Table Tennis Giant Finds Extol the Right Fit for B2B
February 13, 2007 Alex Woodie
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In 1996, sporting goods manufacturer Escalade Sports chose Extol to help it automate its EDI processes. Now, more than 10 years later, Escalade’s decision is continuing to pay off as the company makes acquisitions and prepares for new industry mandates, Extol announced last week. It’s quite easy to add new trading partners and EDI document types using Extol OS/400-based EDI translation software, called Integrator, says Pam Dallmeier, electronic commerce coordinator with Escalade, one of the largest table tennis equipment makers in the world. “Extol does not require programming, which is fabulous,” Dallmeier says. “I can on-board trading partners and customize EDI documents very quickly. This week I created an Advanced Shipping Notice in less than half an hour–done, tested, and in production.” This paid off recently when Evansville, Indiana-based Escalade bought a company that makes archery products. According to Dallmeier, Escalade added five or six of the acquired company’s existing trading partners, “without interrupting the order, shipping, and billing functions. With other EDI systems, this may have taken months,” she says. Soon enough, the Integrator software, which runs on an iSeries Model 810, will be called upon to help with another major company initiative: complying with the data synchronization mandates of Wal-Mart and Sports Authority. According to Extol, the software will tackle this challenge as easily as it tackled the EDI implementation.
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