Explore how AS2 EDI revolutionizes supplier communication by enhancing security, reducing costs, and increasing efficiency. This blog post highlights real-life success stories and demonstrates the concrete benefits of adopting this technology.
Businesses today heavily depend on effective and safe communication to stay ahead of the competition. AS2 is a technology that has completely transformed the way suppliers communicate with their partners. This standard for securely exchanging data over the internet has brought about a significant change for suppliers in different industries. In this blog post, we will delve into the benefits that suppliers gain from using AS2, showcasing real-life success stories and the concrete benefits this technology offers.
Encryption and Authentication: AS2 provides robust encryption and authentication mechanisms, ensuring that sensitive data is protected during transmission. This is crucial for suppliers handling confidential information, such as pricing details and contract terms.
Compliance with Industry Standards: Many industries have strict data security requirements. AS2 helps suppliers comply with standards such as HIPAA for healthcare, GDPR for data protection, and SOX for financial reporting.
Faster Transaction Processing: AS2 enables real-time data exchange, allowing suppliers to process orders, invoices, and other transactions more quickly. This accelerates the supply chain, reducing lead times and improving customer satisfaction.
Seamless Integration: AS2 integrates easily with existing EDI systems and ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) software, streamlining operations and enhancing productivity. Reliability and Accountability
Message Integrity: AS2 ensures message integrity through the use of digital signatures, providing proof of the origin and integrity of the data. This reduces disputes and enhances trust between trading partners.
Acknowledgment Receipts: AS2 provides acknowledgment receipts for each message sent, giving suppliers confirmation that their data has been received and processed by the recipient.
Background: Eshopbox is a technology and services company that supports brands in providing unique, brand-centric e-commerce experiences. Managing over 10 million units across 1.5 million SKUs, they required a secure AS2 solution to support their E-commerce Management Platform on Google Cloud Platform (GCP).
Solution: Eshopbox chose Aayu Technologies’s AS2 Gateway On-Premise solution for its integration with GCP. The AS2 Gateway handles inbound and outbound AS2 message flows efficiently:
Inbound AS2 Flow:
AS2 messages are received over HTTPS.
Successful Message Disposition Notifications (MDNs) are sent back to partners.
Received files are uploaded to Google Cloud Storage, categorized by timestamp and partner AS2 identifier.
A JSON notification is pushed to a Google Pub/Sub topic, informing the backend system of the message details and file locations.
The backend system processes these notifications to continue further actions.
Outbound AS2 Flow:
Files to be sent are uploaded to Google Cloud Storage.
A JSON notification is generated and pushed to a Pub/Sub topic for outgoing messages.
The AS2 Gateway parses these notifications, composes AS2 messages, and sends them after downloading the files from Cloud Storage.
The AS2 Gateway’s dashboard allows monitoring and administration of AS2 transactions, managing messages, trading partners, and certificates. It also supports automatic retries for failed messages and manual redelivery through the dashboard.
Results: The AS2 Gateway deployment on GCP integrates seamlessly with Eshopbox’s infrastructure, handling thousands of transactions daily. It provides robust AS2 communication, ensuring secure and efficient trading. The intuitive dashboard and automated failure handling enhance operational efficiency, supporting Eshopbox’s goal of delivering a seamless e-commerce experience.
For an in-depth understanding, visit the case study here: Eshopbox Case Study.
Background: MatHem.se, Sweden’s largest online grocery store, operates in several major cities and combines a complete grocery store with recipe and subscription services. They sought to streamline product image and trade item information exchange using Validoo services, requiring a platform compliant with GS1’s global standard and capable of handling high message loads and large file sizes.
Solution: MatHem implemented the AS2 Gateway On-Premise solution for AS2 messaging, integrated with Amazon S3 for backend systems. Incoming AS2 messages received over HTTPS are uploaded to S3, where MatHem’s backend system processes them. For outgoing messages, files are uploaded to S3, and the AS2 Gateway composes and sends the messages. Automatic retries with backoff and manual retrying capabilities were included to handle network delays and service unavailability.
Results:
Efficient handling of high message loads and large files.
Seamless integration with Amazon S3 for scalable storage.
Reliable message processing with automatic and manual retry capabilities.
Improved management and monitoring of AS2 transactions via an intuitive dashboard.
For an in-depth understanding, visit the case study here: Mathem Case Study.
Background: VSP DATA specializes in providing complete customer services and support across the reverse logistics space, including logistics, distribution, product and component repair, warehousing, and customer service call centers. Their deep understanding of European markets enables them to offer specialized services such as product localization, input quality inspection, and consulting in import/export, distribution, sales, and servicing of ICT technologies.
Solution: VSP DATA selected the MFT Gateway hosted SaaS offering from Aayu Technologies for their AS2 communication platform. This solution enabled VSP DATA to offload AS2 communications processing, allowing them to focus on core business activities. The MFT Gateway integrates with VSP DATA systems via SFTP, enabling efficient file transfers between VSP DATA and its trading partners.
Results: The cloud-based AS2 communications provided by MFT Gateway offered a transparent pricing model based on message volume. This flexibility allowed VSP DATA to adjust their plan as needed, supporting their growth and ensuring cost efficiency.
For an in-depth understanding, visit the case study here: VSP DATA Case Study.
Background: CentraPass provides a comprehensive decentralized Identity Toolkit and KYC API for New Zealand and Australian identity document verification. They required an on-premise AS2 gateway on AWS for secure communication with the Government of New Zealand, integrated with their existing AWS Lambda-based microservices.
Solution: CentraPass chose the AS2 Gateway from Aayu Technologies for deployment in their AWS account. The AS2 Gateway enabled seamless communication via REST API and webhook capabilities, integrating easily with CentraPass’s KYC API. The Lambda function calls the AS2 Gateway to send messages, and the Gateway’s webhook triggers another Lambda function to store received documents in an S3 bucket for immediate processing.
Results: The integration improved KYC API performance, reducing the average processing time from 10 seconds to 3-5 seconds while meeting the security and control requirements. For an in-depth understanding, visit the case study here: CentraPass Case Study.
With the improved security, cost reduction, increased efficiency, and guaranteed reliability, AS2 empowers suppliers to keep up with the fast-paced business world of today. As more suppliers adopt this technology, the supply chain landscape will keep evolving, promoting even more collaboration and efficiency.
Adheeb is a Senior Software Engineer at Aayu Technologies, with over a year of expertise in enterprise communication software and cloud technologies. Specializing in full stack development, he is passionate about every stage of the development lifecycle—from product design and architecture to implementation—and is always exploring the latest in tech. When he's not coding, you'll find him capturing moments through photography or tuning into intriguing podcasts.
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