ERP Insights >> Magazine >> February - 2016 issue
Retail Industry: From Bricks to Clicks
Author : Meheriar Patel, Chief Technology Officer, The MobileStore Limited
Friday, February 19, 2016
The MobileStore Ltd., India's largest telephony retailer, is a one stop mobile solution shop that provides multi brand handsets, accessories, connections, repairs, VAS etc all under one roof. MobileStore currently has over 600 outlets across 90 cities, thus covering virtually every major town in every state across India.
Today, internet has turned out to be a boon for the retail industry allowing millions of retail startups to launch their business with minimal resources. With the changing times, the choice of purchase which the customers have has turned out to be a major challenge for retailers. The buyers today are not restricted to the brick and mortar stores where they can just walk-in and shop. Internet is also playing a crucial role here by granting the customers an easy access to the retail collections through apps and mobility devices where they can download and use developed applications to buy from the sellers.
Retailers are looking forward to reinvent and redevelop new ways to connect with customers. So, the cyclic curve of customers being online and customers in the store will continue and there will be no stringent pattern where the customer will only come and shop online, or they will only shop through the store. What matters for retailers is to have technology enabled solutions for their customers that would enhance their options of purchase. This should allow the customers to pick up whatever medium they want to use as per their convenience to shop and do whatever is needed for them as the next way is how they want to do it. What is the way of acceptance; it is something that they will have to program themselves.
Impact of Technology on Retail Industry
Technology and retail operations have been going hand in hand for years now. Today, when market places are connected or small distributors are connected, they are connected through the agents in the network which provide services or take services from somebody else. The Application Program Interface (API) plays a crucial role here. The API is supposed to be the most critical piece in any type of connection, because most of the people are using various systems. No two parties will be using the same system, so when you want to connect into two different systems, API integration is must for the business. And one must keep security and time lags in mind. With time being the essence of industry, the business demands are becoming crucial in terms of deliveries.
IoT and Mobility in Retail
Internet of Things (IoT) is having a profound impact on the way in which companies take advantage of connected devices for business transformation. Being a game changer for the retail industry, IoT is giving retailers the tools and insights to transform their businesses. Mobility on the other hand is enabling IoT and allowing more and more businesses to derive advantage out of it. The market places today hold a larger share in terms of mobile penetration, the usage of mobile or applications or through a web browser, but there is a lot of innovations coming in, which is not only going to help in the front end to the customers, but also at the back-end in terms of quality and training which the companies need to take care of internally. There is an equal amount of focus on mobility platforms, web platforms as well as the store platforms. So, the focus of retailers should not be lost because there is a lot of penetration on the ecommerce.
Current Priorities of CIOs
1. Integrating with market places
2. Mobility as a platform is very important
3. Developing feature ready applications
4. Building strong back end transaction systems
5 Building a strong supply chain management system
6. Customer relationship management
Driving Transformation in Retail through IT
Currently, technology is catching up in a big way. The users are becoming very knowledgeable and smart, ready with information and eager to look at the innovating new features and capabilities. India being a global concentrated country, it has a lot of focus from global perspective, the opportunities here are great and obviously IT is playing a very big role in enabling all the features which are actually going to be future ready, safe and secure to operate, having quality tested standards which are very important. You have to be correct the very first time. And if you achieve these things then it will be a great way ahead. (As told to Deepshikha Singh)
Retail Industry: From Bricks to Clicks
Author : Meheriar Patel, Chief Technology Officer, The MobileStore Limited
Friday, February 19, 2016
The MobileStore Ltd., India's largest telephony retailer, is a one stop mobile solution shop that provides multi brand handsets, accessories, connections, repairs, VAS etc all under one roof. MobileStore currently has over 600 outlets across 90 cities, thus covering virtually every major town in every state across India.
Today, internet has turned out to be a boon for the retail industry allowing millions of retail startups to launch their business with minimal resources. With the changing times, the choice of purchase which the customers have has turned out to be a major challenge for retailers. The buyers today are not restricted to the brick and mortar stores where they can just walk-in and shop. Internet is also playing a crucial role here by granting the customers an easy access to the retail collections through apps and mobility devices where they can download and use developed applications to buy from the sellers.
Retailers are looking forward to reinvent and redevelop new ways to connect with customers. So, the cyclic curve of customers being online and customers in the store will continue and there will be no stringent pattern where the customer will only come and shop online, or they will only shop through the store. What matters for retailers is to have technology enabled solutions for their customers that would enhance their options of purchase. This should allow the customers to pick up whatever medium they want to use as per their convenience to shop and do whatever is needed for them as the next way is how they want to do it. What is the way of acceptance; it is something that they will have to program themselves.
Impact of Technology on Retail Industry
Technology and retail operations have been going hand in hand for years now. Today, when market places are connected or small distributors are connected, they are connected through the agents in the network which provide services or take services from somebody else. The Application Program Interface (API) plays a crucial role here. The API is supposed to be the most critical piece in any type of connection, because most of the people are using various systems. No two parties will be using the same system, so when you want to connect into two different systems, API integration is must for the business. And one must keep security and time lags in mind. With time being the essence of industry, the business demands are becoming crucial in terms of deliveries.
IoT and Mobility in Retail
Internet of Things (IoT) is having a profound impact on the way in which companies take advantage of connected devices for business transformation. Being a game changer for the retail industry, IoT is giving retailers the tools and insights to transform their businesses. Mobility on the other hand is enabling IoT and allowing more and more businesses to derive advantage out of it. The market places today hold a larger share in terms of mobile penetration, the usage of mobile or applications or through a web browser, but there is a lot of innovations coming in, which is not only going to help in the front end to the customers, but also at the back-end in terms of quality and training which the companies need to take care of internally. There is an equal amount of focus on mobility platforms, web platforms as well as the store platforms. So, the focus of retailers should not be lost because there is a lot of penetration on the ecommerce.
Current Priorities of CIOs
1. Integrating with market places
2. Mobility as a platform is very important
3. Developing feature ready applications
4. Building strong back end transaction systems
5 Building a strong supply chain management system
6. Customer relationship management
Driving Transformation in Retail through IT
Currently, technology is catching up in a big way. The users are becoming very knowledgeable and smart, ready with information and eager to look at the innovating new features and capabilities. India being a global concentrated country, it has a lot of focus from global perspective, the opportunities here are great and obviously IT is playing a very big role in enabling all the features which are actually going to be future ready, safe and secure to operate, having quality tested standards which are very important. You have to be correct the very first time. And if you achieve these things then it will be a great way ahead. (As told to Deepshikha Singh)
Today, internet has turned out to be a boon for the retail industry allowing millions of retail startups to launch their business with minimal resources. With the changing times, the choice of purchase which the customers have has turned out to be a major challenge for retailers. The buyers today are not restricted to the brick and mortar stores where they can just walk-in and shop. Internet is also playing a crucial role here by granting the customers an easy access to the retail collections through apps and mobility devices where they can download and use developed applications to buy from the sellers.
Retailers are looking forward to reinvent and redevelop new ways to connect with customers. So, the cyclic curve of customers being online and customers in the store will continue and there will be no stringent pattern where the customer will only come and shop online, or they will only shop through the store. What matters for retailers is to have technology enabled solutions for their customers that would enhance their options of purchase. This should allow the customers to pick up whatever medium they want to use as per their convenience to shop and do whatever is needed for them as the next way is how they want to do it. What is the way of acceptance; it is something that they will have to program themselves.
Impact of Technology on Retail Industry
Technology and retail operations have been going hand in hand for years now. Today, when market places are connected or small distributors are connected, they are connected through the agents in the network which provide services or take services from somebody else. The Application Program Interface (API) plays a crucial role here. The API is supposed to be the most critical piece in any type of connection, because most of the people are using various systems. No two parties will be using the same system, so when you want to connect into two different systems, API integration is must for the business. And one must keep security and time lags in mind. With time being the essence of industry, the business demands are becoming crucial in terms of deliveries.
IoT and Mobility in Retail
Internet of Things (IoT) is having a profound impact on the way in which companies take advantage of connected devices for business transformation. Being a game changer for the retail industry, IoT is giving retailers the tools and insights to transform their businesses. Mobility on the other hand is enabling IoT and allowing more and more businesses to derive advantage out of it. The market places today hold a larger share in terms of mobile penetration, the usage of mobile or applications or through a web browser, but there is a lot of innovations coming in, which is not only going to help in the front end to the customers, but also at the back-end in terms of quality and training which the companies need to take care of internally. There is an equal amount of focus on mobility platforms, web platforms as well as the store platforms. So, the focus of retailers should not be lost because there is a lot of penetration on the ecommerce.
Current Priorities of CIOs
1. Integrating with market places
2. Mobility as a platform is very important
3. Developing feature ready applications
4. Building strong back end transaction systems
5 Building a strong supply chain management system
6. Customer relationship management
Driving Transformation in Retail through IT
Currently, technology is catching up in a big way. The users are becoming very knowledgeable and smart, ready with information and eager to look at the innovating new features and capabilities. India being a global concentrated country, it has a lot of focus from global perspective, the opportunities here are great and obviously IT is playing a very big role in enabling all the features which are actually going to be future ready, safe and secure to operate, having quality tested standards which are very important. You have to be correct the very first time. And if you achieve these things then it will be a great way ahead. (As told to Deepshikha Singh)
