E-Commerce Partners Reap Dead-Stock Serendipity

Compiled ByDeborah Austin For Prophet 21 Trading Partner Connect participants, a funny thing happened on the way to collaborative e-commerce: dead-stock solutions. The dead-inventory functionality was not planned in 2001 when technology provider Prophet 21, Yardley, Pa., launched Internet trading network Trading Partner Connect to streamline the commerce process among distributors, their manufacturers and suppliers, and end users. But the solution's ability to track a partner's data/inventory and cross-reference it to other partners' inventory -- rationalizing databases to reveal sought-after items even if they're given different names or item codes by different partners -- has prompted members to tap it for finding/selling dead stock, says Prophet 21 Executive Vice President Doug Levin. Participants have moved close to $1 million worth of dead inventory in the last eight-to-nine-month period, he says.