Best Practice Considerations

Here are some of the decision points for implementing supplier catalogs.

Consider the following:

Decision Point	Impact
Will the supplier's annual program be best served with the suppliers catalog and its categories defined in Oracle Fusion Product Information Management? Note: Hierarchical categories aren't supported. An item can only belong to a single category. Date effectivity is supported for Item-Category association for annual programs.	If the annual program is for all items with few product exceptions, it may be easier to implement without defining the supplier catalog. If the annual program is a complex subset of categories and there are a large number of products, it may easier to define the supplier catalog and use it in defining an annual program.
How best to think about: New category introductions: Add new category to the existing catalog. Discontinued categories: Don't remove, as supplier will naturally stop selling it. New item introductions: Add new item to its category. Discontinued items: End date item in the category.	Avoid creating a new catalog for a supplier unless there is a reorganization of categories. Currently new catalogs and their respective annual programs can't be introduced until all processing is completed for any supplier annual program under the existing catalog.
If a mid year reorganization of categories mandates a new catalog, it must be accompanied by new programs to use the new catalog.	Existing annual programs must be end dated with the termination of its matching catalog. The new catalog must be accompanied with a new set of annual programs.

Decision Point

Impact

Will the supplier's annual program be best served with the suppliers catalog and its categories defined in Oracle Fusion Product Information Management?

Note: Hierarchical categories aren't supported. An item can only belong to a single category. Date effectivity is supported for Item-Category association for annual programs.

If the annual program is for all items with few product exceptions, it may be easier to implement without defining the supplier catalog.

If the annual program is a complex subset of categories and there are a large number of products, it may easier to define the supplier catalog and use it in defining an annual program.

How best to think about:

New category introductions: Add new category to the existing catalog.
Discontinued categories: Don't remove, as supplier will naturally stop selling it.
New item introductions: Add new item to its category.
Discontinued items: End date item in the category.

Avoid creating a new catalog for a supplier unless there is a reorganization of categories. Currently new catalogs and their respective annual programs can't be introduced until all processing is completed for any supplier annual program under the existing catalog.

If a mid year reorganization of categories mandates a new catalog, it must be accompanied by new programs to use the new catalog.

Existing annual programs must be end dated with the termination of its matching catalog.

The new catalog must be accompanied with a new set of annual programs.