Price Book Visualization System for Global Data Consolidation
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Organizations face challenges in managing prices globally due to scattered, incomplete, and inconsistent data across multiple sources, leading to inefficient and inaccurate decision-making, which can result in margin leakage, inconsistent prices, and reduced customer satisfaction.
Innovation Solution
The development of systems and methods that consolidate data from multiple sources to generate consolidated price books, allowing for real-time visualization and flexible customization, with built-in rules for approval processes to ensure accurate and efficient price management.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If data is consolidated from multiple scattered sources, then data completeness and consistency are improved, but processing complexity and time consumption increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the price management system into multiple price books organized by geographic regions, product categories, and customer segments. This segmentation allows data to be consolidated systematically rather than as a monolithic block, reducing processing complexity while maintaining data completeness. Each price book contains specific subsets of price data that can be independently managed and processed.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces an intermediary processing layer that automatically standardizes, cleanses, and validates data from multiple scattered sources before consolidation. This intermediary layer handles the complex processing tasks, shielding users from the underlying complexity while ensuring data reliability through systematic transformation and validation rules.
2Adaptability or versatility
If manual data processing is performed, then flexibility in handling incomplete data is improved, but productivity and accuracy decrease
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements self-service capabilities through automated data processing pipelines that independently handle incomplete, unstructured, and inconsistent data from multiple sources. The system automatically applies cleansing rules, validates data integrity, and standardizes formats without requiring manual intervention, thereby maintaining adaptability while dramatically improving productivity and reducing errors.
3Quantity of substance
If aggregated data is used instead of non-aggregated data, then the number of SKUs and variables available for comparison is improved, but data processing difficulty increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments aggregated data into organized price books that group SKUs by geographic region, product category, and customer segment. This segmentation makes the large volume of aggregated data manageable and easier to process by breaking it into logical units that can be independently analyzed and compared, reducing processing difficulty while maintaining data volume benefits.
4Loss of time
If real-time visualization is implemented, then decision-making speed is improved, but system complexity and computational requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a universal visualization framework that serves multiple functions: displaying price data, comparing different price books, analyzing trends, and supporting what-if scenarios. This multi-functional visualization system reduces overall system complexity by consolidating multiple specialized tools into a single platform, enabling real-time decision-making without proportionally increasing complexity.
Data Source
AI summary
Systems, methods, and graphical user interfaces (GUIs) for visualizing price-book data are provided. Product identifiers and associated price data points are ingested from a plurality of sources and stored in accordance with a product hierarchy. The product identifiers are furthermore organized into a plurality of price books that have a nested relationship with one another. A GUI is provided by which a user may execute an instruction to visualize a portion of the stored data, wherein the input comprises an indication of a subset of the plurality of product identifiers comprising an indication of one or more of the price books. In response to detecting the input, the system generates and displays a visualization based at least in part on the input. Users may further use the GUI to modify one or more price data points in a price book, including simultaneously modifying price data points across multiple price books.