International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, Volume 7, Issue 8, August 2017

ISSN 2250-3153
633

Realization of Supply Chain Reference Architecture

Eugene Moses R, CPIM, TOGAF, Gururaman Subramanian
Oracle Solution Services India (SSI) Pvt Ltd., Bangalore, Karnataka, India

Abstract— In today’s global economy, businesses collaborate using Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) to realize the
across multiple organizations that include customers and business processes. This allows the system to natively support
vendors in multiple geographies due to business growth and collaboration as these are built on business processes rather
mergers and acquisitions. In general, larger companies have a than silo system processes.
greater number of systems with an average of 3.5 order
capture and 3.3 order fulfillment systems [1]. This has led to a II. NEED OF ORCHESTRATION
system landscape where there are multiple software The following are the characteristics of a modern ERP
applications that are implemented to serve both standard and system that enables realization of industry standard supply
customer specific business processes for a specific chain processes through orchestration:
organization. This necessitates organization to embark upon • Multiple company Business process
the practice of Enterprise Architecture (EA) to organize the • Multiple Enterprise Visibility
logic for business process and IT infrastructure reflecting the • Business rule driven
integration and standardization requirement of company’s • Strong collaboration tools.
operating model. [2] • Highly flexible and agile.
• Users should be able to see information from
However, there is a gap between the architecture and the multiple sources and be able to respond to events
solution domain. This paper explores how this gap can be across those sources.
bridged using right tools & techniques, a shared meta-data
model and realize the architecture by orchestrating the
solution based on Service Oriented Architecture (SOA). This
paper also explains how this approach enables the business to
realize supply chain reference architecture like Supply-chain
operations reference-model (SCOR). This enables
organization to adopt industry standard supply chain reference
architecture with the benefit of monitoring the performance
metrics.

Keywords—Supply chain reference architecture, SCOR,

Orchestration, Service Oriented Architecture

I. INTRODUCTION
Traditionally companies were focused only on one
organization where each function had its own source of data Fig. 1 Modern ERP platform
and systems – either off-line spreadsheets or an ERP system. Orchestration realizes the virtual enterprise value chain by
Traditional ERP systems started facilitating collaboration at a a system designed to operate in a virtual way using SOA. It
transaction and operations level. However, these systems enables users to manage the processes and the stake holders
proved inadequate due to their tight integration of underlying across different organizations in a uniform way to deliver a
system process and silo system processes are connected to consistent user experience while operating over heterogeneous,
realize the organization specific business processes instead of virtual enterprises.
top-down approach. Collaboration has become a necessity as
businesses started sourcing components from vendors or Orchestration enables building a composite application
outsourcing some operations to vendors. business process for a set of interacting services, not just by
The modern virtual enterprises work on Boundaryless bespoke development, but using a composition or business
Information Flow™ [3] across multiple organizations that process modelling language, such as Business Process
extends to customers and vendors. Modern ERP serving these Execution Language (BPEL) of information and control
virtual enterprises need to be built on top down architecture through the individual services. Thus, the design and
where the industry standard business processes are realized by development of services is agile, and may be performed by
application services encapsulating the system processes and developers under the close guidance of business analysts. [4]
support, round tripping between business and IT. This is
achieved by orchestrating loosely coupled application services III. ROLE OF REFERENCE ARCHITECTURE

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International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, Volume 7, Issue 8, August 2017
ISSN 2250-3153
634

Enterprise, as part of architectural continuum adopts the Below are the challenges in adopting the Industry
best practices and architectural style of Reference architecture Reference Architectures to an enterprise’s own Organization-
specific to their industry which governs solution being Specific Architectures that govern the solution being realized.
realized.
1) Architecture model address what are the best
Reference architecture is general in nature to some level of practices for a process where as the solution model
abstraction and provides concepts, components and their addresses how to implement process.
relationship used to direct/guide and constrain the 2) Architecture model are efficient at Strategic level
instantiation of (repeated) concrete solutions. [5] whereas solution model is efficient at tactical level.
3) Architecture and solution modeling languages are not
common.
4) Meta-data model not shared between Architecture
and Solution modeling tools.

The above reasons lead to a gap between the Architecture

and Solution being realized during implementation.

V. PROPOSED MODEL TO REALIZE SUPPLY CHAIN REFERENCE

ARCHITECTURE
A solution to the above challenges is to bridge the gap
between the architecture and solution domain using right tools
& techniques, a shared meta-data model and realize the
architecture by orchestrating the solution based on Service
Oriented Architecture (SOA).
Fig. 2 Enterprise Continuum Supply chain Reference Architecture can be classified
based on their meta-data model level of details and entity they
Below are the leading Supply chain Reference Architecture
represent and relationship between them as follows: -
in the market:
TABLE 2: SUPPLY CHAIN REFERENCE ARCHITECTURE LEVEL
TABLE 1: SUPPLY CHAIN REFERENCE ARCHITECTURE
TYPE
SCOR Supply-chain operations reference-model
No Level
(SCOR) is a process reference model for supply
High Medium Low
chain management. This supply chain framework
links business processes, performance metrics, 1 Strategic Tactical Operational
practices and people skills into a unified 2 Business Business Physical Process
structure. The SCOR describes supply chains Capability Process
using process modeling building blocks and TABLE 3: SUPPLY CHAIN REFERENCE ARCHITECTURE ENTITY
contains more than 150 key indicators that TYPE [6]
measure the performance of supply chain
operations. No Entity
VRM Value Reference Model (VRM) is a unified Conceptual Logical Physical
reference model covers the entire enterprise: 1 Owners View Designers Builders View
Corporate, Product Supply and Customer View
domains supported by an extensive list of
Input/Outputs, Metrics and Practices. 2 Models of the Models of Technology
APQC Process Classification Framework (PCF) is a Business the Constrained
-PCF high-level, industry-neutral enterprise process System Model
model that allows organizations to see their
business processes from a cross-industry Below is the model to select fit for purpose tools & technique
viewpoint. The PCF organizes operations and appropriate to realize the supply chain reference Architecture
management processes into 12 enterprise-level based on their meta-data model level & entity: -
categories, including process groups, and over
1,000 processes and associated activities.

IV. CHALLENGES IN REALIZING SUPPLY CHAIN REFERENCE

ARCHITECTURE

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International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, Volume 7, Issue 8, August 2017
ISSN 2250-3153
635

chain to reuse the build blocks namely plan, source, make,

deliver and return with further drill down based on the
level.

Fig. 3 Proposed Model to realize Supply Chain Reference

Architecture
Fig. 3 shows the proposed model to realize the Supply Fig. 4 Supply-chain operations reference-model
chain Reference Architecture by mapping the right tools and SCOR reference architecture meta-data model level can be
techniques based on their metadata level and entity. mapped to proposed model as follows:
Below table provide the details of tools and technique for
the combination of Supply chain Reference Architecture level TABLE 5: MAPPING OF SCOR META DATA MODEL
and entity.
SCOR Proposed Model Combination
TABLE 4: TOOLS AND TECHNIQUE FOR COMBINATION OF Level– C1 C2 C3
SUPPLY CHAIN REFERENCE ARCHITECTURE LEVEL AND ENTITY Entity High- Medium- Low-
Conceptual Logical Physical
Level – Tool Technique Notation
1 Top Level
Entity
(Process
Combinatio
Type)
n
2 Configuration
C1 BPA Business Business
Level
High- Suite Architecture & Motivation
(Process
Conceptual Business Process Model (BMM),
Category)
Analysis (BPA) Strategy Map,
3 Process
Value Chain
element
C2 BPM Business Process Business Process
Level
Medium- Suite Modelling Modelling
(Decompose
Logical (BPM) Notation
Process)
(BPMN)
4 Implementation
C3 SOA Business Process Business Process
Level
Low- Suite Orchestration Execution
(decompose
Physical Language
process
(BPEL)
element)

Below diagram depict the fit for purpose tools and techniques
A. Applying proposed model to SCOR by applying the suggested model to realize the SCOR
Supply-chain operations reference-model (SCOR) is the reference architecture.
industry leading architecture reference model for supply

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International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, Volume 7, Issue 8, August 2017
ISSN 2250-3153
636

coupled application services. The solution is to select right

tools & techniques with shared metadata between the two
domains and realize the architecture by orchestrating the
solution based on Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) as
recommended.

• This will enable organizations to adopt Supply chain

reference Architectures like SCOR, VRM, APQC-
PCF to an enterprise’s own Organization-Specific
Architectures which governs the solution being
realized without re-inventing the wheel.
• This will in turn benefit organization in agility by
loosed coupled application services and better control
by inferring the KPI metrics from realized
transaction.
Fig. 5 Proposed Model to realize SCOR
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
SCOR Level 4 is an implementation level which realizes the We would like to thank Mr. Vijay Ramamurthy, CPIM, CSCP, OEA SCM
business services modelled using BPM in SCOR Level 3 by Senior Architect for reviewing the paper and Mr. Swaminathan Chandramouli,
orchestrating the application services encapsulating the legacy Practice Director for his support and guidance.
and (Commercial of the shelf) COTS application components
using SOA. REFERENCES
[1] Supply Chain Management Review 2013 Order Fulfillment Survey,
Nov’13 issue p45
SCOR Metrics attached to the BPA & BPM model of SCOR [2] Jeanne W. Ross, Peter Weil, David C. Robertson, “Enterprise
Level 1, 2 & 3 can be measured as the architecture being Architecture as Strategy”
realized using SOA orchestration. [3] The Open Group
[4] The Open Group Services Integration Maturity Model (OSIMM)
[5] Steven J Ring, Role of Reference Architecture, MITRE, p10
Below table provide the details of tools and technique for [6] John A. Zachman, Conceptual, Logical, Physical: It is Simple
realizing the SCOR reference architecture: -
DISCLAIMER
Views or opinions presented in this paper are solely those of the authors and
TABLE 6 TOOLS AND TECHNIQUE FOR REALIZING SCOR do not necessarily represent those of his employer Oracle Solution Services
(India) Private Limited or Oracle Corporation US or subsidiary firms and
SCOR Proposed Tool Technique companies.
Level – Model
Entity Combination
Level C1 BPA • Conceptual AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
1 &2 Business Suite Hierarchical
Process Architecture Modeling 1) EUGENE MOSES R, CPIM, TOGAF,
Type & and Business • Process Catalog, and [email protected],
Categor Process Value Chains
Oracle Solution Services India (SSI) Pvt Ltd., Bangalore,
y Analysis • KPI Metrics
Karnataka, India
Reporting
Level 3 C2 BP • Abstract Business Eugene is a cloud champion and versatile IT
Process Business M Process professional with 13+ years of experience across
Element Process Suite • Business Process Supply chain management domain. He specializes
Modelling Modeling Notation in Software as a Service, Service oriented
(BPMN) architecture and business process management. He
Level 4 C3 SOA • Apps integration is a certified professional in Production & Inventory
Implem Business Suite • Business Process management (CPIM) from APICS and TOGAF 9
entation Process Execution Language from The Open Group. He co-authored the paper
Orchestration (BPEL) titled 'Realization of Supply Chain Reference
• Round-tripping with Architecture'
BPM
2) GURURAMAN SUBRAMANIAN
VI. CONCLUSIONS [email protected]
The modern agile ERP application provides challenge of Oracle Solution Services India (SSI) Pvt Ltd., Bangalore,
grounded upon standard business process recommended by Karnataka, India
industry supply reference models with realization of loosely

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International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, Volume 7, Issue 8, August 2017
ISSN 2250-3153
637

Gururaman Subramanian has 20 years of industry

experience and 8 years of technology experience.
He specializes in Value Chain Planning and has
worked in many countries on various assignments.
He has authored and published two conference
papers – one titled ‘Role of IT to encounter food
inflation’ presented in the International Conference
on Technology Management 2012 held at Indian
Institute of Science, Bangalore and the second titled
‘Manage Demand in a Socially Responsible Supply
Chain’ presented in the Biennial Supply Chain
Conference held at Indian Institute of Management
Bangalore in 2014.

CORRESPONDING AUTHOR

EUGENE MOSES R, CPIM, TOGAF,

[email protected],
Oracle Solution Services India (SSI) Pvt Ltd., Bangalore,
Karnataka, India

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