iPaaS for EDI Integrations

As we’ve highlighted, retailers have a lot to consider when planning an integration with trading partners. And, while EDI integrations are essential if you work with a trading partner that requires it, EDI is only one of the integration challenges you need to take into consideration.

That’s why we at Celigo believe iPaaS is the best option for EDI integrations. An iPaaS is much easier to implement than a custom or point-to-point integration. Since Celigo’s integrator.io can be used by both business users and IT developers, the platform does not require an entire IT team while giving companies compete control and visibility over their EDI integrations without relying on external vendors.

Using EDI Documents in iPaaS

Despite the presence of EDI standards (e.g., ANSI X12 and EDIFACT), many companies customize their EDI formats which can vary slightly from the standard formats. If you are using an iPaaS to integrate directly with a vendor, you need access to the required EDI transaction pairs (e.g., 810, 846, 856, etc.) in addition to the ability to customize the document to fit the specific requirements of your partners.

Celgio integrator.io offers over twenty generic EDI document templates that can be quickly modified to accommodate your specific partner requirements. Alternatively, the Celigo team can create an EDI document on-demand if your vendor is currently not supported within the product. EDI formats for Amazon Vendor Central, Cardinal Health, DSCO, Home Depot, Ingram Micro, Macy’s, Wayfair, and many others are available from a drop-down list in integrator.io that is continuously growing with each product release.

How EDI and NetSuite Integration Works

Trading partners typically require between four to seven EDI documents that need to be exchanged with NetSuite. These documents need to be mapped into a format that NetSuite understands and NetSuite responses will need to be mapped into EDI documents that your partner systems will understand.

To make this easier, Celigo offers a number of integration templates that jump start EDI integrations with NetSuite. You can either use these templates to modify, copy, and even delete unneeded integration flows or else build the integration from scratch. Either way, integrator.io offers a built-in EDI parser and file generator.

The parser converts EDI information into data that can be mapped to a corresponding NetSuite record type. For example, a Purchase Order with item, price, quantity ordered, shipping details, and other information is transmitted as an EDI 850 from a retailer to a supplier. The PO is then converted into JSON format and then mapped to the relevant fields in NetSuite to create a new Sales Order in NetSuite.

Celigo integrator.io iPaaS

In addition to the EDI integration capabilities previously described, Celigo’s integrator.io offers a modern platform that makes integrations fast and easy for both business users and developers. You can use integrator.io to integrate your entire business using a variety of protocols.

Key benefits of Celigo integrator.io iPaaS are:

Accelerated Integrations: Use integration templates and tools to build one, two or more EDI integrations in just days instead of months—without relying on external vendors
Ease-of-Use: build, customize, and maintain integrations using either integrator.io’s point-and-click interface or developer tools to use JavaScript and custom code
Flat-Rate Pricing: Unlike the transaction-based pricing offered by VANs, Celigo’s subscription model offers predictable, flat-rate costs regardless of the number of transactions processed
Integration Platform: Integrate your entire e-commerce business using pre-built Integration Apps, integration templates, and application adaptors to integrate shopping carts, OMS, WMS, POS, and any other systems
Visibility and Control: Gain visibility and control over your integrations using powerful management tools to update integrations, identify and troubleshoot errors, and set up user access rights and alerts
NetSuite Expertise: Rely on Celigo’s extensive experience in NetSuite, e-commerce, and cloud integrations that have been built into the product as best practices and backed by a team that can help implement, improve, and troubleshoot integrations

Conclusion

EDI is here to stay. For any company that works with B2B commerce entities, EDI integration is, or will at a future time, be a requirement. In order to make sure communications and processes happen efficiently and accurately, it is important to make sure a seamless, reliable, and flexible integration is in place.

With a variety of integration options available, an iPaaS is the recommended path for many companies. iPaaS gives companies the ability to quickly and easily get their EDI integrations running whether they need to connect one, five, ten or hundreds of vendors. With complete control and visibility over the implementation, maintenance, and updates to integrations, businesses no longer need to rely on an external vendor.

By using an iPaaS, instead of having one solution for EDI integrations, and an entirely different solution for other integrations, such as web stores and marketplaces, you can get it all in one place, whether it’s API-driven, database integrations, or file transfers in EDI or flat-file formats. These are key factors for achieving fast time-to-value and ensuring that the ongoing cost of ownership remains under control.

Celigo’s iPaaS, integrator.io, provides the ideal platform for integrating not just EDI but other key e-commerce and business systems. In addition to built-int EDI templates, integration templates and API adaptors are available to integrate with a variety of applications and data formats. Celigo’s extensive experience with NetSuite, e-commerce, and cloud integrations, integrator.io is backed by teams that embed this knowledge into our products and services.

About Celigo

Celigo integrator.io is a next-generation integration Platform-as-a-Service (iPaaS) that offers a powerful and intuitive integration support for thousands of applications via REST/JSON, HTTP, XML, SQL, EDI, FTP, on-premise agents, and other protocols. Celigo provides prebuilt integration templates, API adaptors, and Integration Apps to meet all your e-commerce integration requirements. Integrator.io helps speed up the development of integration flows by offering the infrastructure for building, testing, deploying and managing software applications in the cloud as well as providing prebuilt connectors and business rules. Integrator.io allows businesses to get multiple apps connected quickly and without the hassles of having to build multiple point-to-point systems from scratch.

As the leader in iPaaS (integration Platform-as-a-Service) for e-commerce, Celigo’s mission is to enable our customers to reach business objectives by simplifying integrations. Our solutions have integrated thousands of industry-leading applications such as NetSuite, Salesforce, Shopify, Amazon, Magento, Zendesk, and more, plus we have helped many companies integrate their homegrown applications.

Celigo’s iPaaS platform, integrator.io, offers the following integration capabilities:

Integration Apps are prebuilt, fully managed integrations powered by the integrator.io platform. With built-in best-practices, business logic, settings, and full configuration capabilities, Integration Apps are the fastest and easiest paths to integration.
Integration Templates provide a starting point for building integrations. Working like a container, prebuilt integration flows that connect and sync objects from one application to another are available with the ability to copy, modify, or delete flows.
Adaptors provide methods, resources, and parameters of an application’s APIs directly within the product with the option to directly integrate an application using HTTP, XML, JSON, and other protocols.

Contact Us for more information on Integrating EDI and NetSuite into your Business.