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In today’s world of information, it is important for businesses to obtain information from trusted and authentic sources. The issues then are:

 

 

 

In any business transaction, the trusted and authentic source of information is one’s trading partner. This means that trading partners must be able to share information. How then can trading partners share information? Traditionally, paper documents were transmitted physically (post, telegraph, courier or fax) or orally (telephone). But these traditional ways of transmitting information are inefficient and error-prone. The more efficient manner to transmit or share information between trading partners is by making their computers talk to each other – electronic data interchange (EDI). EDI is an effective 1-1 way to share information. A 1-1 basis of sharing information is efficient for most business transactions. In the case of data sharing or data synchronization or data alignment, a 1-1 basis of sharing information may not be the most effective way in a developed market, where data synchronization demand has reached a critical mass.

 

In order to have visibility of something, one must collect the information of every event about that something. This means that one must know

 

 

But each individual actor in the supply chain collects or possesses the information of only those event or activities that transpired within its four-walls. This means that if one needs information about an activity that transpired outside his four-walls, he must be able to seek the information somewhere. In the case of EPC/RFID, the ability to seek information outside one’s four-wall is imperative. Thus, there is a need for a GS1 EPCglobal Network.