Oracle is Aeroxchange’s tech partner

NEW DELHI: Oracle has been selected as the technology partner powering
Aeroxchange, the airline industry's largest business-to-business eCommerce
exchange. Aeroxchange, to be officially launched in the next few months, will
offer the most comprehensive selection of aircraft technical parts and services
as well as general business suppliers to airlines on the Web.

With its founding member-airlines in Asia-Pacific, North America and Europe
representing passenger and cargo operations, the new exchange is global in
scope. Its founding partners are Air Canada, All Nippon Airways (ANA), America
West Airlines, Cathay Pacific Airways, FedEx, Japan Airlines, Lufthansa,
Northwest Airlines, Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS) and Singapore Airlines.
Additional airline equity partners include Air New Zealand, Austrian Airlines
and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines. It is estimated that the exchange will handle more
than $45 billion of the world airlines' total purchases of goods and services,
excluding aircraft and fuel.

The new online exchange will be powered by Oracle's leading B2B exchange
platform and technology that will provide not only online auctioning, reverse
auctioning and contract and spot buying capabilities, but will also
collaborative supply chain planning functionality that will facilitate accurate
capacity and demand planning for participating suppliers. Oracle will provide
the technology, functionality and hosting platform.

Initial development will focus on Internet procurement capabilities resulting
in streamlined and enhanced processes for greater efficiency, providing both
airlines and suppliers benefits associated with lower transaction processing and
inventory costs. Lowering the total cost of ownership throughout the supply
chain will create significant value for the participants. Later, development
stages will include supply chain management features such as improved inventory
control and production planning.

Some of the items that will be traded on the Aeroxchange include airframes,
avionics and engine components as well as a wide range of airline specific goods
and maintenance services. In addition to the founding members, all airlines,
other industry related companies and their suppliers will be invited to use the
services of the exchange.