3 Oracle Product Master Data Management Integration Option for Siebel CRM

Siebel CRM is available as an installation option in the Product MDM integration.

This chapter includes the following sections:

• Section 3.1, "Supported Features"

• Section 3.2, "Siebel CRM Interfaces"

• Section 3.3, "Siebel CRM Integration Services"

• Section 3.4, "Assumptions and Constraints for the Siebel CRM Option"

• Section 3.5, "Multiple Price List Methodology"

• Section 3.6, "Synchronizing Sponsorship Items from OPH to Siebel CRM"

3.1 Supported Features

These are the supported features for the Siebel option:

• Synchronization of Metadata

• Synchronization of Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Relationships/Structure under Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Attribute Groups as part of Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Customer UDA as part of Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Transaction attributes as part of Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Item Catalog Category Hierarchies

• Synchronization of Valuesets

  • Synchronization of Valuesets as part of Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Valuesets Independently

  • Multi Language Support for Valuesets

• Synchronization of Items and BOMs

The following process flows are supported from Oracle Product Hub to Siebel CRM as part of the item and BOM Synchronization:

1. Synchronization of Products and Discounts and Associated Structures from Product Hub to Siebel CRM.

   1. Support for Transaction Attributes in Product Synchronization.

   2. Support for Class type structure/ relationship for Siebel CRM.

   3. Support for Controlling Auto-Release of Entities Published from Oracle Product Hub in the Same Batch for Siebel.

   4. Synchronizing pricing of products

2. Synchronization of Promotions from Product Hub to Siebel CRM.

For more information about Siebel CRM, see the Siebel CRM product documentation.

3.1.1 Synchronization of Metadata

Metadata enables customers to predefine various characteristics for the products that facilitates faster introduction of new product variants, reduces the time to market, and results in significant savings on initial and maintenance costs and support for product differentiation offering cross-sell and up-sell opportunities.

The metadata synchronization supports these features:

• Multilanguage support of Item Catalog Category and Transaction Attributes.

  • Since only ICC description is translatable and not the name, use description to capture language specific name in OPH.

  • Use Validation Type as translatable independent to capture language specific values in OPH.

  • Use short description up to 250 characters to capture language specific product names in OPH.

• Synchronization of Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Relationships and Structure Under Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Attribute Groups as Part of Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Customer UDA as Part of Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Transaction Attributes as Part of Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Item Catalog Category Hierarchies

  • Association of Item Catalog Category with Items

  • Publish of Item Catalog Category from OPH to Siebel CRM Implementation Flow

• Synchronization of Valuesets

  • Synchronization of Valuesets as part of Item Catalog Categories

  • Synchronization of Valuesets Independently

  • Batch publish of Valuesets is supported.

    The ICCs must be published one at a time. If there is a hierarchy of ICCs, then the product administrator can publish all the ICCs in the hierarchy by including it's parents and children.

  • Multilanguage Support for Valuesets

All these synchronization processes report the status to OPH publication history.

Note:

There is an exception for Design Studio integration. When product classes are published to Design Studio, an email notification is sent to the product-to-service mapping specialist and the status is set to 'success'. The integration does not return the status back to OPH as the product classes are imported using a Query Product Class service from Design Studio.

3.1.2 Synchronization of Item Catalog Categories

The publication framework of OPH provides a user interface to publish item catalog categories (ICC) to one or more participating applications. The participating applications have to be registered within the publication framework of Oracle Product Hub.

A new ICC is created in OPH as a draft version and it is released, creating a working or active version of the ICC. Similarly, during updates, the draft version is updated and released to create a new version of ICC in OPH. However, at any given point, only one active released version of the ICC exists.

During the ICC publish, the active released versions or the future-dated versions of the ICC are published one at a time to the downstream participating applications (that is, one ICC per publish process). The publishing of ICC is a manual process performed by the OPH product administrator.

The publish action invokes the integration process and provides basic information of ICC such as the ICC unique identifier. The integration process queries OPH and the OPH interfaces provide complete details of the ICC and all the following associated entities.

1. Item Catalog Categories (ICC)

2. Attribute Groups

3. Seeded Attributes and Custom added Attributes

4. Transaction Attributes

5. Valuesets

6. Structure/Relationship associated with ICC

The integration supports both create and update operations for ICC.

• For the create operation, the integration creates a workspace version of the product class in Siebel CRM.

• For the update operation, the existing product class is updated. The updates include changes to the product-class core fields-adding, deleting, and updating structure and relationship, and adding, deleting, and updating transaction attributes and valuesets.

Once the product class has been successfully created in Siebel, the status is sent back to OPH. OPH maintains a publication history for all the versions of ICC for each downstream application.

In cases in which a version ICC is republished without any changes from OPH to Siebel CRM, the updates on the product class do not create a new version in Siebel CRM.

The versions of ICC in OPH are associated with the effective start and end dates. Only the active released version or future-dated versions can be published from OPH publication framework.

The following versions cannot be published from OPH:

• Draft version - versions that are not yet released.

A provision exists to revert to the earlier version of the ICC. For this, a new version with effective dates must be created in OPH. No impact occurs to the integration with the creation of this new version because the integration process handles this as new versions.

Auto-Release of Entities

The auto-release provision is provided by OPH. The auto-release is activated by default. The product administrator in OPH can update it based on the modeling. Siebel releases the entity if the value is set or it must create the workspace version of the entity. The auto-release is supported for synchronize operations.

For more information about auto-release, see Section 3.1.19, "Support for Controlling Auto-Release of Entities Published from Oracle Product Hub in the Same Batch for Siebel".

3.1.3 Synchronization of Relationships and Structure Under Item Catalog Categories

An ICC can be defined with relationship and structure that contains items and BOMs.

• The ICC can be defined with items or BOMs as the relationships. When the integration queries OPH for the ICC, the structures that are defined as relationships with the ICC are also returned. The ICC has references only to the latest version of the structure because the structure has already been successfully published to the downstream application. The integration creates relationships for the product classes in Siebel.

• The items or BOMs are synchronized to the target applications before the ICC is synchronized; otherwise, the integration process fails.

• The query also returns the component UDA associated with the relationship. This component-UDA stores context-specific values for the relationship within the ICC, for example, min, max, default value, and so on. The integration uses the references to create relationships within Siebel, add corresponding products, and set the context-specific values specified by the component UDA within the context of the product class in Siebel.

• All types of BOMs can be added as the relationship for the item catalog categories.

This is an example of how various relationships under ICC are handled by the process integration. This is similar to the relationship handling of items in Option Class Support in Item Synchronization for Siebel CRM.

The structure definition in OPH for item catalog categories supports two types of parent-child relationships:

• Relationship of domain type as product: The product relationship represents another item that is related to the root item.

• Relationship of domain type as class: The class relationship provides a list of items that can be treated as options. In OPH, these items are defined as BOM with BOM item type as option class, and the options are added as components of the BOM.

Note:

Domain type is a UDA associated with the item that identifies the type of relationship.

For more information about telecommunications seeded library attributes and their corresponding valuesets, see "Appendix F: Seeded Item Metadata Libraries, Communications Product Details Library - Vertical" in the Oracle Product Hub Implementation Guide.

Table 3-1 is an example of how product and class type relationships are supported in OPH and how the process integration creates them in Siebel:

Wireless Service ICC

Wireless Router (Item)

Bluetooth devices (Item with an option class type BOM and entity type of option group)

Samba Bluetooth Headset

B-Micro Bluetooth Headset

Table 3-1 Product and class types

Wireless Router Class	Wireless Router
Wireless Device Accessory	Bluetooth devices
Wireless Device Accessory	Samba Bluetooth Headset
Wireless Device Accessory	B-Micro Bluetooth Headset

Table 3-2 depicts the OPH definition of the relationship in the seeded attribute group Version Structure associated with the Wireless Service ICC. These attributes are component attributes values the values of which are set in context of the Wireless Service ICC.

Table 3-2 Attributes

Relationship Name	Domain Type	Product	Class	Default Cardinality
Relationship1	Product	Wireless Router	1	NA
Relationship2	Class	Bluetooth devices	Wireless device accessory	1

For product relationships, the process integration creates a relationship of type product in Siebel for the Wireless Service ICC. This relationship has an empty relationship domain in Siebel.

For class relationships, the process integration creates a relationship of type class and adds all the components of the Bluetooth devices as the relationship domain. The product (Bluetooth devices) is not included as a part of the relationship in Siebel.

This is an example of the support for relationship for product class in Siebel:

Wireless Service ICC

Relationship1 Wireless Router

Relationship2 Wireless device accessory

Samba Bluetooth Headset

B-Micro Bluetooth Headset

Table 3-3 shows the structure attributes of the Wireless Service ICC in Siebel:

Table 3-3 Structure attributes

Relationship Name	Domain Type	Product	Class	Default Cardinality
Relationship1	Product	Wireless Router	NA	1
Relationship 2	Class	NA	Wireless device accessory	1

Table 3-4 Relationship domain

Relationship Domain	Quantity
Samba Bluetooth Headset	X
B-Micro Bluetooth Headset	X

To update the relationship domain, more product components can be added to the product Bluetooth devices, and all the item catalog categories that have class relationship with Bluetooth devices must be synchronized to Siebel for the relationship domain to be updated. Updating the Bluetooth devices and the synchronization is a prerequisite.

Any change in the relationship creates a new version of Wireless Service ICC in OPH. The process integration updates the corresponding Wireless Service ICC and the relationship in Siebel CRM.

3.1.4 Synchronization of Attribute Groups as Part of Item Catalog Categories

Every ICC is associated with zero or more attribute groups. Attribute groups are not defined within a context of the ICC and are reused across ICCs. Attribute groups are used to categorize user-defined attributes and operational attributes. The child ICC inherits the attribute groups of the parent ICC. The attribute groups are published when the associated ICCs are published. In the current release, OPH does not maintain the publication status of the attribute group in the publication history.

Whenever the integration queries OPH for the ICC, the attribute groups associated with the ICC are also returned. The attribute groups are represented at the canonical layer (specification group) as a part of classification scheme EBM. The attribute groups have reference attributes (specification).

None of the entities corresponds to attribute groups in Siebel; therefore, they are ignored at the Siebel connector service in the integration.

Note:

OPH provides a seeded telecommunications library that consists of a set of predefined attribute groups consisting of attributes that have predefined mapping to the fields of the item in the downstream application (Siebel). Updates to these seeded attribute groups and the associated attributes are not supported by the OPH. In addition, the integration does not support addition or deletion of attributes within seeded attribute groups; however, you can define new attribute groups and attributes.

New attribute groups with attributes can be defined. The integration differentiates between the customer-defined UDA and the seeded UDA and creates these as flex field attributes in Siebel. Whenever customer-defined UDA is updated or new attributes are added, all the ICCs that are associated with the attribute groups have to be republished to the downstream applications.

Attribute groups can be of type multi-row. A multi-row attribute group is used to define characteristics that are record-based such as rules, pricelist lines, and so on. See the telecommunications seeded library attributes for definitions of multi-row seeded attribute groups.

When multi-row attribute groups are published, OPH provides the complete definition of these attribute groups with the records. The integration supports these multi-row attribute groups in the canonical model, but ignores them at the Siebel connector. (The values for the multi-row attribute groups are defined during item definition and are set in the downstream applications during the item synchronization process.)

3.1.5 Synchronization of Customer UDA as Part of Item Catalog Categories

The UDAs are defined within the context of the attribute group. These are not versioned entities. The UDAs are associated with valuesets. Context-specific values are set for every UDA within the attribute group. The child ICC inherits these UDAs from the parent ICC.

The static UDA, component UDA, and operational attributes are published with the attribute groups when the corresponding ICC is published.

Whenever integration queries OPH for ICC, the UDAs that are associated with the ICC through attribute groups are returned along with the ICC definition and other entities. The attributes that exist across the attribute groups are extracted and grouped under canonical models of the attribute.

Siebel does not have attributes as separate entity. The static UDA and operational attributes that are defined within attribute groups are ignored in the Siebel connector. These attributes have fixed mapping with the product fields in Siebel and Oracle E-Business Suite respectively. The values for these fields are set during item synchronization.

Note:

UDAs are defined within the context of the attribute group. Any updates to the UDA results in the update of the attribute group. The ICC has to be republished for the updates on the UDA.

All customer-defined UDAs are stored in the flexfield support provided by CRM; therefore, the customers must ensure that they define unique attributes across custom attribute groups. The recommended approach is to prefix the corresponding attribute group name with XX for every customer-defined attribute. All the customer-defined attribute groups that are defined without a prefix are not mapped to any target application, but are available in the AIA layer. Customers have to extend the connector services to map these attributes to the target applications.

The OPH does not track the publication status for attributes in the publication history for UDA.

3.1.6 Synchronization of Transaction Attributes as Part of Item Catalog Categories

Note the following:

• The transaction attributes are defined within the context of the ICC in OPH. These are not versioned entities. The transaction attributes are associated with versioned valuesets in OPH. Context-specific values are set for every transaction attribute within the ICC. The child ICC inherits the transaction attributes and the valueset from the parent ICC.

• Whenever the integration queries the OPH for ICC, the transaction attributes that are associated with the ICC are also returned. The integration process extracts all the transaction attributes and includes them in the specification section of the classification composition EBM. The process integration creates these as attributes of the product class in Siebel and sets the corresponding context-specific values.

• Any changes in the transaction attributes associated with the ICC (add, delete, or update the context specific values) updates the ICC and a new version is released in OPH. When an updated ICC is published, the integration updates the corresponding product class with the transaction attributes in Siebel CRM.

• The static attributes and the transaction attributes both are grouped within the canonical model. The static attributes in the specification is ignored by the Siebel connector and the transaction attributes are created as product class attributes.

• Duplicate transaction attributes cannot be defined within an ICC. If a similar transaction attribute is defined in a parent ICC and the one of its child ICC in the hierarchy, the definition in the child hierarchy overrides the definition of the inherited transaction attribute.

• If the inherited transaction attribute is updated in the child ICC, the transaction attribute does not remain an inherited attribute. It becomes a native attribute of the child ICC.

3.1.7 Transaction Attributes without Valuesets

Transaction attributes are associated with valuesets and the values for the transaction attributes are selected from the list during order capture. For some transaction attributes, the values can be freeform text. For such transaction attributes, a valueset may not be associated in certain applications. For example, Oracle Product Hub.

In Oracle Product Hub, a transaction attribute is created in context of an item catalog category. The transaction attributes may or may not be associated with versionable valuesets. The following are the data types supported for the transaction attributes:

• Char

• Number

• Datetime

• Standard Datetime

• Translatable Text

• BOOL (OPH does not support the Boolean type. If the transaction attribute name has a BOOL suffix, it is treated as a Boolean data type.

• INT (OPH does not support the Integer data type. If the transaction attribute name has an INT suffix, it is treated as an Integer data type)

For the transaction attributes of the first four data types associating the valueset is not mandatory but a valueset can be associated in OPH. However, for a transaction attribute of data type 'Translatable Text' a valueset cannot be associated. This is restricted with the validations in OPH.

During the Item Catalog Synchronization from OPH to Siebel, if a transaction attribute has no valueset associated with it, then the process synchronization creates an attribute definition of Domain Type freeform by using the transaction attribute name and the datatype provided by OPH.

Subsequent updates to Item Catalog categories, for instance, the addition or deletion of transaction attributes or items in the structure will not affect the transaction attributes in Siebel.

3.1.8 Synchronization of Item Catalog Category Hierarchies

Note the following:

• The publication framework for ICC provides flags that provide these publishing options for the product administrator in OPH:

  • Publish only the selected ICC.

  • Publish selected ICC and all its parents.

  • Publish selected ICC and all its children.

  • Publish selected ICC and all its parents and children.

• In cases in which a single ICC is selected for publishing, if that ICC has a parent ICC that is not published, the parent ICC must be published to the downstream applications. If not, the process integration fails. You must publish the parent ICC and republish the child ICC. In this case, the child ICC references the parent ICC. The integration process associates the child ICC and its parent in Siebel. Alternately, whenever a parent ICC is updated, the product administrator must publish the complete hierarchy associated with the ICC.

• In cases in which the flag to publish the entire hierarchy (parents or children; or parents and children) is set, the integration process queries OPH for all the ICCs in the hierarchy. OPH returns the complete definition of all the ICCs in the hierarchy. The standard methodology to publish the entire hierarchy (parents and children) is recommended. The integration process creates the complete hierarchy of all the product classes in Siebel.

• Whenever an ICC is updated in OPH and published to downstream applications, the integration updates the existing product classes. In addition, the corresponding hierarchy is updated in Siebel using the references to children or parent classes. The product classes are released to reflect the hierarchy in the active version.

• The structure, transaction attributes, and the attribute groups of the parent ICC are passed to the child ICC. The inherited structure in the child ICC can be updated, for example, cardinality. Whenever an inherited structure is updated in the context of the child, the inheritance breaks and the structure becomes a native relationship of the child ICC. The behavior is the same for transaction attributes. The process integration updates the corresponding entities in the downstream applications.

3.1.9 Association of Item Catalog Category with Items

An item catalog category can be associated with the items. The items inherit the static attributes, transaction attributes, and structure associated with the item catalog category. An item can be associated with only one item catalog category.

• When items are published in the publication framework, a reference to the item catalog category is published with the item.

• The process integration creates the association of item and the ICC during the item synchronization process.

3.1.10 Publishing of Item Catalog Category from OPH to Siebel CRM Implementation Flow

Figure 3-1 shows the high-level integration flows for the item catalog category (ICC) synchronization:

Figure 3-1 Synchronization of ICC/Product Class created in OPH

These are the synchronization steps:

1. The product administrator in OPH publishes the ICC from the publication-framework user interface. The process publishes an event and provides basic information about ICC. The event consumer process invokes the requester ABCS for OPH.

2. The requester ABCS queries the target applications from OPH by calling the get target systems service.

3. Once the target systems are retrieved, the requester queries the ICC definition from OPH by calling the OPH Query ICC interface. The OPH Query ICC interface returns the complete information of the ICC together with the complete definitions of the associated entities (attribute groups, attributes, and valuesets). Valuesets are independent entities and can be associated with different attributes within the same or different attribute group in an ICC.

4. The OPH requester connector service transforms the response from the OPH query ICC interface into the SpecificationValuesetListEBM and ClassificationSchemeListEBM. The ClassificationSchemeListEBM has complete definitions of ICCs, attribute groups, attributes, and their associated valuesets. The connector service invokes an enterprise business service and provides the SpecificationValuesetListEBM as the input.

5. The specification valueset enterprise business service routes to the appropriate synchronize attribute definition Siebel provider ABCS.

6. The attribute definition class Siebel provider ABCS invokes the API provided by Siebel to create the corresponding attribute definitions in Siebel.

7. The Siebel synchronize attribute definition returns to the caller with indication of success or failure.

8. Once the response is returned by the synchronize attribute definition API, the Siebel connector service invokes a response EBS.

9. The specification valueset response EBS returns the response to the requestor ABCS. The OPH requester ABCS transforms the valueset response EBM and invokes the OPH service to update the status. The OPH service updates the publication history for the valueset.

10. The OPH requester ABCS invokes the ClassificationSchemeEBS and provides ClassificationSchemeListEBM as input.

11. The ClassificationSchemeEBS routes to the appropriate synchronize product class Siebel provider ABCS. It invokes the API provided by Siebel to create product classes and their attributes. The product class also has structure or relationships associated. The relationships are created based on the relationship type. Siebel API also synchronizes the product class names in multiple languages.

12. The synchronize product class API returns the status to the connector service.

13. The Siebel connector service invokes a response EBS.

14. The ClassificationSchemeResponseEBS sends the status back to the requester ABCS.

15. The OPH requester ABCS transforms the classification scheme response EBM and invokes the OPH service to update the status. The OPH service updates the publication history for the ICC.

This diagram illustrates the services and their interaction.

Figure 3-2 Synchronization of ICC in OPH

Table 3-5 Sequence steps

Steps	Name	Step Description
1	OPH ICC publish event is raised from the OPH System	OPH ICC publish events are raised when the product administrator publishes the ICC from the OPH system.
2	SyncItemCatalogCategoryPIMEventConsumer	SyncItemCatalogCategoryPIMEventConsumer listens to the business event and receives the WF_EVENT_T_msg event payload. SyncItemCatalogCategoryPIMEventConsumer routes to SyncItemCatalogCategoryPIMReqABCSImpl with complete event payload.
3	SyncItemCatalogCategoryPIMReqABCSImpl	The OPH Requestor, SyncItemCatalogCategoryPIMReqABCSImpl, receives the event payload and calls the OPH publication service to get the list of target applications by passing the batch ID. It then constructs the query ICC OPH ABM, calls the OPH query ICC web service, and gets the complete ICC details. It transforms the Query ICC response message to SyncSpecificationValueSetListEBM (only if valuesets are associated with T-Attr in OPH and the SyncValueSet flag is set to True in AIAConfigurationProperties.xml) and SyncClassificationSchemeListEBM. If valuesets are associated with T-Attr and the valueset synchronize property is set to True in the AIAConfigurationProperties.xml, SyncItemCatalogCategoryPIMReqABCSImpl invokes SpecificationValueSetEBS, passing SyncSpecificationValueSetListEBM to synchronize valuesets in Siebel and other participating applications. Once the valueset synchronization is done successfully, it calls the classification scheme EBS passing SyncClassificationSchemeListEBM to synchronize the ICC. It gets the ICC synchronization response, constructs the OPH publication service ABM, and calls the OPH publication web service.
3.1	OPH Publication Service (PublicationService_GetBatchSystems)	This service takes the batch ID and gives the list of the target systems to which the synchronization should be done.
4	OPH Query ICC web service	OPH Query ICC web service receives the batch ID, publishes parent hierarchy and child hierarchy flags, and returns the ICC details associated with that batch.
5	SpecificationValueSetEBS	SpecificationValueSetEBS receives SyncSpecificationValueSetListEBM as an input and routes it to the SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl service to synchronize valuesets.
6	SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl	SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl receives SyncSpecificationValueSetListEBM. It transforms the EBM into the SyncAttributeDefinition ABM and calls the Siebel valueset-synchronization Web service. Once synchronization is done, it gets the response from the Siebel system, transforms SyncSpecificationValueSetEBM to SyncSpecificationValueSetResponseEBM, and invokes SpecificationValueSetResponseEBS.
7	Synchronize Attribute Definition Siebel Web service	Synchronize attribute definition Siebel Web service synchronizes the attribute definition in Siebel.
8	SpecificationValueSetResponseEBS	SpecificationValueSetResponseEBS receives SyncSpecificationValueSetListRespEBM as input and routes it to the SyncItemCatalogCategoryPIMReqABCSImpl service.
9	ClassificationSchemeEBS	Once the valueset synchronization is done successfully in Siebel, SyncItemCatalogCategoryPIMReqABCSImpl calls the ClassificationSchemeEBS passing SyncClassificationSchemeListEBM as its input and routes it to the SyncClassificationSchemeListSiebelProvABCSImpl service.
10	SyncClassificationSchemeListSiebelProvABCSImpl	SyncClassificationListSiebelProvABCSImpl receives SyncClassificationSchemeListEBM. It transforms the EBM into a SWIClassImportUpsert_Input message and calls the Siebel product-class synchronization web service to synchronize simple product class along with attributes or structures if associated. It then populates the cross-reference with the corresponding Siebel IDs. Once this is done, it checks for any associated hierarchy. If it exists, it makes another call to the same Siebel Web service passing hierarchy information. Once synchronization is done, based on the workspace auto-release flag (Y), it calls the Siebel product-class synchronization service again and passes the workspace auto-release flag. It then constructs the SyncClassificationSchemeListResponseEBM and passes it to ClassificationSchemeResponseEBS.
11.1	Synchronize Product Class Siebel Web service	Synchronize product class Siebel Web service synchronizes the product class in Siebel and returns the response message.
11.2	Siebel workspace release Web service	Once the product class synchronization is done in Siebel, SyncClassificationSchemeListSiebelProvABCSImpl calls the Siebel product-class synchronization Web service again, passing workspace name, workspace refuse flag, and workspace auto-release flag to release the workspace.
12	ClassificationSchemeResponseEBS	ClassificationSchemeResponseEBS gets the SyncClassificationSchemeListResponse message and routes it to SyncItemCatalogCategoryPIMReqABCSImpl.
13	OPH Publication Service	Once the OPH requestor gets the ICC synchronization response message, it calls the OPH ICC publish status Web service to update the publication status in OPH. These are the possible status values: Failed Succeeded Partial Fail (in case valueset fails)

3.1.11 Synchronization of Valuesets

The valuesets can be published independently or during the ICC publish from the OPH publication framework. The valuesets can be associated with the static UDA, customer UDA, and transaction attributes. For all the seeded valuesets of the telecommunications library, the integration provides DVMs. For all the valuesets that are associated with the transaction attributes, the integration with Siebel creates the attribute definitions.

Valuesets associated with the customer-defined UDAs are handled as freeform values with the corresponding language codes. The MLS support for the valuesets depend on the validation type associated with the valueset. Section 3.1.15, "Multi Language Support for Valueset Synchronization"

3.1.12 Synchronization of Valuesets as Part of Item Catalog Categories

Note the following:

• Whenever the integration queries OPH for the ICC that is published, the valuesets that are associated with the attributes of the ICC are returned.

  Note:

  This includes the nonversionable valuesets that are associated with the UDA within the attribute groups and the versionable valuesets associated with the transaction attributes. In addition, if the same valueset is associated with more than one attribute, OPH returns a unique set (union) of valuesets associated with the ICC.

• The integration supports only the synchronize operation.

• In cases in which a versioned valueset is republished to Siebel CRM, the updates on the attribute definition do not create a new version in Siebel CRM. Once the attribute definitions are created, they are associated with the corresponding attributes of the product classes in Siebel.

• Even though the canonical model consists of valuesets associated with the UDA and the transaction attributes, the Siebel connector ignores all the valuesets that were associated with the UDA and creates attribute definitions for all the valuesets that were associated with the transaction attributes. The integration provides DVMs for all the valuesets that are associated with the seeded attributes of the telecommunications library.

• Whenever an ICC is published, the publication framework extracts the version of all the valuesets that were associated when the ICC was released, implying that the version of the valueset that was associated with the ICC when the ICC was created might differ from the active released version of the valueset; therefore, publishing always picks up the version of the valueset that was associated when the ICC was released. The version in the downstream application is driven by the versions that are published. No one-one mapping exists between the versions of entities in OPH and the downstream applications. OPH provides validation to ensure that only the released version of the valueset can be associated with the attribute.

3.1.13 Synchronization of Valuesets Independently

Note the following:

• The publication framework provides a separate user interface to search and to publish the valuesets. Multiple versions of the valueset exist in OPH, but at any point, only one active released version of a valueset exists. Only the active released version and the future-dated versions of the valuesets can be published. OPH enables you to publish one or more valuesets per publish process to the downstream participating applications. The publishing of valuesets is a manual process performed by the OPH product administrator.

• The publish action invokes the integration process and provides basic information about valuesets. The integration queries OPH for the complete details of all the valuesets.

• In cases in which a version valueset is republished to Siebel CRM, the updates on the attribute definition do not create a new version in Siebel CRM.

• The versions of valuesets in OPH are associated with the effective start and end dates. Only the active released versions or future-dated versions are published.

• Draft versions-versions that are not yet released-cannot be published from OPH.

• Once the attribute definitions are successfully created in Siebel for versionable valuesets of OPH, a status is propagated back to OPH. OPH maintains the publication history for all the versions of valuesets for each downstream application.

• OPH supports these data types:

  • Char

  • Number

  • Standard Date

  • Standard Date time

  • BOOL (OPH does not support the Boolean type. If the valueset name has a BOOL suffix, it is treated as a Boolean type)

  • INT (OPH does not support the Integer type. If the valueset name has an INT suffix, it is treated as an Integer type)

• Siebel supports all of these data types as well as Boolean and Integer data types except Datetime.

Figure 3-3 illustrates the valueset publish from OPH to Siebel CRM.

Figure 3-3 Valueset publish from OPH to Siebel CRM

These are the steps depicted in the diagram.

1. The product administrator in OPH publishes one or more valuesets from the publication-framework user interface. The process publishes an event and provides basic information about the valuesets. The event consumer process invokes the requester ABCS for OPH

2. The requester ABCS queries the OPH valueset service.

3. The OPH valueset service returns a single payload with all the valuesets to the OPH requester ABCS.

4. The OPH requester ABCS extracts all the valuesets and transforms them into a single SpecificationValuesetListEBM. It invokes an enterprise business service with the synchronization operation and provides the SpecificationValuesetListEBM as input.

5. The enterprise business service routes to the appropriate provider ABCS.

6. The Siebel provider ABCS transforms the incoming SpecificationListEBM into attribute definitions. The Siebel provider ABCS invokes the Siebel interfaces.

7. The Siebel interface creates the corresponding attribute definitions. It checks the workspace auto-release flag: If it is Y, it calls Siebel Web service to release workspace. If it is N, the workspace is not released. In case of D (default behavior), it reads release workspace from AIAConfigurationProperties.xml. The interface returns to the caller.

8. The Siebel provider ABCS sends the status through a response EBS.

9. The response enterprise business service routes to the appropriate update valueset publish status OPH provider ABCS.

10. The update valueset publish status OPH provider ABCS invokes the OPH update status Web service and provides the valuesets and the corresponding statuses. The OPH update status service updates the publication history to reflect the status of publish.

Figure 3-4 illustrates the services and their interactions:

Figure 3-4 Valueset publish from OPH to Siebel CRM

Table 3-6 shows the sequence steps:

Table 3-6 Sequence steps

Name	Description
OPH valueset event is raised from the OPH system	OPH valueset events are raised when the product administrator publishes the valuesets from the OPH system. Valuesets can be published in batches.
SyncValueSetPIMEventConsumer	SyncValueSetPIMEventConsumer listens to the business event and receives the WF_EVENT_T_msg event payload for the valueset event. SyncValueSetPIMEventConsumer routes to SyncSpecificationValueSetListPIMReqABCSImpl with complete event payload.
SyncSpecificationValueSetListPIMReqABCSImpl	The OPH requester ABC implementation service, SyncSpecificationValueSetListPIMReqABCSImpl, takes the batch ID from the WF_EVENT_T ABM payload, queries the get target systems service, and calls the Query valueset OPH service to get the response. SyncSpecificationValueSetListPIMReqABCSImpl service also calls the query target application's OPH service and gets the response back. It counts the target applications from response, and based on the count it constructs the EBM for applications. SyncSpecificationValueSetListPIMReqABCSImpl service transforms the Query valueset OPH service response ABM into QuerySpecificationValueSetList EBM and calls the SpecificationValueSetEBS Service.
SpecificationValueSetEBS	SpecificationValueSetEBS Service gets SyncSpecificationValueSetList EBM as its input and routes it to the SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl service.
SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl	SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl receives the SyncSpecificationValueSetList EBM message as input. SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl transforms the SyncSpecificationValueSetList EBM message into a Siebel request ABM message and calls the synchronize attribute definition Siebel Web service. This service also filters the MLS mapping. A filter condition uses DVM to get the details on how many languages a provider system is supporting and another DVM is used for language code translation across applications. Only supported languages are synchronized to the provider system, for example, Siebel. Synchronize attribute definition Siebel Web service returns the response to SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl service, which has the status details.
SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl	SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl receives the response from synchronize attribute definition Siebel Web service and transforms the Siebel response ABM message into SyncSpecificationValueSetListResponseEBM and calls the SpecificationValueSetResponseEBS service. The valueset synchronization is based on all or none basis. If OPH is sending a batch of 10 valuesets out of which five fail, this status is sent back to OPH that batch failed and the error that comes from the provider service is logged in error-handling framework.
SpecificationValueSetResponseEBS	SpecificationValueSetResponseEBS routes the SyncSpecificationValueSetListResponseEBM to SyncSpecificationValueSetListPIMReqABCSImpl
SyncSpecificationValueSetListPIMReqABCSImpl	SyncSpecificationValueSetListPIMReqABCSImpl service transforms the SyncSpecificationValueSetListResponseEBM message into a OPH valueset status-update Web-service input message and calls the OPH value set status-update Web service.
OPH value set status update Web service	This Web service takes the input message from the SyncSpecificationValueSetListPIMReqABCSImpl service and updates the status in OPH as: Success Failed

3.1.14 Batch and Initial Load

The integration does not support initial load or batch load capability for item catalog categories. The recommended process is to publish the ICCs one at time because this is performed design time.

3.1.15 Multi Language Support for Valueset Synchronization

See Section 2.3.2, "Support for Multi-Language for Item Synchronization"

3.1.16 Synchronization of Products, Discounts, and Associated Structures from Oracle Product Hub to Siebel CRM

Products and discounts are created as items in Oracle Product Hub and are synchronized to one or more Siebel CRM instances. The items and BOMs together with the seeded telecommunications library attributes are used to model various entities like products, discounts, bundles, promotions in Oracle Product Hub.

For more information on modeling the entities in Oracle Product Hub, see the whitepaper "Guidelines and Methodology to Define and Manage entities in Oracle Product Hub for Oracle Product MDM Integration 2.5" Note ID - 1086492.1 on My Oracle Support.

For more information about the functional and technical details of this process flow, see Chapter 2, "Synchronization of Items and BOMs".

3.1.17 Multi-Event Product Synchronization from OPH to Siebel

Products that have multiple charges and events are created as customizable products in Siebel. Events are created as separate products and are added as child products of the main product. The component products represent the charges and events and have the billing type of event that is set in Siebel. The item synchronization process from horizontal implementation supports both create and update of products in Siebel.

To support create and update of pricelist, the process integration to Siebel reuses the communications pricelist Siebel-provider-connector services. The OPH requestor item ABCS must create the corresponding item and pricelist line cross-references.

3.1.18 Support for Class Type Relationship in Product Synchronization for Siebel CRM

The item definition in OPH (for product) supports two types of parent-child relationships:

• Relationship of domain type as product: The product relationship represents another item that is related to the root item.

• Relationship of domain type as class: The class relationship provides a list of items that can be treated as options. In OPH, these items are defined as a BOM with BOM item type as option class. The options are added as components of the BOM. During the promotion definitions, the item that has a class relationship is reused across promotions and one or more items in the options are included or excluded based on the promotion modeling.

Note:

Domain type is a UDA associated with the item that identifies the type of relationship.

For more information about Telco seeded library attributes and their corresponding valuesets, see "Seeded Item Metadata Libraries," Oracle Product Hub Implementation Guide.

Table 3-7 provides an example of how product and class type relationships are supported in OPH and how the process integration creates them in Siebel.

Root item (item with a model type of BOM)

Wireless router (item)

Bluetooth devices (item with an option class type of BOM and entity type of option group)

Samba Bluetooth Headset

B-Micro Bluetooth Headset

Table 3-7 Example of how product and class type relationships are supported in OPH

Item Catalog Category	Item	Item Components
Wireless Router Class	Wireless Router	NA
Wireless Device Accessory	Bluetooth devices	NA
Wireless Device Accessory	NA	Samba Bluetooth Headset
Wireless Device Accessory	NA	B-Micro Bluetooth Headset

Table 3-8 depicts the OPH definition of the relationship in the seeded attribute group: version structure associated with the root item. These attributes are component attributes for which values are set in context of the root item.

The type is expected to be set to Option Group. If the type is not set to Option Group, the class relationship is not set in Siebel; instead, it is associated as a product.

Table 3-8 OPH definitions

Relationship Name	Domain Type	Product	Class	Default Cardinality
Relationship1	Product	Wireless Router	NA	1
Relationship2	Class	Bluetooth devices	Wireless device accessory	1

For product relationship, the process integration creates a relationship of type product in Siebel for the root item. This relationship has an empty relationship domain in Siebel.

For class relationship, the process integration creates a relationship of type class and adds all the components of the Bluetooth devices as the relationship domain. The product (Bluetooth devices) is not included as a part of the relationship in Siebel.

Table 3-9 provides an example of the support for relationship for products in Siebel.

Root Item

Relationship1 = Wireless Router

Relationship2 = Wireless Device Accessory

Samba Bluetooth Headset

B-Micro Bluetooth Headset

The structure attributes of the root item in Siebel are:

Table 3-9 Attributes for root items in Siebel

Relationship Name	Domain Type	Product	Class	Default Cardinality
Relationship1	Product	Wireless Router	NA	1
Relationship 2	Class	NA	Wireless device accessory	1

Table 3-10 Relationship domain

Relationship Domain	Quantity
Samba Bluetooth Headset	X
B-Micro Bluetooth Headset	X

To update the relationship domain, you can add more product components to the product Bluetooth devices and all the items that have a class relationship with Bluetooth devices must be synchronized to Siebel for the relationship domain to be updated. Updating the Bluetooth devices and synchronizing them is a prerequisite.

Siebel has a relationship type attribute called domain type, and a DVM is created to map the domain type.

Any change in the relationship creates a new version of root item in OPH. The process integration updates the corresponding root item and the relationship in Siebel CRM.

Note:

A BOM item with the same item catalog category or a simple item cannot be added as a component of any root item more than once for any parent-child relationship in OPH.

3.1.19 Support for Controlling Auto-Release of Entities Published from Oracle Product Hub in the Same Batch for Siebel

The Product MDM integration enables the product administrator to control the automatic release of all the entities within the project workspace in Siebel at a more granular level than the Siebel system parameter. This enables different behaviors with regard to entity auto-release based on the publishing style and the needs of the various product administrators.

OPH passes a flag to allow a more granular control at the batch level for the release of all the entities within the project workspace. This flag specifies whether the entities within the project workspace should be auto-released, should not be auto-released, or should use the default behavior set in Siebel with regard to auto-release.

• While OPH sets the flag at the batch level, Siebel cannot use it at the batch level because within a batch, multiple Siebel services are called for product and discounts, pricelist items, promotions, and structures. If the flag is set at service invocation level, inconsistencies may exist, for example, the service for product and discounts may succeed and all the product and discounts released in Siebel, but the service for the associated structures may fail and the overall batch publishing would fail; however, the entities for product and discounts are released in Siebel. Hence, the workspace cannot be released until all the entities in the batch that need to be synchronized are successfully synchronized.

• OPH also passes a workspace name. The Siebel ABCS uses the workspace name received from OPH as the product workspace name. The workspace name allows creating all the entities from the same batch within the same workspace.

• OPH passes the batch auto-release flag and workspace name with each payload (item payload and BOM payload) at the header level. Values of these parameters are consistent in different payloads associated with the same batch ID.

• The batch auto-release flag is set to one of these values:

  • Y - indicates that the batch is released automatically

  • N - indicates that the batch is released manually

  • D - indicates that the release of the batch should be controlled by the Siebel system parameter. This is the default.

  OPH always publishes the batch auto-release flag with a value of D.

• Siebel services for the creation of product and discounts, promotions, pricelist items, and structure take these at the header level:

  • Workspace name

  • Workspace reuse flag

  • Auto-release flag

  If a workspace does not exist, Siebel creates a new workspace; however, if it exists, the workspace reuse flag is set to Y and the workspace is reused. Otherwise, if the workspace exists and the workspace reuse flag is set to N, a new workspace is created the name of which is a concatenation of the value in the workspace name and a time stamp.

• When the first Siebel service within a batch is invoked, which typically is the service for the creation of products and discounts:

  • The value passed from OPH in the workspace name is used for the Siebel workspace name.

  • The value passed in the batch auto-release flag is used for the Siebel auto-release flag (upon DVM conversion), and the Siebel workspace reuse flag is set to N.

• When subsequent Siebel services are invoked for the same batch:

  • The value passed in the batch name is used for the Siebel workspace name.

  • The value passed in the batch auto-release flag is used for the Siebel auto-release flag (upon DVM conversion), and the Siebel workspace reuse flag is set to Y.

• Finally, when all the Siebel services pertinent to the same batch have been invoked and if the batch has succeeded, one more service for the creation of product and discounts is invoked with an empty sequence of products and discounts. It has these values for the header attributes:

  • The workspace name is the value passed in the batch name.

  • The Workspace reuse flag is Y.

  • The Auto-release flag is Y.

• Within Siebel, an unpublished workspace is not discarded, because administrators may want to access them for investigation. Periodic cleansing of unpublished workspaces is an administrator activity in Siebel.

Note:

The auto-release flag is always passed as Default from OPH.

3.1.20 Synchronization of Promotions from Product Hub to Siebel CRM

Promotions are defined as items in OPH with entity type as promotion. The process integration creates product promotions for every such item in Siebel.

Promotions have model BOM as the structure. The model BOM can have one or more items that have model BOMs as structure or can have items that represent promotion level discounts. The process integration adds the corresponding customizable products as components of the promotions in Siebel.

• Promotions cannot have an option class BOM associated with the root item. The immediate components of the promotion can have a BOM of type option class. The items or components that are associated with BOMs of type option class are reused to create different promotions.

• Promotions support n-level nesting of BOMs. The typical value for n is between 1 (one) and 6 (six).

• In addition to the seeded UDA that is set for the item, these seeded user-defined attributes (UDAs) that are specific to items of entity type promotions are set during the promotion definition in OPH. See Sellable Product Information Library under Telco Seeded Library Attributes for more information.

  • Promotion: More Information

  • Charge Plan: Non Recurring Charge Details

  • Charge Plan: Recurring Charge Details

  • Charge Plan: Charges, Adjustment, Usage Plan Details

  • Commitment: Charges Credits

  • Product Promotions: Upgrade

• The process integration to Siebel sets the corresponding fields of the promotion in Siebel.

• Whenever a BOM is created for the promotion (root item) and the components are added, these seeded component UDAs are set during the promotion definition in OPH. See Component UDA for Item Synchronization under Telco Seeded Library Attributes.

  • Product Promotions: Components (Component UDA)

  • Product Promotions: Component Pricing (Component UDA)

  • Product Promotions: Pricing: Components: Adjustments (Component UDA)

• Once the promotions and all the associated BOMs and their components are successfully synchronized to Siebel, the status is updated in OPH publication history. Even if one of the components or child components of the BOM within the promotion fails, or is partially successful, the status on the promotion item is failed.

• Adding, deleting, or updating the components that are directly associated with the promotions, or updating the fields of promotions such as promotion name, description, and so on, or updating the promotion-related information such as seeded and component UDA creates a new revision of the promotion in OPH. The new revision must be published to the downstream applications from the publication framework in OPH. For the deletion of components, the expectation is that the AIA configuration property synchronization flag be set to Y.

Populating Commitments on Sub-components: Level 3 Products

Whenever there are level 3 products in a product, structure and data for commitments need to be populated. Access the Product Promotion components structure UDA and populate the commitments such as Grace Period, Grace period, UOM, ApplyComponentCharge, Commitment, Prorated Plan and so on in the override column instead of the New Column.

For example, M113 Options is an Option Class or a Class Aggregate as it is an immediate component of a Promotion which has one default product, P113 Voice Unlimited Service. For this Product P113 Voice Unlimited Service, we need to populate the Default Cardinality field in the Override Value column.

Populating the Default Products in a Promotion Aggregate

If a Promotion has Aggregate (Product Class/Product Line) and they have some products in the hierarchy, then populate the 'Default Cardinality' value in the override column of Version structure UDA of the corresponding products.

For example, if you need to populate the commitments, do that in the same column in the Product Promotions Components UDA which is above the Version Structure. This is for products under both the Bundle as well as Aggregates.

Component Exclusions in Context of Promotions

Whenever a promotion is defined in OPH, some of the components of the promotion or subcomponents under the root item can be excluded.

In Figure 3-5 the components that are marked in red are excluded in context of the promotion A. In addition, item E with the associated BOM has been reused in the promotion definition under a different component B. These signify different paths to the components under the same root item (promotion) definition.

Figure 3-5 An example of component exclusions

OPH publishes the entire promotion definition with all the components, and wherever exclusions exist, it explicitly marks the exclusions by providing the path of exclusion from the root item (promotion).

The process integration to Siebel handles the exclusions as follows:

• Siebel provides a contextual framework to control the promotion definition. In Siebel, the complete promotion definition with components at all levels can be updated in context of the promotion without affecting the original definition of the customizable products that are included in the promotion definition. The integration identifies the components that are excluded, which is specified in the payload that is published from OPH. Siebel does not remove or delete the components of customizable products in context of the promotions. This is a documented Siebel limitation.

The process integration uses the cardinality associated with the components to exclude the components in context of the promotion.

The promotion definition in OPH can specify the exclusions in these ways:

• Promotion definition can set the minimum cardinality and maximum cardinality of the component UDA to be 0 (zero).

• Promotion definition can mark the exclusions of the components.

Note:

Siebel provides the context-specific framework only in case of product promotions, not for customizable or component-type customizable products.

Exclusions Within Option Class BOMs

Table 3-11 explains the exclusions within option class BOMs.

Table 3-11 Exclusions within option class BOMs

1	VoIP Limited Package
1.1	VoIP Core Bundle
1.1.1	VoIP Core Service
1.1.1.1	VoIP Service Options
1.1.1.1.1	Basic VoIP
1.1.1.1.2	VoIP w/ unlimited calls
1.1.1.1.3	Fast Dialing
1.1.1.2	VoIP Voicemail
1.1.1.3	VoIP Caller ID
1.1.1.4	VoIP Fax Service
1.1.2	VoIP Adaptor
1.1.3	VoIP Phone
1.1.4	VoIP Laptop Phone
1.2	VoIP Recurring Discount

Case 1: Exclude components of item that represents promotions

The component items that are directly under the promotion are excluded by removal of the components.

These are the immediate components of the promotion VoIP Limited Package

1. VoIP Core Bundle

2. VoIP Recurring Discount

If any of these components have to be excluded, both the minimum and the maximum cardinality in the component UDA - Product Promotions: Components must be set to 0 (zero) in OPH and synchronized to Siebel CRM.

Case 2: Exclude components of items that represent bundles within the promotion

The component items that are not immediate children of the promotions but are subcomponents in the promotion definition are excluded by specifying the minimum and maximum cardinality as 0 (zero).

These are the subcomponents of the promotion VoIP Limited Package:

1. VoIP Core Service

2. VoIP Service Options

3. VoIP Voicemail

4. VoIP Caller ID

5. VoIP Fax Service

6. VoIP Adapter

7. VoIP Phone

8. VoIP Laptop Phone

The component items that are not immediate children of the promotions but are subcomponents in the promotion definition are excluded by right click on the component and exclude from current revision onwards in Product workbench of PIM. In Siebel, the excluded component's Default quantity is blanked out.

Case 3: Exclude component of option class items

The components under an option class item have to be excluded in OPH by means of the exclusion method provided in the product workbench. Default cardinality in the component UDA - Version: Structure must be specified in OPH for all the items that are not excluded.

These are the components of the option class item VoIP Service Options:

1. Basic VoIP

2. VoIP with unlimited calls

3. Fast Dialing

If one of the components of the option class has to be made optional in context of the promotion, the default cardinality must override to 0 (zero).

Note:

If a component has to be excluded from the option class, right click on the Component and exclude from Current Revision onwards in the Product Workbench of PIM.

If an override is not specified to any of the components, none of the components are excluded and the default quantity in the target application is set to 0 (zero), thus making all the components available as optional items as part of the same promotion.

Component Overrides in Context of Promotions

• The promotions contain various levels of BOMs, where the model BOM is the root BOM. The components association with the BOMs within the context of the promotion can be overridden. For example, the minimum cardinality set at the immediate parent item can be overridden in context of the promotion.

• This UDA is used to update the component association at every level of the BOM: Version: Structure (Component UDA).

• The process integration sets the component overrides in context of promotions in Siebel.

Transaction Attribute Value Exclusions in the Context of Promotions

• A valueset is associated with every transaction attribute of the item. In OPH, a subset of values from the set of values of the valueset can be excluded for the transaction attribute of a component in context of the promotion. The metadata synchronization process synchronizes all the valuesets from OPH to Siebel. See Section 3.1.1, "Synchronization of Metadata".

• Whenever the items are added as components of the BOMs of parent items or added as components of BOMs that are included in the promotions, the product administrator in OPH can exclude a subset of values from the valueset associated with the transaction attribute in context of the BOM or the root item. During promotion synchronization to Siebel, OPH provides the values that were excluded from the valueset. The component that is marked in green represents the excluded value. This is marked C in the diagram depicting components exclusion.

• The process integration to Siebel must set the values as exclusions for the corresponding attributes published from OPH in context of the promotion.

Promotion Based Discounts

The discounts on the components of the promotion are specified by means of these component UDAs:

• Product Promotions: Component Pricing (Component UDA)

• Product Promotions: Pricing: Components: Adjustments (Component UDA)

For more information about how to define promotion-based discounts in Oracle Product Hub, see the whitepaper ”Guidelines and Methodology to Define and Manage Entities in Oracle Product Hub for Oracle Product MDM Integration” in article ID 1086492.1 on My Oracle Support.

3.2 Siebel CRM Interfaces

Siebel CRM interfaces used by the integration are:

Inbound Siebel CRM Web Services: Synchronize Items or BOMs

• Service name: SWIProductIntegrationIO

  • Operation name: SWIProductImportUpsert

  • Request and response: SWIProductImportUpsert_Input, SWIProductImportUpsert_Output

Inbound Siebel CRM Web Services: Synchronize Pricelist

• Service name: SWIISSPriceListItemIO

  • Operation name: SWIPriceListItemUpsert

  • Request and response: SWIISSPriceListItemIO.xsd

Inbound Siebel CRM Web Services: Synchronize Promotions

• Service name: SWIPromotionIntegrationIO

  • Operation name: SWIPromotionUpsert

  • Request and response: SWIPromotionUpsert_Input, SWIPromotionUpsert_Output

Inbound Siebel CRM Web Services: Synchronize Attribute Definition

• Service name: SWIAttributeIntegrationIO.wsdl

  • Operation name: SWIAttributeImportUpsert

  • Request and response: SWIAttributeIntegrationIO.xsd

Inbound Siebel CRM Web Services: Synchronize Product Class

• Service name: SWIProductClassIntegrationIO.wsdl

  • Operation name: SWIClassImportUpsert

  • Request and response: SWIProductClassIntegrationIO.xsd

Inbound Siebel CRM Web Services: Synchronize Product Line

• Service name - SWIProductLine.wsdl

  • Operation Name - SWIProductLine_Synchronize

  • Request and response - SWIProductLine.xsd

Outbound Siebel CRM Web Services

There are no outbound events from Siebel CRM for the Oracle Product Hub integration.

For more information about Siebel web services, see CRM Web Services Reference.

3.3 Siebel CRM Integration Services

These are the integration services required for Siebel CRM to integrate with Oracle Product Hub:

• SyncProductSiebelProvABCSImpl

• SyncBillOfMaterialsListSiebelProvABCSImpl

• SyncClassificationSchemeListSiebelProvABCSImpl

• SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl

• ProductOptimizedSyncPriceListListSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl

• SyncItemCompositionListSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl

3.3.1 SyncProductSiebelProvABCSImpl

This single operation service accepts a SyncItemListEBM product message as a request. It does the following on receiving the ItemEBM based on the entity type specified with the item:

For type promotion, it transforms this message into a Siebel promotion ABM and invokes the Siebel promotion ABM. For the type as product or discount, it is assumed to be of type product.

For type as option_group it is assumed as Option Group. For discount_model it is assumed as Discount Model and for bundle it is assumed as Commercial Bundle. In case of non-promotion items-based on the entity type, the transformation conditionally transforms the corresponding elements required to support that entity.

This service transforms the message into Siebel product ABM. It invokes the Siebel product web service to synchronize with Siebel.

3.3.2 SyncBillOfMaterialsListSiebelProvABCSImpl

This single operation service accepts a SyncBillOfMaterialsListEBM product message as a request and returns SyncBillOfMaterialsListResponseEBM message. The BillOfMaterialsEBS invokes SyncBillOfMaterialsListSiebelProvABCSImpl.

This service receives SyncBillOfMaterialsListEBM, transforms it into a Siebel product ABM, and invokes the Siebel product web service to synchronize the item structure with Siebel.

When an item is defined as an option class in OPH, the provider services has two distinct behaviors:

• Synchronize option class as a product with the option components as relationships with domain type of components.

• Option class item can be established as a child with domain type of class. The service to establish the same as class is based on the values set for the component UDAs associated with the product. Domain type must be set to class, and the relationship name and class name must be same as ICC name that is pre-established in Siebel as product class.

• The components under the option class item in OPH are set as relationship domain for the class type relationship.

3.3.3 SyncClassificationSchemeListSiebelProvABCSImpl

This single operation service accepts a SyncClassificationListEBM product message as a request.

The responsibility of this service is to receive SyncClassificationListEBM, transform it to Siebel product class ABM, and invoke the Siebel product-class web service to synchronize it into Siebel. Once the product class synchronization is done in Siebel, it passes the response message to ClassificationResponseEBS.

3.3.4 SyncSpecificationValueSetListSiebelProvABCSImpl

This single operation service accepts a SyncSpecificationValueSetListEBM product message as a request.

The responsibility of this service is to receive SyncSpecificationValueSetListEBM, transform it to Siebel attribute definition ABM, and invoke the Siebel attribute-definition web service to synchronize it into Siebel. Once the attribute synchronization is done in Siebel, it passes the response message to specification valueset response EBS.

3.3.5 ProductOptimizedSyncPriceListListSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl

The ProductOptimizedSyncPriceListListSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl service transforms the PriceList EBM into a Siebel pricelist message and then calls the Siebel pricelist web service on operation InsertOrUpdate. The ProductOptimizedSyncPriceListListSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl transforms the PriceList EBM into a Siebel product message and then calls the Siebel product web service on operation Product_spcImport_spcUpdate. The Siebel web service completes the request and returns a response message. ProductOptimizedSyncPriceListListSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl then transforms the Siebel response message into the PriceList response EBM and sends it back to PriceListEBS.

Figure 3-6 ProductOptimizedSyncPriceListListSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl

3.3.6 SyncItemCompositionListSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl

The SyncItemCompositionListSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl process accepts the SyncItemCompositionListEBM. It transforms SyncItemCompositionListEBM into the Siebel product ABM. It then invokes the Siebel Product web service to create products and product structures in Siebel.

Figure 3-7 SyncItemCompositionListSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl

3.4 Assumptions and Constraints for the Siebel CRM Option

The assumptions and constraints for the Siebel CRM option are:

1. The Item with BOM item type = "Option Class" and its component items must have the same item catalog category.

2. Changes to the seeded static attribute groups are not supported. If customers want to introduce new static attributes, they must define new attribute groups and static attributes provided that the internal name of the custom static attribute have a prefix of 'XX_'. The integration creates these as flex attributes in Siebel. If new valuesets are introduced in OPH for new UDA, the integration passes the information as free-form text.

3. The items and BOMs in the structure of an ICC must be published before the ICC is published.

4. The item catalog categories that are associated with the items must be synchronized to Siebel before the items are published.

5. Every operating unit in Oracle Product Hub that has an associated order-entry item-validation organization needs to be defined as a business unit in Siebel and the item validation organization defined as the inventory location associated with the business unit in Siebel. This is required even if the operating unit and inventory organization role is associated with the same organization. For more information about establishing cross-references, see Section 7.4, "Setting Up Cross-References". (This is applicable only if the Order to Cash: Siebel CRM - EBS integration is being planned or implemented with Product MDM.)

6. The cross-references for inventory organization for item validation organization are set only for Siebel CRM and only those items from an item validation group that are associated with a single operating unit can be synchronized to Siebel CRM. (This is applicable if the Order to Cash: Siebel CRM - EBS integration is being planned or implemented with or without Product MDM).

7. Oracle Product Hub produces multiple BOM revisions, but it can identify whether the component item of the BOM is part of the current revision or a future revision of the BOM so that Siebel can filter out the item components that are not part of the current BOM structure. Siebel has a limitation that it uses only the current BOM revision.

8. The integration supports multi-tier pricing between OPH and Siebel and product prices with different effective dates. One Rate plan can have multiple pricing with different non-overlapping effective dates.

9. For Siebel CRM, these entities and associated subcomponents need to be setup manually in OPH:

   • Proration plans for items of entity type of promotion.

   • Compatibility rule matrix.

   • Volume discounts.

   For Siebel CRM, these entities and associated subcomponents need to be enriched post synchronization:

   • Eligibility rules.

   • Configurator Rules

   • Sales Catalog

   • Volume discounts.

10. Once the products are successfully synchronized from OPH to Siebel, they can also be updated to enrich the product definition.The existing products (subscription) that have references to pending quotes, orders, or assets in Siebel or Oracle BRM cannot be enabled as simple-service bundles. Similarly, the simple service bundles cannot be changed into subscription based billing products because by doing this, it impacts the existing asset cross-references. This is enforced by using the Siebel validation only in the UI.

    A mechanism or methodology must be defined for a product administrator in OPH to identify a given set of products that have pending quotes, orders, or assets in Siebel (Order capture application). Once identified, the corresponding products must not be updated and synchronized to Siebel unless the validation is added in the Siebel application.

11. Pricelist:

    • A price list contains multiple product offerings and a product can appear in multiple price lists.

    • A Siebel CRM price list contains prices for all product offerings in one currency.

    • Changes to pricing either the current or future effectivity is done within the same price list

    • A single product definition is created for a specific asset (for example, handset) and separate one-time prices are defined in different price lists. For example, Consumer Price list and Business Price list. This helps in creating or using price lists for consumer, creating or using price list for business and associating single product definition of asset to each of the pricelist and define prices in price lists.

    • A single product definition is created for the monthly tariff and separate recurring prices are defined in different price lists. For example, Consumer Price list and Business Price list. This helps in creating or using Price list for consumer, creating or using price list for business and associating single product definition of asset to each of the pricelist and define prices in Price lists.

    • Publishing the product definition from OPH:

      • Synchronizes the product definition and the different pricing information in the consumer and business price lists in Siebel. Future date effectivity prices must be added as new pricelist line items within the existing price list.

      • Synchronizes the product definition and the different pricing information for the consumer and business users as separate rate plans in BRM. For example, Consumer Pricelist and Business Pricelist. To track the relationship of rate plans with the pricelist, separate rate plans and rate plan selector definitions are created in BRM. Future date effectivity prices must be added as new rate tiers within the existing rate plan.

3.5 Multiple Price List Methodology

This section details the methodology of multiple price lists having OPH/BRM as its product master.

3.5.1 About Price Lists and Rate Plans

In Siebel CRM, a price list is a set of standard prices for products and services. You can use multiple price lists to offer separate prices for the same product and you can specify a default price list. The price list specifies a price, the currency for that price, and the frequency with which the price is charged.

For example, you can use separate price lists to charge business customers US$30 a month for internet service and to charge residential customers US$50 a month for the same service. In this example, the residential price list specifies that the price is 30, the currency is US dollars, and the frequency is monthly and the business price list specifies that the price is 50, the currency is US dollars, and the frequency is monthly.

You can use multiple price lists to offer different prices in different market segments (such as consumer or business customers, as in the previous example), different currencies, different sales channels (such as products purchased online or at a store), or different geographic locations.

Siebel CRM price lists map to rate plans in OPH/BRM. You create the price lists in Siebel CRM and set up the mapping between price lists and rate plans in the PRICELIST domain value map (DVM) before creating products in OPH/BRM.

While creating products in OPH/BRM, you define rate plans to specify what to charge for the products. You associate the rate plans with corresponding price lists configured in Siebel CRM so that the integration can determine where Siebel CRM tracks charges.

Note:

BRM also has a price list entity, but this is different from the Siebel CRM price list. When this document refers to price lists, it is referring to the Siebel CRM entity.

3.5.2 Creating or Updating Rate Plans in OPH/BRM

The product master (OPH/BRM) stores the relationship between a rate plan and the pricelist. The integration uses this relationship to create or update pricing information in Siebel CRM.

• In OPH/BRM, for multiple Rate Plans the Rate Plan Selector is used to define the relationship between a Rate Plan and the Pricelist.

• To define price lists, user can either choose Standard pricing model or Billing pricing model. In OPH, the Rate Plan attribute group is used for Pricing Code Billing and Pricing:Simple Price List attribute group for Pricing Code Standard is used to define the relationship between a Rate Plan and the Pricelist.

• When no pricelist is explicitly specified, the configured default pricelist is used.

3.5.3 Associating Rate Plans in OPH/BRM with Siebel CRM Price Lists

You associate rate plans in OPH/BRM with Siebel CRM price lists in Pricing Center using a rate plan selector.

To associate a rate plan with a price list using a rate plan selector:

1. In Pricing Center, follow the steps for defining rate plan selectors described in the Pricing Center Help.

2. When setting up columns for your rate plan selector, create a column called EVENT.PIN_FLD_USAGE_TYPE.

3. Add a row for each rate plan and corresponding price list that you intend to use.

4. In the EVENT.PIN_FLD_USAGE_TYPE column:

   • To associate a rate plan with a specific price list, enter the name of the price list exactly as it appears in the PRICELIST DVM.

     If you enter a name that does not appear in the PRICELIST DVM, an error will occur when you synchronize the products to Siebel CRM.

   • To associate a rate plan with the default price list, enter * in the place of a price list name. The integration maps * to the default price list. See Table 3-13 for an example.

5. In the Rate Plan column, enter the name of the rate plans that correspond to the price lists that you entered in the EVENT.PIN_FLD_USAGE_TYPE column.

6. Finish defining the rate plan selector as described in the Pricing Center Help.

Example Rate Plan Structures

In this example:

• Two products have been synchronized from BRM to Siebel CRM: Broadband and GSM.

• A default price list has been set up in Siebel CRM, and entered into the AIAConfigurationProperties.xml file and the PRICELIST DVM, as described in Section 7.4, "Setting Up Cross-References".

• Four additional price lists have been set up in Siebel CRM and entered into the PRICELIST DVM: ConsumerPL, BusinessPL, NewYorkPL, and CaliforniaPL.

• Five rate plans have been set up in Pricing Center: ConsumerRP, BusinessRP, NewYorkRP, CaliforniaRP, and StatesRP.

Table 3-12 shows the rate plan structure for the Broadband product. For this product, the product administrator uses two price lists to offer different prices for consumer and business customers.

Table 3-12 Example Rate Plan Structure for Broadband Product

Rate Plan Name	Price List Associated with the Rate Plan	Tier	Start Date	End Date	Monthly Cycle Forward Fee
ConsumerRP	ConsumerPL	1	01/01/2013	12/31/2013	$40
BusinessRP	BusinessPL	1	01/01/2013	12/31/2013	$30

Table 3-13 shows the rate plan structure for the GSM product. For this product, the pricing administrator uses the NewYorkPL and CaliforniaPL price lists to offer different prices for customers in New York and California and the default price list for customers in all other states. To make the integration use the default price list, the product administrator enters * for the price list associated with the StatesRP rate plan.

Table 3-13 Example Rate Plan Structure for GSM Product

Rate Plan Name	Price List Associated with the Rate Plan	Tier	Start Date	End Date	Monthly Cycle Forward Fee
NewYorkRP	NewYorkPL	1	01/01/2013	12/31/2013	$45
CaliforniaRP	CaliforniaPL	1	01/01/2013	12/31/2013	$40
StatesRP	*	1	01/01/2013	12/31/2013	$35

In Siebel CRM, the Broadband product is mapped to price list line items under the ConsumerPL and BusinessPL price lists and the GSM product is mapped to price list line items under the NewYorkPL, CaliforniaPL, and default price lists.

3.5.4 Offering a Product in Multiple Currencies

To offer a product in multiple currencies:

1. In Siebel CRM, create price lists as described in Section 7.4, "Setting Up Cross-References", and enter them in the PRICELIST DVM. Create a separate price list for each currency.

2. In Pricing Center, create rate plans that use the same currencies as the price lists in the PRICELIST DVM.

3. Define a rate plan selector for your product, associating the rate plans in the rate plan selector with the Siebel CRM price lists that use the corresponding currency. You must ensure that the currency in the rate plans matches the currency in the associated price lists. Currency matching is not validated by Siebel CRM or BRM.

4. Finish defining the rate plan selector and product as described in the Pricing Center Help.

5. Commit the product to the OPH/BRM database so that it is synchronized to Siebel CRM.

Example of Offering a Product in Multiple Currencies

To offer a product called Broadband in Canadian dollars and U.S. dollars, the BRM product administrator uses a separate rate plan associated with a separate price list for each currency while creating the product.

In this example:

• A default price list has been set up in Siebel CRM and entered into the AIAConfigurationProperties.xml file and the PRICELIST DVM.

• Two additional price lists have been set up in Siebel CRM and entered into the PRICELIST DVM: CanadaPL and USAPL. The currency for the CanadaPL price list is Canadian Dollars (CAD) and the currency for the USAPL price list is U.S. dollars (USD).

• Two rate plans have been set up in Pricing Center: CanadaRP and USARP. The currency for the CanadaRP rate plan is Canadian dollars (CDN$) and the currency for the USARP rate plan is U.S. dollars (US$).

The product administrator uses the rate plan structure shown in Table 3-14 when creating the product.

Table 3-14 Offering the Broadband Product in Multiple Currencies

Rate Plan Name	Price List Associated with the Rate Plan	Tier	Start Date	End Date	Monthly Cycle Forward Fee
CanadaRP	CanadaPL	1	01/01/2013	12/31/2013	CDN$30
USARP	USAPL	1	01/01/2013	12/31/2014	US$35

When the product administrator commits the Broadband product to the BRM database to synchronize it to Siebel CRM, the Broadband product is mapped to price list line items under the CanadaPL and USAPL price lists.

3.5.5 Managing Pricing in Rate Plans and Price Lists

After you have synchronized your products from OPH/BRM to Siebel CRM, you can manage the prices in the rate plans in OPH/BRM and resynchronize the products to Siebel CRM to update the price lists. You can manage prices by changing a product from using multiple price lists to using the single default price list.

3.5.5.1 Changing a Product from Multiple Price Lists to a Single Price List

To change a product in OPH/BRM that has already been synchronized to Siebel CRM from using multiple price lists to using the default price list:

• If the one of the rate plans in the rate plan selector is associated with the default price list (uses * in the EVENT.PIN_FLD_USAGE_TYPE column):

  1. In Pricing Center, set the duration end dates to the current day for all of the rate plans for the product associated with non-default price lists. Leave the rate plan associated with the default price list as is.

     See the discussion of defining the duration of a rate in the Pricing Center Help for more information about setting the duration end date.

  2. Commit the product to the OPH/BRM database so that the product is resynchronized to Siebel CRM.

• If none of the rate plans in the rate plan selector are associated with the default price list:

  1. In Pricing Center, set the duration end dates to the current day for all of the rate plans associated with the product.

     See the discussion of defining the duration of a rate in the Pricing Center Help for more information about setting the duration end date.

  2. Commit the product to the OPH/BRM database so that the product is resynchronized to Siebel CRM.

  3. Under the Rate Plan Structure column for the product, select Single Rate Plan.

  4. Commit the product to the OPH/BRM database so that the product is resynchronized to Siebel CRM. The integration automatically associates the single rate plan structure with the default Siebel CRM price list.

Examples of Changing a Product from Multiple Price Lists to a Single Price List

To change the GSM product with the rate plan structure shown in Table 3-13 from using multiple price lists to using a single price list (the default price list), the OPH/BRM product administrator uses Pricing Center to edit the rate plan selector. The product administrator does the following:

• Changes the end dates of the NewYorkRP and CaliforniaRP rate plans to the current date. See Table 3-15.

  Table 3-15 Setting the End Date for Rate Plans for the GSM Product

  Rate Plan Name	Price List Associated with the Rate Plan	Tier	Start Date	End Date	Monthly Cycle Forward Fee
  NewYorkRP	NewYorkPL	1	01/01/2013	01/31/2013	$45
  CaliforniaRP	CaliforniaPL	1	01/01/2013	01/31/2013	$40
  StatesRP	*	1	01/01/2013	12/31/2013	$35

  
  

• Commits the product to the OPH/BRM database to resynchronize the product to Siebel CRM and update the effectivity dates for the price list line items.

Setting the end date for the rate plans not associated with the default price list means that the integration only uses the default price list and StatesRP rate plan for that product.

To change the Broadband with the rate plan structure shown in Table 3-12 from using multiple price lists to using a single price list (the default price list), the OPH/BRM product administrator uses Pricing Center to edit the rate plan selector. The product administrator does the following:

• Changes the end dates of the ConsumerRP and Business RP rate plans to the current date. See Table 3-16.

  Table 3-16 Setting the End Date for Rate Plans for the Broadband Product

  Rate Plan Name	Price List Associated with the Rate Plan	Tier	Start Date	End Date	Monthly Cycle Forward Fee
  ConsumerRP	ConsumerPL	1	01/01/2013	01/31/2013	$40
  BusinessRP	BusinessPL	1	01/01/2013	01/31/2013	$30

  
  

• Commits the product to the OPH/BRM database to resynchronize the product to Siebel CRM and update the effectivity dates for the price list line items.

• Selects Single Rate Plan under the Rate Plan Structure column for the Broadband product.

• Commits the product to the OPH/BRM database to resynchronize the product to Siebel CRM.

Changing the rate plan structure to Single Rate Plan means that no price list is associated with the rate plan in OPH/BRM. The integration automatically associates this rate plan structure with the default Siebel CRM price list and maps the Broadband product to price list line items under the default price list.

3.5.5.2 Support for Effectivity

The price lists effectivity period can be managed by changing the start and end dates on a rate plan. Any extensions can be possible by creating the same pricelist with new effective dates.

Similarly, the change in pricelist name can be achieved by setting the end date on incorrect Pricelist and recreating a new rate plan, map it to the new pricelist/tier group/rate data and balance impact.

3.6 Synchronizing Sponsorship Items from OPH to Siebel CRM

Sharing groups are groups of services that share benefits. Sponsorship items are used to model splitting the cost of service. For example, using sharing groups, a company can pay for some of its employees' mobile phone usage and offer a discounted rate for calls between employees.

One of the use case for Sharing groups is for Charge sharing. Sponsorship objects represent the charge share object that defines the rules for sharing the charges.In OPH, you need to define the Sponsorship object and then synchronize to Siebel, PDC and BRM. After synchronization sponsorship item to Siebel, further modelling of Sharing Groups is required. This includes defining Promotion Group and including sponsorship item in the promotion group.After synchronizing sponsorship item to PDC and BRM, further enrichment is required to define the charge sharing model. OPH supports definition of Sponsorship and discounts objects. However, promotions groups are not supported.

The AIA MDM Product pre-built integration interfaces between Oracle Product Hub, Siebel CRM, and BRM to process sharing group requirements using a connector. It maps the sharing group product and discount offerings between OPH, PDC and BRM and also creates or updates AIA cross-references.

3.6.1 Sharing Group Components

Each sharing group definition consists of associated components. You need to define these components in Oracle Product Hub and map to Siebel CRM, BRM, and PDC. These components include:

• Sponsorships

• Discounts

• Members

• Promotion Groups

  During run time, the owner of a sharing group needs to create the group at the owner account level. Members and services are added to the group by the owner. To avail the benefits of the sharing group, members need to subscribe to the sharing groups published by the owner.

3.6.1.1 Sponsorship

Sponsorships are defined in Oracle Product Hub as items and mapped to billing type items of chargeshare in Siebel CRM. Chargeshare model have to be predefined in BRM. Sponsorship items are used to define rewards in promotion groups in Siebel.

After a sharing group request is published from OPH, AIA looks at the billing service type to determine the type of sharing group to create in BRM. When a service creation plus a promotion group creation request comes in, AIA first creates the service and then the sharing group in BRM. During the initiate billing phase, the AIA BRM provider provisions the promotion group line items after all services have been sent to billing.

3.6.1.2 Discounts

Discounts and chargeshares are created in BRM and special rating products created in Siebel CRM, added at design time as rewards to be shared by the group owner and members.

Discounts are created as items in Oracle Product Hub and synchronized to one or more Siebel CRM instances. The items and BOMs together with the seeded telecommunications library attributes are used to model various entities like products, discounts, bundles, promotions in Oracle Product Hub.

For more information on modeling the entities in Oracle Product Hub, see the whitepaper ”Guidelines and Methodology to Define and Manage entities in Oracle Product Hub for Oracle Product MDM Integration 2.5" Note ID - 1086492.1 on My Oracle Support.

For more information about the functional and technical details of this process flow, see Section 4.2, "Oracle BRM Interfaces", Section 4.1.2, "Synchronization of Discounts and Discount Models from Oracle Product Hub to Siebel CRM and Oracle BRM"

3.6.1.3 Membership

Member components are used to define items that represent members of a sharing group in OPH. Members are defined using the item type, Promotion Group Membership and maps to Product Type in Siebel. Members can also be other accounts or assets. When synchronizing sharing groups, memberships are defined as service bundle or simple service bundle in Siebel CRM.

3.6.1.4 Promotion Groups

Your customers can share charges, discounts, and special rating profiles by purchasing promotion groups. You create promotion groups at design time in Siebel CRM. Each promotion group definition includes an owner membership product, a member membership product, and one or more reward products.

For more information on how to model sharing groups using Siebel promotion groups, refer to the Oracle® Application Integration Architecture Oracle Communications Order to Cash Integration Pack Implementation Guide for Siebel CRM, Oracle Communications Order and Service Management, and Oracle Communications Billing and Revenue Management, Release 11.4, ”Creating Promotion Groups”.

To process sharing group discounts, the AIA PIP integration does the following:

• Promotion group rewards with the billing service type of discount is purchased for the owner.

• Promotion group rewards with the billing service type of special rating Friends and Family ERA is created for the owner.

• Promotion group rewards with the billing service type of subscription is purchased for the owner.

You use APIs to create or update sponsorships in BRM when published from OPH to BRM.

3.6.2 Defining a Charge Sharing Group in OPH and Publishing to Siebel CRM

A charge sharing group allows the owner of the group to sponsor the charges of one or more members of the group. Members subscribe to the sharing group to avail sponsorship and discount benefits.

Charge sharing groups are used to determine how charges are shared among members. For example, an employer can sponsor the voice charges incurred by employees who are members of a charge sharing group.

This figure shows the high-level tasks to create a charge sharing group in Siebel CRM and how the integration is handled in AIA and BRM:

Figure 3-8 Creating a Charge Sharing Group in Siebel CRM

Here are the steps to define a charge sharing group in Oracle Product Hub and synchronize with Siebel CRM and BRM:

In Oracle Product Hub:

1. Define a sponsorship item type and specify the sponsorship attribute for chargeshare.

2. Map an event to the chargeshare model.

3. Create a Membership item type.

4. Create a Promotion Group item type.

5. Add one or more membership item to the promotion groups and define the cardinality of the membership products.

6. Add one or more products to each of the membership within the promotion groups.

7. Add one or more rewards products to the promotion groups and define the access control rules on the each of the membership within the promotion groups.

8. Define the promotion group validation rules such as the compatibility rules for promotion groups and membership in the context of the promotion groups.

9. Define the asset membership cardinality of the rewards products across promotion groups.

10. Associate the promotion groups, memberships and the rewards products to one of more pricelists.

11. Create or update the commitment terms and conditions for promotion groups and membership items.

12. Optionally, define pricing adjustments on the membership products, assets, and rewards in the promotion groups.

13. The promotion group, membership or rewards can be synchronized on their own or as part of the structure of the promotion group.

14. Publish and synchronize the following for promotion groups to Siebel.

15. Publish and synchronize the Sponsorship Object from PH to BRM/PDC when Sponsorship object is published standalone or when it is published as part of the Promotion Group Structure.

16. Publish and synchronize the Membership Object from PH to BRM/PDC as billing product when there is a charge (recurring or onetime) for the member.

AIA synchronizes the sponsorship items from OPH to Siebel. The product in Siebel must indicate the billing type as sponsorship. AIA also synchronizes the sponsorship items from OPH to PDC along with the charge share event map attributes and synchronizes the sponsorship items from BRM to Siebel.

In Siebel CRM:

1. Map sponsorship item type to the billing type attribute in Siebel.

In BRM:

1. Sync the sponsorship item to Siebel CRM using the billing item type.

2. Sync billing service type in BRM to these billing service types in Siebel CRM:

   • /account indicates that the charge sharing is at the account level.

   • /service/telco/gsm/telephony indicates charge sharing is for specific service.

3.6.3 Defining a Charge Discount Group in OPH and Publishing to Siebel CRM

Discount sharing group is a way to share a discount or resource, such as free minutes between multiple accounts or services. A member is charged for usage, discounting credits on the member's account and free minutes are deducted from the owner.

For example, Joe receives a 10,000 free minute discount. Joe wants to share the free minutes with his family members. Joe is the promotion group owner who is charged a recurring or one-time fee or both. In this plan, a discount in the promotion group fee is offered as a reward for using the sharing group.

In Siebel CRM:

1. Create a promotion group and assign Joe as the owner.

2. Add the members to the promotion group.

3. Specify the membership domain.

4. Define the rewards.

5. Map the promotion group reward billing service type, Discount to BRM

6. sharing group type, Discount Sharing Group.

In BRM:

1. Map the billing type in Siebel CRM to Subscription or Item. The billing item is charged to the promotion group owner at account or service level. The fee product billing service type should match the sharing group owner service type. In Siebel, these products are added as rewards.

   In this case, the reward for subscribing to the sharing group and paying the subscribing fee is 5GB data to be shared amongst the sharing group members.

When a service creation plus promotion group request comes in, AIA first creates the service and then sharing groups in BRM. During the billing phase, the AIA BRM provider processes the promotion group line items only after all services have been sent to billing.

3.6.4 Synchronizing Multiple Product Lines from OPH to Siebel CRM

You can now set up multiple product lines for a product in Oracle Product Hub (OPH) and then synchronize this relationship from OPH to Siebel CRM. For example, you can set up an iPhone to belong to two product lines: mobile handsets and smart phones.

Figure 3-9 Multiple Product Lines

Here are the high-level steps to set up and synchronize multiple product lines for a product from OPH to Siebel CRM:

In Oracle Product Hub:

1. Define product line object in OPH with these attributes:

   1. Product Line (required)

   2. Product Line Description

   3. Zero or more Product Line Managers

2. Product line managers can be mastered in Siebel and then setup in PH as value sets as part of post installation steps.

3. Associate product lines to entities such as billing products and discounts, promotions, and bundles in OPH. Specify an effective date.

In AIA when you publish a product line in OPH, the Product MDM integration synchronizes the product line definition and the product line relationships with Siebel CRM and creates or appropriate cross reference for the product lines.

3.6.5 Synchronizing Promotion Enhancements from OPH to Siebel CRM

Promotion aggregates allow you to group together products with common tariff plans. For example, you can group together handsets with common tariff plans.

Here are the high-level promotion aggregates integration steps between Oracle Product Hub and Siebel:

In Oracle Product Hub:

1. Define a promotions product aggregate by product class.

2. Define one default product from a set of product options.

3. Specify one or more product line for a product offering.

4. Define promotion product aggregate by product line in OPH.

5. Specify a promotion adjustment by product line.

In AIA, synchronization occurs between a promotion and a product line or product class and promotion based aggregate pricing by product line or product class.

In Siebel CRM, web services are used to support integration of promotion aggregate definition and promotion pricing aggregate definition.

The Product MDM PIP synchronizes the following promotion attributes from OPH to Siebel:

• Splitting and merging promotion definition

• Promotions upgrade rules

• Action attributes

• Promotion upgrade attributes

• Commitment attributes of promotion components

• Commitment attributes of customizable product components

• Relationships between a promotion and a product line or product class

• Promotion based aggregate pricing by product line or product class

3.6.6 Integration Services

The synchronize product and price business flow uses the following BRM interfaces:

• ProcessSalesOrderFulfillmentSiebelCommsReqABCSImpl

• UpdateSalesOrderSiebelCommsProvABCSImpl

• ProcessFulfillmentOrderBillingBRMCommsProvABCSImpl

• ProcessFulfillmentOrderBillingBRMCommsAddSubProcess

• ProcessFulfillmentOrderBillingBRMCommsUpdateSubProcess

• ProcessFulfillmentOrderBillingBRMCommsDeleteSubProcess

3.6.7 Cross References

The new xrefs for working with sharing groups are as follows:

• BUNDLEDPROMOTION_MEMBER_ID.xref: Used to maintain relationship between bundled promotion and its subcomponents.

• PROMOTIONGROUP_MEMBER_ID.xref: Used to maintain the relationship between the promotion group and its members.

3.6.8 Assumptions and Constraints

The assumptions and constraints for working with the AIA Product MDM pre-built integration connection between OPH, Siebel CRM, and BRM are as follows:

• AIA creates a new sharing group in BRM for each type of promotion group reward. Promotion group rewards are shared by all promotion group members.

• When synchronizing promotion group members to BRM, AIA directly associates them as SG members in BRM.

• Promotion Group can have only one owner at any point of time.

• When a promotion group ownership is changed on the Siebel side, the system deletes the existing promotion group and adds new one.

• Suspend or resume functions are not available for promotion groups.

• If the promotion group owner is suspended, then all rewards are suspended for the promotion group members.

• Although there is no corresponding information in Siebel SalesOrderABM, AIA populates the promotion group information for the promotion group header order line.