Allocations, Authorizations and Supplier Sequencing (AAS)

How do I stop an invalid Carrier from loading at my terminals?
How do I limit a risky Shipper from using up all my Supply?
How do I determine who I am loading off of?

For terminal operations, in particular Terminal Truck loadings, the ability to control the access to who can load off of whom is critical for allowing Customers to manage their inventory.  A number of Terminal Automation Systems (TAS) already have this capability – Toptech, Diamond, CSI all can use either TABS or TDS.  However there are a number of issues with the current TAS solutions:

1. Cannot create or handle properly cross terminal and cross TAS allocations.
2. Supplier sequencing unavailable in any system.
3. Limitation with number of validations that can be performed. Validations such as Min/Max, Available inventory, carrier insurance, etc… not supported.
4. Costly – Most of these solutions charge a fee per request. So for each Authorization or Allocation a fee is assessed for using the system.

Synthesis Release 8.0 provides elegant new functionality that addresses these issues and provides improved customer maintenance experience.

Authorizations:
In this release Synthesis reverses its old model where the loading permission was delegated to the terminal to control.  Now Synthesis will use the request model (similar to TABS and in fact supports PDXR) to authorize the loading of product.  This works by sending a request to Synthesis to load for a Shipper, Supplier, Location, Carrier and Date.  Synthesis will then run through its validations to confirm that the Load Authorization is allowed.  These validations currently include in R8:  Min/Max checks (making sure the supplier would not fall below their Min), and Allocation.  However, with the Synthesis Rule engine in place adding new validations in future releases is straight forward process.  Planned validations for future releases include:  Carrier insurance checks, Driver checks, Available inventory checks, Credit Checks, etc…

Allocations:

• The Allocation functionality within Release 8.0 has been significantly improved:
  Creation of multiple time period allocations – Monthly, Daily, Yearly and Custom
• Allocations by Suppliers to Shippers, Shippers to Customers, Customers to Destinations
• Rollover, % increase per allocation and Max rollover allowances
• Improved view and search screens for both Customers and Administrators
• Ties in with Supplier Sequencing for Shipper Allocations

As part of the Rule engine framework Allocation Rules are now validated as one of the validations the Authorization will perform.

Supplier Sequencing:
Synthesis Release 8 now has the ability to specify which Suppliers a Shipper is loading off.  So a Shipper who has been Authorized by a Supplier (Suppliers Authorize a Shipper by creating an Allocation for them) can now specify based on product/location and dates what order they want to pull inventory off of Suppliers. So for example if Shipper X is authorized by Supplier A and Supplier B then Shipper X can say I want to load first off of Supplier A and then off of Supplier B.  They can also specify a time frame or for specific location/product combinations which Supplier to use.  The User Interface for this functionality is also using the latest FLEX framework to allow drag and drop and other dynamic features. 

Overall the changes provided within Synthesis AAS R8 allows both the Terminal Operator and their Customers a much richer ability to manage who , what and when product can be loaded.