NEW YORK, Jan. 15, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- NRF 2019, NYC
-- Today at the National
Retail Federation's 2019 Big Show, IBM (NYSE: IBM) announced
the latest findings of a study into the Retail & Consumer
Industry and launched new AI-powered innovations to help the retail
industry accelerate customer experience by providing tools designed
to optimize worker and business performance. At the heart of this
is retail's growing adoption of intelligent automation, defined as
the convergence of people, processes, automation, and AI.
This represents a watershed moment for the industry as human
capabilities can be augmented to help reduce errors, while enabling
a culture of digital operations and customer experience
innovations. Spearheading this transformation is IBM Order
Management with Watson Order Optimizer, and IBM MetroPulse, which
help retailers improve omni-channel profitability and customer
satisfaction.
As the next generation of customers expects brands to provide
unmatched experiential design and functionality across multiple
interfaces, retaining customer loyalty requires retailers and
manufacturers to implement cognitive, automated services while
still remaining transparent and secure.
Developed with the National Retail Federation, IBM's Institute
for Business Value released the findings of its latest report, 'The
coming AI revolution in retail and consumer products,' which
surveyed 1,900 Retail and Consumer Products leaders across 23
countries. The survey reveals:
- 85 percent of retail and 79 percent of consumer products
companies surveyed plan to be using intelligent automation for
supply chain planning by 2021.
- 79 percent of retail and consumer products companies surveyed
expect to be using intelligent automation for customer intelligence
by 2021.
- Retail and consumer products executives surveyed project that
intelligent automation capabilities could help increase annual
revenue growth by up to 10 percent.
"The changing landscape across today's retail and consumer
industries has resulted in a rapid rise of emerging technologies,
especially when it comes to Automation and Artificial Intelligence.
Retail is one of the sectors to already implement and invest in
cognitive and AI technologies, resulting in new and unexpected
offerings for consumers and shoppers around the world," said
Luq Niazi, Global Managing Director,
IBM Consumer Industries.
Niazi added, "Throughout the entire value chain and operational
infrastructure of B2B and B2C commerce, there has already been an
increased adoption and demand for Intelligent Automation. This also
brings forth the need for stronger transparency, ethical practices
and business prioritization to evaluate and deploy AI
responsibility. Working with the right partners and third-party
experts can result in acceleration of digital services,
capabilities and customer experience and business efficiency for
retailers of all sizes."
"Retailers are increasingly using innovative technologies to
offer new ways to shop both online and in-store and provide
rewarding careers for employees. From reducing shipping costs and
improving supply chain efficiency to personalizing shopping
experiences and helping workers acquire new skills, AI technologies
allow retailers to compete in the 21st century economy and better
serve their customers. This is what the future of retail looks
like," said NRF VP of Research Development and Industry Analysis
Mark Mathews.
Leading French retailer Casino Group is already using
Intelligent Automation in their operations. Cyril Bourgois, Chief Digital Officer, Groupe
Casino, commented that "as the gap between brick-and-mortar and
digital stores closes, physical and digital distribution channels
will not only need to adapt to tastes and trends but also to
anticipate them. This requires an entirely new mindset based on
constant adaptation, with a view to more effectively anticipating
and meeting consumer expectations while maintaining close, trusting
relationships with the customers."
New AI-Powered Innovations for IBM Order Management –Putting
Fulfillment at the Heart of the Customer Experience
New AI-powered innovations from IBM Order Management (OMS)
are designed to help organizations improve omni-channel
profitability and customer experience. The AI-powered Watson Order
Optimization capabilities integrated with OMS can help increase
purchase conversions by quickly adapting to seasonal fluctuations,
while scaling fulfillment capacity. This supports increased yet
regionally varied customer demand.
As the only solution of its kind, omni-channel fulfillment
practitioners can increase collaboration across store ops,
merchandising, supply chain and IT to save time and improve
business performance. Order Optimizer's new predictive models
factor seasonality as it learns daily sell-through patterns, using
data from across the fulfillment network to help organizations
identify where to best source an order. Additionally, new carrier
optimization capabilities can help reduce shipping costs by
automatically issuing alternative carrier options to fulfill orders
if weight or dimension limits are exceeded for the initial
carrier's restrictions.
These innovations build on the integration of IBM Order
Optimizer's business user controls UI and resolution rooms within
Watson Supply Chain Insights. This provides 'one source of truth'
to help fulfillment leaders analyze the impact to customer
experience, SLAs and conversions, while facilitating collaboration
among external suppliers to help reduce order processing costs.
"Order Optimizer has allowed REI to see immediate reductions in
split shipments, reducing costs and improving customer delivery
experiences," said Matt Bergerson,
Director of Omni Channel Experience and Operations, REI. "It also
helped us manage capacity constraints as peak, reducing order
expedites and providing faster service to our customers."
IBM MetroPulse
IBM's Industry Platforms Unit, working with IBM's India Research
Lab, brings new first-of-a-kind, AI-driven capabilities into the
latest enhancements to MetroPulse. The new capabilities are
designed to allow consumer industry companies to better understand
customers through:
- New larger data sets from a leading consumer products
market data provider and also product sentiment data via product
ratings and reviews provider, provides access to consumer
preferences and characteristics at the neighborhood level.
- New retail-industry specific vocabulary into the
platform to help the AI understands the difference between fashion
items such as jackets and sweaters, and between boat necks and
V-necks.
- New AI algorithms and models that can help identify and
understand the signals buried in the data and exposes them in a
meaningful and standardized way via APIs. These signals can then be
further processed by solutions and additional solution-specific
models to help business leaders and merchandisers to understand trends,
behaviors, and preferences of their target consumers. The new
models use explainable AI techniques to help users of the platform
understand why an AI model generates a particular output for a
given input.
Available now, the enhanced MetroPulse is a
software-as-a-service cloud offering for line of business users in
retail and consumer brand businesses.
IBM will demonstrate the capabilities of IBM Order Management
and MetroPulse at NRF 2019 in booth #2119.
About IBM
For further information please visit:
www.ibm.com/industries/retail-consumer-products
Media Contacts
IBM
Leslie Park
IBM External Relations
leslie.park@ibm.com
201-230-1418
National Retail Federation
Bethany Aronhalt
Senior Director, Media Relations
National Retail Federation
aronhaltb@nrf.com
202-626-8119
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SOURCE IBM