service.

Once channel data is received, patented reconciliation algorithms search for inconsistencies in the data, looking across different partners, types of partner data, and reporting periods. Problems are automatically flagged, then reviewed by Entomo analysts. Corrections and adjustments are made if possible through further analysis and sometimes in consultation with the partner if necessary. If issues still remain the unresolved matters are referred to the customer for their review and help in resolution. Sometimes even deeper investigations are required. Entomo can undertake these investigations on the customer's behalf including onsite audit's at partner locations.

DATA ENRICHMENT
End-customer and end-use data is used by companies for several things - for example, to understand where their products are sold, who should be paid commissions, whether marketing programs are having an impact and a variety of other uses.

Unfortunately, even when end-customer data is reported by the channel it is usually reported in inconsistent formats and ridden with errors. This makes it hard for companies to analyze channel data and use it to make sales and marketing decisions.

Entomo's optional data enrichment services are designed to address this problem by significantly improving the quality of the data after it is received from the channel.

By using proprietary tools and techniques, the customer's own internal databases, and optional third-party reference databases like those available from D&B, CorpTech and others, Entomo first normalizes partner-submitted data, so that similar end-customer and end-use information can be compared and matched as similar - no matter its initial form. Once that has been done, further enrichment can be performed on the normalized data including addition or validation of postal addresses, identification of corporate relationships, insertion of territory, region, end-customer name, pricing, DUNS numbers, SIC codes, etc.

The resulting data provides a very detailed view of distribution channel and end-customer activity that can then be used to support better decision-making in sales and marketing.

OUTSOURCED PARTNER MANAGEMENT
Entomo's Outsourced Partner Management program extends the cleansing, normalization, duplicate removal, and enrichment services discussed earlier into a completely turnkey offering where Entomo is not just responsible for these services but also for managing the data collection relationship with partners. This includes:

• Ensuring that there is a strong contractual basis for requesting the data. This includes the linking of financial incentives to delivery performance.
  
• Replacing informal and often rudimentary processes for managing channel data collection operations with formal systems and processes based on industry best practices.
  
• Jointly designing and implementing these streamlined business processes for requesting and collecting data with our customers and business partners.
  
• Establishing a regular schedule for data delivery.
  
• Establishing clear lines of communication and a well defined escalation and problem resolution procedure
  
• Establishing clear ownership of deliverables.
  
• Following up with channel partners to resolve issues relating to missing and erroneous data.
  
• Investigating discrepancies and conducting partner audits as needed.

Because this service is completely outsourced, it is executed by Entomo staff from Entomo facilities using Entomo systems and tools. Hence as far as the customer is concerned, there are no people to hire or train, no software to install maintain or learn, and no operations to monitor. Entomo takes on complete ownership for these tasks.

With the service deployed Entomo customers will immediately see significant measurable improvements in the quality, efficiency, and reliability of channel data collection, including the number of channel partners submitting complete, correct and timely channel data.

As a result, Entomo's partner management services are today used by some of the best known companies in the world - to collect and process data from hundreds of their channel partners worldwide across thousands of products and parts.

CHANNEL PARTNERS
Every day Entomo receives, daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly inventory, POS, in-transit, royalty, claims and other channel related data feeds, on behalf of its customers, from distributors, retailers and resellers worldwide.

Once received by Entomo this data is cleaned, normalized and enriched, then fed into existing customers applications for further processing

Please contact Entomo to check if we already receive data feeds from your existing channel partners. A list of existing channel partners whose data is processed by Entomo can also be provided under NDA.