Core-Level Concepts

Ignite Fulfill links and siloes different pieces of information throughout the system by using the following concepts. This is a quick, top-level overview of these concepts and how they link together.

System Entities

Organizations

Organizations are the first-level identifier of all data in the system. An organization will typically be linked with users and warehouse information. This linkage allows the system to establish the organization's existence, the warehouse's location, and which users should be allowed to access the data contained within. More information can be found on the Organization page.

Warehouse

Warehouses are the second-level identifier of all data in the system. A warehouse can only belong to one organization as of writing this article. The reason our linkage is built this way is to allow for potential multi-warehouse functions in the future. All inventory information will be uniquely linked to a warehouse, along with linkages to merchants and products to determine the SKU and the merchant it belongs to.

Connections

Connections refer to any connections made with supported third-party integrations for enhancing a business use case. These refer to any marketplace connections, e-commerce platforms, shipping carriers, etc. Connections can either belong to a merchant or an organization, depending on which scope was selected by the user initiating it. More information can be found on the Connections page.

Products

Products refer to the catalog and listing information that is fetched from connections and stored in the system. We do not permit the creation of listings within the system, hence all the information stored on the connection is accepted as a source of truth. Products can also be linked together to create composite items, which enable bundling and multi-packing capabilities. More information can be found on the Products page.

Inventory

Inventory refers to all the real-world entities that represent stock for a product. Inventory is linked with a merchant’s products, and stored in a warehouse. We track three main quantities, allocated, fulfillable, and unfulfillable quantity. All of these are tracked against products.

Orders

Orders refer to all inbound and outbound inventory transfer requests that are generated and/or processed through the system. These include advanced shipping notices, purchase orders (for inbound) sales orders, and shipments (for outbound).

Fulfilments

Fulfilments refer to the actual fulfillment released onto the floor on which activities are performed. A good way to think about this is how Amazon shipments are split. Amazon shipment plans can be divided into multiple shipments that may be delivered to different fulfillment centers. Using this example, the shipment plans are the orders and the actual fulfilled shipments are fulfillments.

This concept can be extended to potential scenarios involving partial fulfillment like back orders, advanced orders, dealing with out-of-stock SKUs already allocated to orders, etc.

Real-World Entities

Users

Users refer to those real-world individuals that will access the system. As of writing this article, a user can have one of three pre-defined roles. This role dictates the level of access a user will have to a system. A user can have access to multiple organizations, each with a specific role. This allows the user to use the same credentials across different operations. More information can be found on the Users page.

Merchants

Merchants refer to the real-world individuals/entities that are availing fulfillment services from an organization that uses Ignite Fulfill. Merchants will have a dedicated user to log into the platform to see the merchant-facing interface. All connections and products that are fetched on behalf of a merchant will be child-linked to them. Merchants will also be parent-linked to a warehouse and organization to determine their access. More information can be found on the Merchants page.