In IBM has announced the launch of a Smarter Commerce Center of Excellence (CoE) at the India Software Lab, Bangalore. The CoE will consist of a team of 25 technical experts selected from the B2B and Commerce Enterprise Marketing Management teams from India Software Lab.
By bringing together a powerful combination of technical expertise, domain knowledge, and best practices from IBMs extensive global engagements, the CoE will offer innovative solutions to automate and accelerate the purchasing, marketing, sales and customer service functions to organizations across India, South Asia and Asia Pacific.
Speaking on the occasion, Dr Gopalakrishnan, Vice-President, India Software Lab, said, The Center of Excellence for Smarter Commerce, the first of its kind in India, will work closely with the business teams on customizing Smarter Commerce solutions for Companies. These solutions, across different technology platforms, will integrate and more effectively manage the value chain across buying, marketing, selling and service processes for different sectors.
Recently IBM researchers surveyed more than 500 economists worldwide and estimated that our planets system of systems carries inefficiencies totaling nearly $15 trillion, or 28 percent of worldwide GDP. Much of this waste is found in our systems of commerce in inventory backlogs, failed product launches, wasted materials and ineffective marketing campaigns. An IBM Institute for Business Value (IBV) study, New Rules for a New Decade, surveyed more than 650 procurement and supply chain executives and found that companies are putting a priority on visibility, integration with partners and other capabilities that can enable smarter commerce approaches.
Dulles Krishnan, Director - Commerce Solutions, IBM Growth Markets, said, Empowered customers are reshaping business, compressing margins and changing paradigms. Customers today expect to engage with companies when and how they want, in person, online and on the go. And they want these methods to tie together seamlessly. Smarter Commerce channelizes marketing efforts to build trust and recognition, leading to greater customer loyalty, revenue and profit margin growth, and agility.
IBM Smarter Commerce Solutions have enabled customers like ING to increase average campaign response rates and the latter expects to reduce its direct marketing costs by 35 percent per year. Crocs, a large retail company, has achieved near-100 percent fill rates on Internet orders through planning and reserving all inventory by channel. True Value, one of the worlds largest retailer-owned hardware cooperatives, serving 54 countries with more than 5,000 stores and 12 regional distribution centers, has decreased lead-time variability, increased fill rates and reduced lost sales with enhanced supply chain visibility.
In India too, IBM is working with leading companies in Retail, CPG, Financial Services, Auto/Manufacturing sectors. Its offerings enable enterprises to provide customer centric solutions in the areas of sourcing/procurement, ecommerce, targeted marketing, supply chain optimization.
Smarter Commerce initiatives draw on IBM's WebSphere Commerce platform and a $2.5 billion investment in on-premise and cloud-based software from IBM's acquisitions of Sterling Commerce, Unica and Coremetrics.
In addition to continuing to expand its solutions through development, IBM continues to expand the Smarter Commerce portfolio through acquisitions to address the entire commerce lifecycle of buying, marketing, selling and service. In December 2011, IBM announced its intent to acquire DemandTec and Emptoris. While DemandTec addresses customer-facing issues, such as price, promotion and merchandising tactics, Emptoris addresses supplier-facing issues, enabling organizations to automate and bring greater intelligence to their supply chain initiatives.
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