Sustainability in MDM: tracing the origin of your products

Sustainability  throughout the entire production chain

Sustainability is increasingly on the agenda. MDM systems follow this trend and facilitate the processing of sustainability data as master data better and better. Tom quickly picks up on this: “We are evolving more and more towards a circular economy. In this, it is important to be able to trace products back to where they come from. To obtain an ecological label for products, you must be able to trace each component back to its source. Data plays a crucial role in this.”

Where previously you spent a lot of time tracing an entire production chain, this process is now much more efficient. It takes data system administrators less time to manage sustainability data. It also provides clarity: it quickly becomes clear how ecological a product really is. As a provider, you can decide based on that data to include certain products in your range and exclude others.

Compliance with local regulations

Tracing the components of products to their origin is also important for compliance with local regulations. Tom explains: “In the past, origin played a less significant role, so companies were less concerned with it. With MDM, it is now very easy to capture that data. MDM systems ensure that you can trace and include the entire chain of components of a product in the system.”

For product providers, this is important, but for end-users, the importance of clear data is also increasing. Consumers are more aware than ever: the ecological and social footprint of products plays an increasingly important role in purchasing decisions. By offering origin data clearly and transparently through your MDM system, consumers can check how fair or ecological their product is.

An additional advantage of this data transparency: greenwashing becomes a thing of the past. From source to consumer, you can trace the lifecycle of a product: it becomes impossible to present products as more environmentally friendly than they actually are. “When you make efforts in terms of sustainability, you can substantiate this with your data,” Tom continues.

“Data is objective, which is an advantage. Based on that data in your MDM system, you give extra weight to sustainable visions and ambitions.”

How AI and machine learning provide time savings and ease of use

In the future, the role of AI in MDM systems will increase. There are several reasons driving the adoption of AI and Machine Learning (ML). Firstly, there is the explosion of attributes in products. Additionally, regulatory pressure has increased, as has the demand for transparency. “AI responds well to these needs,” Tom continues. “The current trends can be seen in functions such as auto-classification, text and image generators, and matching reviews with ML recommendations.”

Automatic classification of products

In your MDM system, it is possible to upload a photo and then let machine learning do the initial classification. “Imagine: a clothing provider can use image recognition on a photo of a garment to determine what type of item it is. The algorithm can distinguish between a shirt or pants and will automatically assign the item to the correct category.”

It goes even further, Tom says: “When the system detects that the shirt is blue, it automatically suggests ‘color = blue’. Depending on how you have trained and set up your system, you choose whether a human check is still needed or not. Do you want to double-check if it is really blue, or do you trust that the AI is correct?”

Automatic generating text and images

Another handy functionality of AI is the text and image generators. “Nowadays, you can use AI to provide product descriptions in your MDM system,” Tom explains. This can save a lot of time.

AI uses advanced Machine Learning algorithms such as deep learning and neural networks. As a result, text generators can generate relevant text when you provide them with a context or prompt. Besides text, it is now even possible to generate images via AI.

“Suppose the images of your products have not yet been made. If you need generic images, you can also use AI to generate images.” You simply provide a text description or style reference to the image generator. It then tries to construct your requested image as accurately as possible. AI-driven image generators increase efficiency and provide additional ease of use.

Data as a Service transforms your data management

Data always and everywhere available in real-time

The last trend we spot is Data as a Service (DaaS). This involves using an external service provider to maintain and deliver your product data. All product data is stored in a cloud environment. This has enormous advantages: you always have access to the data, plus only one dataset is needed for all users. No more local copies of product lists!

“This is quite a great evolution,” Tom says enthusiastically. “A previous challenge with MDM was that data could not always be made available in real-time. To retrieve data, you sometimes needed a lot of IT resources and high computing capacity of computers.” This is now a thing of the past.

“What happens with DaaS is that they have turned the system around. Where you used to push the data towards your webshop and other recipients, it is now sent once to the cloud environment. From there, all users who need the product data can retrieve it centrally.”

This offers advantages. The data is always available, in real-time, and with high volume. As a result, you no longer risk overloading your MDM system. Plus, when data is updated, you immediately receive a notification that the data has been changed.

“This is convenient for the receiving systems. You not only get the message that data has been changed, but you also see at a glance whether those data changes are relevant to you,” Tom explains. “From the DaaS system, events are sent to the event queues to notify that changes have been made. If we take our blue shirt as an example again, you will know in real-time which data has been changed for that shirt. Not all updates are equally relevant to you as a receiving system. You get to choose which updates you want to retrieve. While in the past you had to retrieve and process all data when changes were made, including data that might not be relevant.”

Opportunities of the cloud environment

DaaS is also a scalable service. This means that many users can retrieve product information simultaneously. “A nice use case of this can be that product providers offer a QR code in the store. When you scan it, you immediately receive all product information about that item. Think of the origin, certifications, sustainability… of the product. Millions of users can scan those QR codes simultaneously. With a classic MDM system without DaaS, this is not possible: the systems could overload with many simultaneous requests.”

Another nice example is that without DaaS, you also had to use middleware and sometimes a lot of outbound integrations. “At a client, 30 outbound integrations were needed to 30 different receiving systems. Not only did building this take a lot of time, but it could also take several hours for all that data to be synchronized in all those diverse systems. In the DaaS story, we only need to build one outbound integration to the DaaS solution, and from there, the receiving systems can retrieve the data via API technology. An incredible bonus is that it now only takes a few minutes to synchronize that data. There is a huge time saving.”

We integrate these trends into your MDM solution

It takes some technical knowledge to successfully integrate these new functionalities into your MDM system. Are you excited to use these MDM trends in your systems as well? Let us help: our experts have tons of experience to fine-tune your MDM system according to these latest trends. Ease of use and time savings come naturally!

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