Hot SKU

A Hot SKU is a popular item with a high volume of requests during a specific period of time.

For example, the release of a new CD from a very popular artist might generate a high volume of requests for that item right as it goes on the market.

Under high transaction load, the presence of Hot SKUs can create a situation where multiple lock requests are placed on the same item at the same time. When that happens, one transaction holds the lock and the rest are blocked.

Sterling™ Order Management System can identify a certain item as a Hot SKU automatically. Under normal conditions, when Hot SKUs are not detected, the system would place a lock on an item during inventory changes, update the supply and demand tables, and then release the lock. When an item is considered hot, the system does not lock it. Instead, the changes are inserted into two additional tables, one for demand and one for supply.

Sterling Order Management System always looks at both the base and additional tables. In order to keep the additional tables from growing infinitely, Sterling Order Management System provides an agent that reconciles the base and additional supply and demand tables.