Third-party (3P) WMS apps
- Mohit Malviya (Unlicensed)
What are third-party (3P) WMS apps?
Third-party WMS apps are specialized Eshopbox apps designed to efficiently integrate and access sellers' warehouse operations. For example, Increff, Microsoft D365, etc.
These apps can be tailored to specific industry needs and provide a cost-effective, scalable solution for warehouse management.
Context
In the current notable scenarios, Eshopbox, one of the e-commerce operations platforms, operates its own OMS for its sellers by receiving B2C orders from various marketplaces (Amazon, Myntra, Flipkart). The orders then gets handled through Eshopbox FCs. However, multiple sellers have now requested Eshopbox to handle B2C orders on its OMS platform with Sellers' warehouses configured with third-party (3P) WMS applications.
Necessitating an end-to-end integration for this new process, Eshopbox will be seamlessly required to develop and integrate all its APIs with 3P-WMS APIs. Apart from order routing handling, this integration will also need Eshopbox to regulate the inventory and returns workflows to Sellers' 3P-WMS locations and their associated channels.
To begin with, Blackberry has asked Eshopbox to integrate its services with Increff WMS, which, in turn, Blackberry warehouses will utilise at its end.
Functional requirements
For each new 3P-WMS, an associated app will need to be created on the Eshopbox apps page. The name of the app will be the same as the 3P-WMS name. For example, if the 3P-WMS is Increff, the app's name will be Increff.
Keeping Increff as an example going further, the following are each step's details through which the Increff app will be configured. Please note that the same steps will be used across other multiple 3P-WMS app configurations in the future.
Step 1: Connect your Increff account
Eshopbox will share a refresh token with the Increff team. Increff will use the same to configure and create an Eshopbox-integrated channel at its end.
After creating the channel, the Increff will share the related login credentials (username and password) with Eshopbox.
Eshopbox will use the same login credentials to connect the Increff app at its end.
Step 2: Add app locations
App locations will need to be configured at this point. An "Add app location" button can be introduced for the same.
Clicking on the Add app location button, the basic details like Location name, Location code, etc., except the Self-fulfilment section, will be asked, as per the current flow, to create & add an app location. The details will be requested in a pop-up-based form.
Upon its creation, a new tab named App locations should also be created and shown on the Location page. The App locations tab will display a listing representing all the app locations. Each listed app location will be incorporated with an associated app name and active sales channel tags.
An edit location action will also suitably be provided with each listed app location as it has been presently followed. Upon clicking it, we will show one line stating, "This is a third-party WMS app location" instead of the Self-fulfilment location.
The already created app location can also be edited if any app location is clicked from the dropdown present in the "Add app locations" section.
Non-self-fulfilled locations (locations, other than the ones where the sellers handle the self-fulfilment) will also be shown in the dropdown so that the seller can convert the same to 3P-WMS app locations at any time. These locations can also be edited when clicked.
Please note that the Eshopbox service-driven fulfilment centres and self-fulfilled locations will not be shown here.
Step 3: Make your products available to Increff
No additional functional additions are required.
Step 4: Set automations
No additional functional additions are required.