Retail EDI

Governing the Mess Around File Transfer - Managed File Transfer Solutions In the Gartner '2008 Magic Quadrant for Managed File Transfer' analysts caution IT professionals about relying on FTP saying, "FTP alone is not a viable option to give you the insight, security, performance, and ultimately, the risk mitigation necessary to conduct business responsibly." This is because very few companies have a good handle on the files moving into and out of their organizations. Files that can't be exchanged via EDI due to format or size, end up moving via Email, FTP, Fed Ex and through Web services. Most companies don't have any central way of tracking and managing all of these file transfers which puts them at risk and without the audit trails needed to meet most corporate and government compliance mandates. Plus countless IT resources are required to manage the exchanges, add new partners, and keep the various networks up and running 24/7. So what other option is there? A number of EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) providers are now offering Managed File Transfer (MFT) applications to solve these problems.

MFT applications provide two important benefits: First they secure the file exchanges making them less prone to hackers. Second, they give IT staff a portal from which they can see and manage all file exchanges (regardless of who sent the file or whether the file was sent via FTP, FTP over SSL, Web Browser, etc.). A few of these solution providers, even do the set-up, provisioning, and maintainance of partner connections for you. As with most software applications these days, MFT applications come as both server-based and SaaS solutions. EasyLink Services International, for example, offers a fully hosted MFT solution called EasyLink MFT. Hosted solutions allow organizations to pay only for the data that gets sent which lowers the cost compared to server-based MFT applications which can have high license and upgrade fees and expensive hardware requirements. Plus hosted solutions are easier to get up and running as there is nothing to implement or support (the vendor provides support and there are never any upgrades). No matter how your company decides to manage file exchanges, one thing is clear. the number and size of files being sent and received is only going to increase with time, and MFT solutions are a promising option for dealing with the problems inherent in managing such complex file exchanges.

A Note from Retailedi:  You can read more about MFT at Easylink here: http://www.easylink.com/our-services/mft.html.  Tracy Ganesh is employed by Easylink Services (http://www.easylink.com) as a Product Marketing Manager.