Automating Email Reports from QuickBooks

An accounting system is essential for every business to track funds flowing in and out of their business processes. In the not so distant past, bookkeeping was handled through files and registers. File stacks were bundled on office shelves like debris for years, and it was a Herculean task for bookkeepers to check closed accounts. Moreover, keeping papers for such long periods was not practical. The integrity of bookkeeping methods was debated in the early 2000s when instances of massive financial fraud came to light.  Then, the idea of digital bookkeeping was thought to be a myth. Technology birthed the Accounting Renaissance, where digital applications, on premise and cloud replaced papers and files. QuickBooks is one such example, known to small and medium scale businesses across the globe.

Turn the Pages Back

An accounting system developed and managed by Intuit in the early 2000s, QuickBooks started with an on premise DOC version that was installed on either a personal machine or a hosted server. The Digital Wave helped QuickBooks claim a large chunk of small-scale customers, but left gaps in the standard aspects of traditional accounting standards. Then, a series of version updates and patch releases enhanced the product and turned it into a cohesive accounting system. Intuit has integrated QuickBooks with a handful of tools and web applications.

Every Penny Counts

When you are beginning a business, every penny counts. You have to accomplish more with less and ensure you pick the correct tools to operate your business. Most stakeholders need to see reports daily to ensure projects are on schedule.  Accounting tools have different templates for reporting, which can be customized and sent across as pdfs or excel sheets.  The following are some major QuickBooks reports that stakeholders see as critical to their SMB:

·         Profit & Loss Report

·         Balance Sheet

·         A/R Aging Summary

·         A/P Aging Summary

·         General Ledger

Detailing accounting data is complicated. Customers and bookkeepers spend an innumerable amount of hours capturing information and then spend additional hours building out customized reports. To address the restrictions of their product, Intuit created advanced reporting, which is incorporated with QuickBooks Enterprise 14 R6P and higher for those with a functioning Full-Service Plan.

Email the Reports Out

This module helps customers set up a schedule to email reports at the needed frequency (i.e., daily business reports to staff, weekly money-related reports to managers, monthly budget reports to customers).  Generally, not everyone in the company has login access to Accounting systems to view financial statuses, particularly Account Receivables. In this case, scheduled reports are convenient, and can save a ton of time and provide an understanding of the organization's budgetary execution to date. Scheduled reports eventually influence better business choices that can add to future development and achievement. The key benefits of implementing QuickBooks Email Report Automation are:

·         Custom reports

·         Improved productivity

·         Better communication

·         Report compliance

·         Secured accessibility

Automate the Process in a Controlled Way

QuickBooks schedules predefined report templates that contain sensitive financial data that cannot be exposed. Stakeholders and the Accounting Department face the dilemma of segregating the data, so as not to send full reports to all team members. 

QuickBooks doesn’t allow the creation of custom reports or scheduled emails; thus, an intermediary database can do the job. QuickBooks has open APIs for different entities including reports. We at DBSync help our customers integrate QuickBooks with databases and various other cloud and on premise applications. The database, integrated with QuickBooks, can be in line with QuickBooks reports, and required information can be sent across the recipients based on business preferences. DBSync has email connectors that can be used to send emails based on the defined trigger criteria. Your QuickBooks database and email connector can be knitted together in an integration platform for controlled automation of email reporting. This helps when sending QuickBooks reports to selected recipients only.

Conclusion

Data is a crucial factor in driving business decisions. Decision-makers at different levels need to have access to customized reports that save time and effort. Automation of reporting distribution helps make for a sustainable organizational environment where stakeholders can focus on developing the business. 

An accounting system is essential for every business to track funds flowing in and out of their business processes. Technology birthed the Accounting Renaissance, where digital applications, on premise and cloud replaced papers and files. There are many benefits to automate parts of the process like emails..

Choosing the Right Point of Sale (POS) System for your Retail Business

Point-of-Sale systems (POS) have become a “must-have” for any retail store trying to reach the next level in their Line-of-Business. More than twenty (20) years ago, cash registers were used to manage sales. Increasing customer choices and product varieties over the past several decades have demanded more sophisticated electronic options to allow stores to reconcile their stock and transactions automatically.

With the technology boom, Electronic Cash Registers (ECR) -- later termed Point-of-Sale systems -- have become this option, expanding beyond the transaction register to cloud-based POS applications that allow complete control over multiple global retail lines.  Product inventory and sales can be controlled and monitored from any location seamlessly and with full transparency. A simple POS terminal can increase sales exponentially for any retail business by processing customers fast and providing multiple payment options.

For every retailer, selecting the best POS system for their business is a top priority. A few features that every POS should have are:

●     Stock Visibility -- keeping track of product movement can help retailers avoid stock-outs or dead stocks and thus improve customer relationships. A right POS should also keep track of inventory at other branches and provide continuous insights on product sales.

●     Routing the Branch -- keeping customers happy with an eCommerce POS option to process a sale at a different branch (if the product is not available in one department) is an excellent customer satisfaction strategy.

●     Real-time reporting -- the option to generate real-time business reports, based on product sales and inventory data, is one of the key features that every multi-store retailer needs. These reports can also help businesses get rid of extraneous costs.

●     Multichannel Customer Experience -- retailers who manage online stores along with physical stores should have the option in their POS system to provide the same consistent product and pricing information to their customers, whether online or onsite.

●     Integration with 3rd Party Apps -- businesses using POS systems need to make their data available to their ERP and accounting applications. With open API’s, these POS systems can allow integration platforms like DBSync to share the data with various other apps securely, thus avoiding double data entry.

●     Loyalty Programs -- with the smartphone era, modern POS systems are implementing loyalty programs more than ever to keep customers engaged. Customers can download the app instead of swiping or punching cards, to keep track of their purchases and earn reward points. This helps retailers keep track of their customers’ purchases and allow them to serve them better.

●     Data security -- data must be kept secure at all ends. Customer buying patterns and personal info is much more of a concern nowadays. A proper compliance POS system allows retailers to protect customers’ privileges and gain their trust and loyalty.

Several additional factors to consider when selecting a POS are cost, ease of use, and longevity. For multi-channel retailers who sell online and in physical spaces, applications like Shopify POS and Vend meet the above criteria. These POS applications not only allow retailers to manage sales, they even help in doing multichannel eCommerce by connecting to various eCommerce channels like Amazon, Big Commerce, and Walmart, thus increasing their presence around the globe. Moreover, these applications allow integration with various 3rd party applications for shipping and accounting process with the help of open API's. DBSync, a pioneer in the field, allows for seamless integration, providing complete control over the business and optimizing sales. 

Retailers must adhere to specific standards when selecting POS systems, keeping in mind that the perfect marriage of POS with eCommerce is the key to running a successful retail business in the future.

Multichannel Ecommerce – Benefits, Challenges and Opportunities

Shopping online is one of the most popular activities on the Web. A person can shop anytime or anywhere–even in pajamas! Webpages are built to promote specific goods and services that can be purchased online and delivered to a personal/professional setting. Over the past ten (10) years, eCommerce has grown in leaps and bounds, particularly with the rise of companies that allow electronic transactions, such as eBay and Amazon. 

Nowadays, it is common for companies to have a significant online presence, mainly “brick and mortar” stores, where multichannel eCommerce gives customers the ability to: 

• Search through an extensive database of products and services and build their orders over several days
• Compare pricing for the same product over dozens of channels and choose the best one. 

An eCommerce multichannel is where different groups of people sell goods/services in different ways at different times. The goal is to satisfy as many people as possible while continually scaling to increasing traffic. There can be several challenges with this approach: 

To avoid such hurdles, businesses often choose a single platform to publish and manage their product and service lines, such as Shopify, ChannelAdvisor, and Seller Active. This platform provides a central place to trade products, reach out to more communities all over the world, and receive revenue in common currency. Often these platforms are used to sell and manage products/services, but additional applications can be added to process shipping and backorders. Apps like Shipstation and Ecomdash allow vendors to fulfill their orders by direct shipping and order processing options, or using shipping gateways like UPS and FedEx. 

Based on the product and service verticals, these sellers can be divided into two categories: 

B2C merchants have direct reach to customers and thus have to strictly maintain their product portfolio, as customer buying patterns are based on product reviews and past experiences with the seller. B2B merchants, on the other hand, have to provide merchants’ orders on time and thus have to maintain their delivery portfolio diligently. ECommerce platforms for both types of sellers are the same, but utilization is different. Most of the B2C and B2B merchants use an integrated web of applications to manage their day-to-day operations. A typical example would be:

The applications vary from merchant to merchant — B2C often go for the cheaper option while B2B go for ERP’s, which have all of the above capabilities. These applications provide an efficient way to complete operations on multichannel eCommerce platforms, as the integrated platform automates data sharing and reduces manual intervention to maintain product stock.

DBSync, a pioneer iPaas for a multichannel eCommerce, provides actionable information towards customer and product repletion statuses. Most IPaaS’ fail when it comes to a full cycle integration, and thus B2B merchants tend to go with fully optimized and integrated ERP. However, not all ERP’s support of all channels, so merchants end up with a simplified, integrated solution. 

DBSync is a leading player in this vertical, as its’ pre-built connectors for applications like ChannelAdvisor, Shopify and Shipstation, can be used to build connections to other similar domain apps using the Swagger framework. 

CSEs (Comparison Shopping Engines)

The battle for most retailers today is to create brand awareness for their product/service. Comparison Shopping Engines (CSEs) like Google Shopping, Nextag and Connexity allow customers to compare product lines over multiple eCommerce channels. NOTE: A fee is required to have a product appear in top search results. 

Most retailers struggle to set their multichannel strategies and thus fail to reach their target audience. Some companies like ChannelAdvisor and GoDataFeed have options to simplify this process. They provide Feed Campaign Management and optimize product listing ads for digital marketers, providing them with a centralized platform to enhance their product content, overcome unprofitable products automatically and provide actionable insights to grow their product line bidding.

Conclusion:

The fast-growing eCommerce industry is trending towards growing the customer base rather than the number of channels. Hence, retailers/sellers have to focus their Multichannel Marketing Strategy to ensure repeat customers. 

The ability to “tag” products based on user preferences (via Web and mobile browsing) and make them available on social media has been a game-changer, as customers no longer have to leave social media channels to purchase a product/service. Retailers can also invest in CSEs to ensure their product/service reaches its targeted community. This can increase search listings and allow movement towards Omni channel marketing.

DBSync, as a unified integration platform, can play a crucial role in making B2B sellers’ businesses grow beyond their expectations by optimizing order processing and fulfillment and exposing them to the global eCommerce web.

Working with Amazon S3 Using DBSync

What is Amazon S3

Amazon simple storage service is storage for the internet. Amazon S3 has a simple web service interface that you can use to store and retrieve any amount of data, at any time, from anywhere on the web. It gives any user access to the highly scalable, reliable, fast, inexpensive data storage infrastructure that Amazon uses to run its global network of websites.

Working With Amazon S3 Bucket

To upload your data (photos, videos, documents, and more), you first create a bucket in one of the AWS regions. You can then upload any number of objects to the bucket.

In terms of implementation, buckets and objects are resources, and Amazon S3 provides APIs for you to manage them. For example, you can create a bucket and upload objects using Amazon s3 API. You can also use the Amazon S3 API. You can also use Amazon s3 console to perform these operations. The console internally uses Amazon S3 APIs to send requests to Amazon s3.

Amazon S3 Connector Via DBSync

Amazon S3 Connector is built to connect to the Amazon S3 Cloud storage for Transferring of various sensitive data like files, directory systems from and into S3 Cloud storage system. DBSync Amazon S3 Connector supports four kinds of operations

1. Upload File: Facilitate reading of file from the local file system and writing to the Amazon S3 Cloud storage.
2. Upload Directory: Facilitate reading of designated directory from the local file system and writing to the Amazon S3 Cloud storage.
3. Download File: Facilitate reading of file from Amazon S3 Cloud storage and writing to the local file system.
4. Download Directory: Facilitate reading of designated directory from Amazon S3 Cloud storage and writing to the local file system.

The use-case described in the tutorial section will help you all to understand better how it benefits for your automation needs and reap benefits by decreasing the manual intervention for data backup.

If you want to transfer, sync or backup files from one cloud service to a database, are you going to manually do it by downloading files to your local disk and re-uploading to your database? Is a better way to do it, right? We recommend DBSync solution to help you backup, sync and move files from Database to Amazon S3

Step1: We have to connect DBSync to the database from where you want to export the files. For more information on what and how databases can be connected can be obtained from the below link. http://help.mydbsync.com/docs/display/dbsync/Database.

Step 2: We have to connect DBSync with Amazon S3 storage, you will need to enter specific information so that the DBSync can communicate with Amazon S3. so you will need the following.

• Bucket Name
• Access Key ID
• Secret Access Key

Here is the link to rightly configure the Amazon s3 connector to help you connected with the DBSync.

http://help.mydbsync.com/docs/display/dbsync/Amazon+S3

Step3: Now it’s that all the connections are set between DBSync and Source, Target applications. We will have to create the Project, Process, and workflow in the DBSync, After those are done you will need to do the mapping which will help DBSync to understand from where to where the files have to be moved.

Step 4: Hit the Run Now button located at the top right corner of the page as shown in the above screen. If sync is successfully executed it shows up in the console, in case of errors also same will be displayed in the console. After the successful completion of sync, go to the Amazon S3 storage to the given file path to check files are copied along with correct directory name, file names, and data in the files.

Here are some of the wiki links of how DBSync allows the user to connect with the Amazon S3 connector and a tutorial that can help the working mode of the DBSync Amazon S3 Connector.

http://help.mydbsync.com/docs/display/dbsync/Amazon+S3

http://help.mydbsync.com/docs/display/dbsync/File+System++To++Amazon+S3

Kindly leave us a comment in or Contact us, case of queries, thoughts or recommendations, one of our representatives will get in touch if our product offering interest you.

Web-References :

http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/dev/Welcome.html

Why You Need a Cloud Integration Platform

As Organizations move past their underlying Software as a Service (SaaS) systems, they perceive the expanding need to incorporate information and procedures between the open cloud and their on-premises databases and applications. The pain point was the development cost of creating the entire design of the middleware to connect one to another and of course, security. Identifying the gap, many vendors have moved to address the issue.

Most Organizations, when they buy a SaaS solution, start looking into the possibility of connecting the system to their existing IT environment. It could be a CRM to an Accounting system or an ERP system to a database. The complexity of the integration varies with the type of business domain and the number of systems they use.

It started with connectors rendering the open APIs of systems. Contrasted with the single “connectors” that sellers create to empower integration, cloud integration platforms are increasingly programmable and progressively adaptable to deal with not just one system but with a more extensive arrangement of off the rack applications. Here a large grouping of custom applications is created inside one environment. Thus, you utilize a platform that can be connected to meet the requirements of multiple systems.

The cloud integration platforms gain importance when the SaaS solutions or applications become popular and when cross-functional processes need to exchange data among several disparate on-premises and SaaS offerings. Moreover, many applications are offloaded to Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) or Platform as a Service (PaaS) clouds. The integration has to be contained in the circle of an enterprise’s overall business strategy, processes, and operations. Progressively, they should fit into a prior domain and potentially interoperate with extra SaaS or On-premise applications that may be added to that condition.

Who are there in the market?

There are two types of vendors in the segment:

• Vendors who are very specific to data integration or middleware market For eg: DBSync a middleware technology used for data and application integration
• Vendors who started as a cloud application

Regardless of the type of vendors, nowadays most of technology can run on-premises, cloud or both. It’s winding up progressively prevalent to build up the integration in the cloud, at that point run it on-premises or in the cloud, at that point report back to an administrator console for execution monitoring, which can be either on-premises or in the cloud.

Run your Cloud Integration Platform:

One of the key benefits in running Cloud Integration Platform is less hassle of running an application from clients server utilizing the on-premise resources, including installing the platform and managing the integration process. If the use case is the connection between two cloud application, Cloud Integration platform is the best option. In a hybrid environment, the cloud platform services will call the service APIs running on the ground. E.g., web connector in QuickBooks. The value proposition is more than ever that; they need to be able to fit into a pre-existing environment and possibly interoperate with new SaaS apps that might be added to that environment.

Conclusion:

It’s imperative for IT groups to seriously investigate the alternatives a particular seller offers, which is primarily on platform capabilities. The second is a way of deployment which should address the compatibility questions. The last but essential is packages and pricing associated.

You can learn more about various apps offered by DBSync here

5 reasons why customers should have Data Integration

1. Take advantage of specialized applications

If I can say in my words, every piece of software that works with data represents analyses and transforms information in a specialized way. By integrating data into a format accepted by that application, you’re giving yourself the power to open and use your data in that software.

For Example, In DBSync we are using different types of connectors like Salesforce, Microsoft CRM Dynamics, NetSuite (ERP), QuickBooks and many more.

With the help of these connectors, we are Integrating the data from different sources to different destination platforms.

2. Reduce technical complexity and improve business agility

In present time Data Integration architecture enables organizations to eliminate point to point Integration, Reduce Complexity and improve overall optimization while providing self-service access for distributed teams.

3. Make Data More Available

Centralizing your data makes it easy for anyone at your company (or outside of your company, depending on your goals) to retrieve, inspect, and analyze it.

Easily accessible data means easily transformed data. People will be more likely to integrate the data into their projects, share the results, and keep the data up to date.

4. Managing CRM Applications

Customer data integration is essential for the success of CRM. You need to have accurate customer details (the single version of the truth). This is important so that all the customer service employees (from those who call the customer to those who process the application) have a clear view of the customer and see the same data. Organizations are mainly utilizing customer data integration for customer retention by having a 360-degree view of them. Their next step would be using customer data integration to get new customers.

5. Data Integrity

According to me many things will happen with your data from the day it is created in your system and throughout its lifecycle. It can be transferred to other systems, altered and updated multiple times. Human interactions, data transfers, viruses or compromised hardware are all events that can compromise your data’s integrity. This is where maintaining data integrity can become a tricky task.

In my job providing data integration solutions to organizations, data quality, and data integrity are always something we discuss in details. I believe that data integrity should be top of your mind at every stage of the data lifecycle, and already from the design and implementation phase of your systems. Data integrity also ensures recoverability and searchability, traceability and connectivity. Protecting the validity and accuracy of data also increases the stability and performance of your systems.

Reasons why to go for DBSync

DBSync is a proven integration platform which facilitates integration between various legacy systems, services, processes, business partners and data to provide new business value and improve new business performance. DBSync manages all communication, data translation, and process interaction among various connected applications. If I talk about the pricing, we have an excellent plan for our clients, and they can also choose the best package what they like based on their needs and requirements. Please check all the prices with all subscription plans at DBSync.

Best in class support and service plans

We are providing videos to the customers to help them in Implementation, to training documentation that explains, to a community platform, to one-on-one support from partners who can speed up your integration.

DBSync ensures you have everything required to implement and run your integration project deployment successfully.

Providing standard support through email or online are included as a part of the yearly subscription. Check out more.

Easily Customizable Integration by using iPaaS

The DBSync iPaas is the fastest way to integrate between two applications with its existing pre-defined solutions. It allows companies to connect “Cloud to Cloud” or “Cloud to On-Premise” applications quickly to solve any integration problem. You can also use it to streamline various known business processes like an order to cash, procure to pay, service to cash, payment integration or integrate your cloud applications with your database.

DBSync provides Development studio that would jump start your cloud adoption with pre-built templates and easily customizable integrations, API’s and extend the platform so that any non-technical users can quickly build processes that connect with an unlimited number of Endpoints. Check out more.

Support Standard and Custom Connectors for Integration

Connectors or adapter which are sometimes referred to from an integration standpoint as a set of components within the iPaas are that opens a connection to an external system that is used to authenticate, push and pull data from external systems.
Connectors in DBSync may be categorized into two types

• Standard Connectors

The standard connector presents a published, constant Interface (API) to users and other components on the upstream side of the connector. Please check the below link to see how many standard connectors we are supporting.

• Custom Connectors

DBSync provides SDK for building custom connectors. Most of the times we are getting requirements from the customers to create the custom connectors for them to transfer/ Integrate a Data from One application to another application like Salesforce to QuickBooks and many more. Check out more.

Tutorials

The tutorial is a method of transferring knowledge and may be used as a part of a learning process. DBSync tutorials are used for knowledge transfer.
Most of the time customers are using different tools for Data Integrations, but they don’t know how to use these tools for data integration. So, here DBSync is providing a Tutorial section for the users so users can come and see how they will be going to Integrate their data with the help of DBSync from Source to Destination applications like Salesforce to QuickBooks and many more. Tutorials provide all the information to the user about the queries builder and hierarchy mapping for the data flow. Check out more.

Template Library

Solution Library is a collection of pre-built integration solutions. These solutions can be easily added to your integration instance.

It helps the customers to get all the data about how to Integrate from source to target applications. With the help of Template Library customers will get to know about the information of Data Flow, Field Mapping, Process Map, Prerequisites for Integration and how the user will get to start with DBSync includes all the sequential points. Check out more.

Handling EDI using Cloud Workflow

Electronic Data Interchange or EDI has existed since the early 70s. Today, many IT giants, such as IBM, are still using it.  One of the many reasons is its practicality, as this data format offers a way to transfer commercial documents in an easy and fast manner.

In this article, you will learn about the benefits of EDI, and how to create a collective digital model using EDI files and DBSync’s Cloud Workflow.

Benefits of EDI

EDI has been in the market for a long time. One of the reasons is its benefits.

“EDI continues to prove its major business value by lowering costs, improving speed, accuracy and business efficiency. The greatest EDI benefits often come at the strategic business level.”

EDI Basics

EDI’s most important benefits can be summarized as:

Table 1: Benefits of EDI

These benefits can be capitalized in many business cases. One of the most important of them is Supply Chain Integration.

Use Case: Supply Chain Integration

Today businesses operate in a multi-enterprise environment. An important aspect of this ecosystem is the value added through the integration of partners and customer communities.

Collaborative digital models can deliver great things, such as supplying manufacturing lead times, product availability data, demand forecasts from end customers, and more.

This data availability could, for example, allow you to consider precise inventory levels across the supply chain, based on demand data, prices and market calculations.

Thus, a B2B digital chain could benefit from EDI, and made possible with DBSync Cloud Workflow: EDI being used to describe the documents, and Cloud Workflow to execute the document transfer via FTP servers.

Once the EDI file has been transferred, a third application, usually called an EDI convertor,  is necessary in order to interpret the code contained in the EDI file, and transform it into a proper document.

Figure 2: Supply Chain Integration

How Cloud Workflow Manages the Document Transfer

There are two different operations with an EDI document. First, an EDI file can be transferred between different points, via, for example,  FTP servers. Second, the EDI document needs to be parsed and transformed into the actual document.

Cloud Workflow can easily transfer text documents stored in an FTP server to another data source, including another FTP server. The files are handled via a separator, in a similar manner to CSV files.

This feature allows Cloud Workflow to transfer EDI files. Although EDI files are defined by many different standards, such as ANSI, EDIFAC and TRADACOM, the common characteristic is that they can be transferred via a separator.

However, it must be noted that Cloud Workflow doesn’t parses the EDI document. It only transfers the text file containing the EDI code.

Figure 3: EDI transferred via Cloud Workflow

In order to understand how Cloud Workflow transfers EDI documents between FTP servers, let’s take a look at the next figure, which shows the basics of an ANSI EDI document definition.

An EDI document starts with a “Start of transaction” indicator, and ends with an “End of transaction” definition. In the middle, the contents of the document are defined.

In EDI terms, a single document is called a “transaction set” or “message”. A document can be something like an invoice, a purchase order or another commercial document. A transaction set is comprised of data elements, segments and envelopes.

Data elements are the individual items of the document, and are contained in segments, separated by a data element separator. In the example shown in the figure the separator is a star or *.

Finally, a document is stored in an envelope, which can contain one or more documents. Envelopes are then transferred between sites.

By using this EDI file structure, Cloud Workflow can transfer EDI documents located in FTP servers in a similar way it transfers CSV files.

Figure 4: Structure of an EDI document

Wrapping Up

We have seen that DBSync’s Cloud Workflow can easily transfer EDI documents stored in FTP servers. The next step is to convert the EDI code into a proper file.

This feature opens immense possibilities. One very important option is its use in Supply Chain Integration, where a chain of FTP servers could serve as a link between different points in the supply chain.

The opportunities opened by this collective digital model are many: from production based on customer data, to inventory planning, reduction of lead times, and more.

Would you like to learn more about Cloud Workflow and its powerful features? Visit our website at https://www.mydbsync.com/, where you can try our app for free.

A 10 Minute Guide To Hybrid Integration Platform (HIP)

Are you interested to know what the newest thing in integration is? The answer to your question is Hybrid Integration Platform, better known as HIP. This integration approach is fast becoming the new wave in integration.

By 2022, Gartner predicts at least 65% of large organizations will have implemented an HIP to power their digital transformation

This article is a step-by-step explanation of what HIP is, why you should consider it, what will you need to implement it, and how to choose the right implementation approach according to your business reality.

So, let’s start by explaining what HIP is.

What is HIP?

A Hybrid Integration Platform or HIP is a framework for system integration that was developed by Gartner, and considers the following four dimensions.

1. Constituents: are stakeholders in the integration project.
2. Endpoints: are where the systems to be integrated reside.
3. Integration models: are the entities to be integrated.
4. Deployment models: are the different connection environments.

Now, let’s see each dimension in detail.

Figure 1: An HIP example

Constituents

One of the most important characteristics of HIP is the inclusion of new stakeholders, who are now involved in integration. Together, they join forces by forming a “facilitation team” that assists and performs the integration task. This team is composed of the following roles:

1. Integration specialists: people with technical knowledge involved in the integration project.
2. Citizen integrators: people that participate in the integration project, but are not technically strong. For example, business unit managers, people from marketing, etc. This group participation will increase in the future.
3. “ad hoc” integrators: people who participate in the project without a specific role.
4. Smart machines: their importance is increasing, and will increase even more with the advances in IT. Typical examples are delivery trucks, production machines and pool cars.

Endpoints

The endpoints define where the systems reside. HIP innovates, when compared with other integration approaches, in that it basically includes all possible hosting methods. These are:

• On premises devices: includes systems that are available on site. An example is custom made legacy systems.
• Cloud: includes systems that are available through the internet, usually as a service. A typical example is Salesforce.
• Mobile: includes systems that are available on mobile platforms, such as Android.
• IoT: includes systems used to manage things, such as security cameras and automobiles. With the advance of IoT in recent years, systems integration will increasingly consider including these elements.

Integration models

An important aspect of HIP is that it considers not only the integration of data, but a vast range of entities. These are:

1. Applications: applications that need communication with each other.
2. Data: data available on databases and generated by different systems.
3. B2B: systems across different businesses.
4. Processes: business and operation processes.

Deployment models

Similarly, HIP connects systems residing on different deployment settings. The main ones are:

1.  
1. On-premises: systems residing on site.
2. Cloud: systems hosted on the cloud.
3. Hybrid: systems on the cloud and on site.
4. Embedded: systems embedded in IoT devices.

Now that we know what HIP is about, we can move to the next important question: why you must consider HIP in order to survive in the present competitive market?

Why HIP? Breaking the boundaries

In today’s world of hyper-competition, businesses need a powerful competitive edge to survive. In order to have it, businesses cannot fall behind in the quality of their software systems. They need the best software available, development speed in custom software, and data sharing among different systems.

In order to achieve this, technology ecosystems are converging more and more towards using a common data source, which is administered in an efficient and focused manner, according to the priority needs of the businesses.

In these ecosystems, operational, transactional and analytical apps feed from and contribute to the same pool of data sources. For example, apps such as Salesforce, which are used by the Marketing and Sales department, draw data from the same pool that BI and analytics do.

This unified data source results not only out of the need to reduce data silos, but also from the necessity for updated information that prompts the right business decisions and thus, increases in sales and profits.

  

Figure 2: Apps connected to a unified data source

Now that you are aware of the importance of HIP, let’s analyze how to implement it. In order to do this, first we need to consider what factors are important when deciding on an HIP approach.

3 Implementation key factors

The main points to consider when implementing an integration implementation are:

1. Business priorities: functional and timing requirements, considering the better ROI for your business. Based on these priorities, integration should be considered as a “product” that drives business value.
2. Available skills: certainly a very important aspect, as integration specialists are a scarce resource.
3. Allocated budget: particularly important for the small and medium enterprise.

Figure 3:  Implementation factors

How to implement HIP

There are three main ways to implement HIP. How to choose among them depends mainly on the size and level of homogeneity / heterogeneity of your business.

The first one is Centralized. It includes a single implementation and a centralized governance. The implementation is done by a centralized team. Thus, it is best for small to medium enterprises that, due to their size, are highly homogeneous.

The second implementation method is Shared. This method also has a single implementation and a centralized governance. However, it is implemented by several teams, usually located at the different business’ subsidiaries. Therefore, it is ideal for large and global organizations that are homogeneous in nature.

Finally, there is the Federated model. It involves multiple HIP implementations, a federated governance (from which its name derives), and it is implemented by several teams. Thus, it is the characteristic implementation model for large, global and heterogeneous businesses.

Table 1: Implementation approaches

DBSync and HIP

HIP is the future in integration, and DBSync is already there. Our three main products are: Cloud Workflow, CDM and Replication.

Cloud Workflow lets you connect two or more apps via connectors. A typical example would be reading data from Salesforce and feeding it into a database or another app.

CDM and Replication are two powerful tools that help you create snapshots of your Salesforce data and replicate it. There is an on-premises version and a recently released cloud version.

There are several characteristics that define our tools as hybrid. First of all, their user friendliness that basically creates an environment that does the job for you. Secondly, the capabilities to work both, on the cloud and on-premises. And finally, the capacity to create custom connectors and thus, to basically connect anywhere.

The benefits of these tools are legion: reducing admins’ and developers’ wasted time, reducing data duplication, reducing storage needs, creating continuous workflows that can run from lead to sale, coordinating data sources for Analytics and AI, and many more.

Table 2: DBSync main connectors

Conclusion

There are many reasons to understand what Hybrid Integration Platform is about. In this article, you have seen some key concepts that define HIP, and which can also help you analyze how you can apply this approach.

Ready to learn more? Check out our website at http://www.mydbsync.com/ which features many more knowledge resources, and try hybrid integration with our product for free.