JDA creates a more profitable omni-channel supply chain

JDA Software Group, Inc. has announced new integrated fulfilment capabilities that combine the power of JDA Intelligent Fulfilment and Labour Productivity solutions with Order Management solutions from IBM Commerce. By leveraging this powerful technology collaboration, companies can process orders more intelligently and profitably across sales channels in real-time to ensure customers have a flawless end-to-end buying experience.

"The convergence of physical and digital retail has changed how you need to deliver on the customer buying experience. The customer is the new boss and they want their product, at their moment, at their price, delivered their way. As a result, companies need to offer personalised, differentiated customer experience while delivering the order as promised," noted Wayne Usie, senior vice president of retail, at JDA. "In the past, retailers made fulfilment decisions without a holistic view of inventory, labour and transportation availability and costs, and have historically sacrificed profit margins to deliver customer satisfaction. With this release, we have bridged that gap and provided the foundation to solve this problem by integrating with IBM to provide the necessary visibility in execution to labor and demand impacts - allowing companies to begin improving profitability with each omni-channel order."

"Many retailers force shoppers to choose between convenience, product selection and price as they shop across channels. In fact, some shoppers that select the 'pick up in store' option might need to visit multiple store locations to fulfil their entire order, which ultimately tarnishes their brand experience," said John Mesberg, General Manager, Offering Management and Strategy, IBM Commerce. "By leveraging the combined expertise of IBM and JDA, retailers can present order fulfilment options in real-time that delight demanding customers and ensure that a great experience lasts from the first click to when they have their purchase in hand."

The latest JDA release delivers major benefits to both retailers and shoppers alike:

• "Click and Collect" ordering delivers simple, customized ordering for shoppers, and cost savings for retailers. Instead of navigating a confusing array of options, JDA offers a simplified experience that allows shoppers to select their preferred pick-up or delivery time and location as part of a streamlined, simplified buying experience. Behind the scenes, JDA and IBM integrate the order management, the warehouse management and the transportation management systems to fulfil each order profitably. For example, retailers can reduce inventory by linking to distribution centres and hubs while maximising transportation assets because shipments by automatically consolidating shipments and optimising routes.
• "Rescue the Return" minimizes the cost of product returns. Product returns are becoming significantly more costly for omni-channel retailers who lack visibility into incoming returns, and the resources needed to process these items. As a result, returned items at a store location rather than being added back into inventory and sold to a customer. JDA's new release features an intelligent returns authorisation process where the order management system alerts the warehouse management system of expected returns. By including returned items as part of available inventory, teams can proactively fulfil orders and reducing the number of mark-downs in order to minimise lost sales, and maximise margins.
• Destination-driven demand shows the true source of orders. When shoppers can't find the product they're looking for in a store, store associates typically arrange for delivery from a fulfilment centre to their home. However, traditional fulfilment systems fail to attribute this demand to that store location which results in forecasts and inventory plans which, over time, fail to deliver an accurate assessment of what is in stock, which can ultimately impact the customer's experience. With these new capabilities, teams have insight into each customer's omni-channel order details which enables accurate forecasting and replenishment of stores and, more broadly, improved upstream inventory positioning to reduce labour, transfer and shipping costs in the future.

"As omni-channel retailing continues to advance, we believe that integration between physical and digital channels is vital, as is tighter integration between eCommerce, Order management and all elements within the supply chain. This will be key to driving better customer service through increased responsiveness and at the same time, improve business efficiency, said Peter Swann, operations director, Debenhams. "We believe customer expectations will continue to increase and that the collaboration between IBM and JDA in developing their Intelligent Fulfilment suite of solutions, could provide companies with the platform to meet those expectations but also do it in the most profitable manner."

"Today, only 16 per cent of companies are able to serve multiple channels profitably, in part because their order fulfillment systems are not integrated with other key systems. Most retailers cannot see the true cost of fulfilling a specific order, including inventory, labour and transportation costs," said Usie. "For the first time, JDA's collaboration with IBM balances a customised buying experience for shoppers with a realistic cost-to-serve model. This unique capability creates an opportunity to balance high levels of service with high levels of profitability, even in today's challenging omni-channel environment."