What to choose between Hosted Catalog and PunchOut?

Centralize catalogs in hosted or Punch-Out mode?

Key words: hosted electronic catalog, Punch-Out electronic catalog, E-purchase, e-catalog.

First of all, in order to ensure the rationalization of Purchases, reduce administrative costs and improve governance, companies use e-Purchasing solutions such as Sourcing-Force.com. These now include numerous B2B electronic catalogs generalists or specialists by profession.

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Why an electronic catalog?

The use of e-catalogs in an e-Purchase procedure is an important advantage in controlling expenses, while achieving significant process savings. Indeed, an electronic catalog corresponds to a database of products and services accessible from the search engine of the e-Purchase solution. Sourcing Force.

Electronic catalogs bring significant improvements, both for Buyers and especially for Contractors, namely:

• Simplification of Supplies,
• Respect for panel contracts,
• Strengthening business relationships,
• Improvement of satisfaction,
• Reducing disputes...

The e-Catalogue thus represents a major element in the creation of orders with standardized content resulting from negotiated contracts.

Most of the time, we find two types of electronic catalogs :

• Hosted catalogs: they are stored in the information systems of the purchasers, and directly connected to the e-Purchase tool.
• Punch-Out catalogs: they are accessible via an interface between the e-Purchase solution Sourcing Force and the supplier's merchant website.

When in a position to offer both solutions, Purchasing organizations must choose the most appropriate solution to deploy according to Purchasing objectives..

To optimize the choice between a hosted catalog or a punch-out catalog, several selection criteria must be taken into account:

• The technical-functional characteristics of the solutions,
• The detailed analysis of the needs of end users, who established a hosted mini-catalog,
• The consequences for the various actors involved in the Purchasing process,
• Beyond purely technical aspects, the choice of the solution will have significant impacts on both the Purchasing and Supplier teams.

While it is relatively difficult to know specific needs and constraints in advance

For Buyers and Suppliers, a number of criteria can be presented to help determine the solution to be adopted (cf. table below).

COMPARISON BETWEEN HOSTED AND PUNCH-OUT CATALOGS

Hosted catalogPunch-Out CatalogDirectly integrated into the e-Purchase tool.Accessible via an interface between the e-Purchase tool and the supplier's merchant website.Responsibility for creation: the supplier and occasionally also the Buyer.Responsibility for creation: only the supplier.The purchaser checks the information in the catalog before making it available to end users.The supplier provides its merchant website.The supplier provides its merchant website.The purchaser defines and takes care of the Reporting on the general use of the catalog.The supplier provides Reporting on orders and the use of the catalog. The type of interface is generic: the Purchase process is similar for all catalogs.The type of interface is specific: the Purchase process may be different depending on the supplier's merchant site.Limited to the interface offered by the Buyer's system.The supplier provides a specific interface with advanced features.For maintenance, the Buyer or his service provider takes care of the processing, loading of catalogs as well as the administration of the catalog.. The supplier takes full responsibility for updating prices and administering the catalog.

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