Database Links Via The Web

Aspect's client to be linked with R/3

By Gregory Dalton

spect Development Inc. aims to help manufacturers better integrate their design and production processes by giving them Web-client access to its parts database. The new Java-based client, Explore.net, is also being linked with SAP's R/3 application suite.

Explore.net gives engineers designing high-tech products-including networking devices, airplane engines, and computers-desktop access to Aspect's Explore database of 2.5 million electronic and mechanical parts. Previously, users needed a powerful PC or workstation to run the program.

Outside Help
IBM, which has an Explore database for 1,500 employees worldwide, decided earlier this year to partial ly fund the development of Explore.net to make access easier. IBM started testing the client this month at about 100 sites.

In one scenario, an IBM worker in Mexico would use Explore.net to identify parts and suppliers by searching the Explore database stored on an IBM server in New York. The worker could then order parts that were needed, through a back-end connection to IBM's procurement software.

Internetworking vendor Bay Networks Inc. has begun deploying Explore.net for about 400 users. Explore database users Lucent Technologies, 3Com, and Pratt & Whitney are also interested, according to Aspect, in Mountain View, Calif.

As part of an agreement between Aspect and SAP, the Explore database will be tied to SAP's R/3 procurement and purchasing modules later this quarter. That integration will extend R/3 into the design phase of manufacturing by letting engineers locate a component using the Explore database and then move easily to R/3 to calculate costs and availability or even initiate a purch ase order.

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