Nippon Steel to Implement Electronic Shipping Documents for Import of Raw Materials

Since last year， Nippon Steel has been taking care of all the administrative work associated with the payment for the imported raw materials， such as iron ore and coal， by itself*1).
The majority of the administrative work is related to processing a variety of paper shipping documents*2)， which are sent from suppliers， shipping companies， banks or other trading partners.
To enhance business processing efficiency and reduce administrative costs， Nippon Steel decided to implement the utilization of electronic documents in place of the paper shipping documents for raw materials.

For the implementation of these electronic documents， Nippon Steel will adopt bolero.net service， which is offered by Bolero International Ltd.
Nippon Steel and POSCO in Korea， which is adopting bolero.net at the same time， are the first two companies in the steel industry to adopt bolero.net.
The two companies， which had formed a strategic alliance in August 2000， have agreed to cooperate in many areas regarding this implementation， and have been collaborating in creating a common format for electronic shipping documents (boleroXML DTDs for the steel raw materials trade).

bolero.net enables users to exchange electronic shipping documents via the Internet. Its title registry application can be effectively substituted for the legal function of conventional shipping documents such as Bills of Lading. bolero.net also offers boleroXML， a set of simplified electronic trade document definitions， which will facilitate interoperability amongst the members.
In the first step of implementation， Nippon Steel will start exchanging electronic shipping documents with BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto， the two major mining companies based in Australia that joined up with bolero.net late last year and have been working closely with Nippon Steel and POSCO， and major shipping companies， which transport raw materials for Nippon Steel， in the 2nd half of this year. In addition， Nippon Steel will encourage other trading partners to participate in this implementation so that electronic shipping documents can be utilized for trades with more suppliers and shipping companies by the end of this fiscal year.

*1)Last year， Nippon Steel established NS Resource Net to take care of these administrative work associated with the import， which had been taken care of by the trading companies.

*2) paper shipping documents include Bills of Lading， Sea Waybills， Invoices， Certificates of Weight， Certificates of Analysis， etc.

For further information contact:
Nippon Steel Corporation Takashi Kanke +81-3-3275-5021

Reference:
http://www.bolero.net/