Descartes Systems Group (NASDAQ: DSGX) (TSX: DSG), Waterloo, Ontario, unveiled Descartes Community, a cloud-based service, at the annual Descartes Global User and Partner Conference. The new service allows Descartes customers to more deeply interact in their daily business within their industry and find new ways to grow.

The Descartes Community service offers members the ability to connect with Descartes GLN members through collaboration tools and automate multiparty processes by utilizing the SMF business document definitions. To facilitate the widespread adoption of the Descartes Community, Descartes is making its industry leading Standard Messaging Format (SMF) communication protocol publicly available for use, free of charge, to those wishing to connect to Descartes Global Logistics Network (GLN).

“Our customers are telling us that they need solutions that get them better connected to the organizations and individuals they work with every day and to be able to more easily reach across their industry to find and transact with new partners and do it in new ways,” said Chris Jones, executive VP of marketing and services at Descartes.

“The Descartes Community service is unique in that it allows organizations and individuals to define their operational and electronic capabilities and roles, provides industry-wide access, and helps brings together the applications and content that are needed every day to make the best decisions across the logistics chain possible and execute them,” Jones says.

The backbone of the cloud-based Descartes Community is Descartes’ GLN, the world’s largest multi-modal network with over 35,000 connected parties.