Content about Information technology management

Go offline, young man: That appears to be the mantra of e-commerce merchants these days.

As competition in the world of online retailing heats up — with Amazon's ever-burgeoning dominance posing the biggest threat — more pure-players are taking the brick-and-mortar plunge. It's a reminder, many experts say, of the strong appeal of the in-store experience — even when stacked up against the convenience of online shopping.

Los Altos, Calif. -- Talend said Monday that The Container Store is deploying Talend Enterprise Data Integration to simplify, standardize and move data across multiple platforms.

With Talend, The Container Store now has cross-platform standardization, improved development times and automated processes that were previously done manually.

Menlo Park, Calif. -- Managing and classifying enterprise data is the number one security and privacy area in need of improvement, and remains a major challenge for IT departments, according to a survey about IT risk factors for 2013 published by global consulting firm Protiviti.

The 2013 IT Priorities Survey found that IT executives are struggling to manage the wide variety of technology risk, regulatory compliance and performance challenges that now face them.

Redwood Shores, Calif. -- Oracle Corp. said on Monday it has agreed to buy Acme Packet for $29.25 per share or approximately $1.7 billion, net of Acme Packet’s cash.
 
Acme Packet, which is based in Bedford, Mass., makes networking equipment that allows customers to deliver voice, video and data across Internet networks for tasks such as video conferencing.
 

By Chris Donnelly, managing director, Accenture Retail

Ahead of the holidays, 56% of U.S. consumers told us that they expected to ‘showroom’ as they bought gifts this year — underlining the threat of online pure play retailers to the success, and even existence, of traditional retailers. However, traditional retailers can compete and even win this battle.

Campbell, Calif. -- Product lifecycle management software provider Centric Software said Tuesday that it has become the PLM system provider to Build-A-Bear Workshop.

Build-A-Bear Workshop purchased the Product Specification, Product Sourcing, Calendar Management, Line Planning, Quality Management and Material Management modules of the Centric 8 PLM system. Build-A-Bear Workshop also will implement Centric’s mobile apps and the Enterprise Connectivity module to integrate Centric 8 data with the company’s enterprise resource planning system.

New York -- PTC announced that Brooks Brothers Group Inc. has chosen PTC Windchill FlexPLM software, PTC's Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) solution for retail, to improve product design and development effectiveness, reduce costs and better capture market opportunities.

Tokyo -- Analytic data solution-provider Teradata said Monday that Takashimaya Co. has completed deployment of a Teradata data warehousing environment to serve as the primary data analytics system for centrally housing and managing its product and customer information.

Takashimaya is one of the world's largest chains of department stores, and is the nucleus of the Takashimaya Group worldwide.

Dublin, Calif. -- Epicor Software Corp., a leader in business software solutions for manufacturing, distribution, retail and services organizations, announced the company has again been named the leading vendor of point-of-sale software for both specialty soft goods retailers and hard goods retailers by research and advisory firm IHL Group. This marks the second consecutive year that Epicor has been ranked the No. 1 vendor overall in both studies.

The e-commerce experience has expanded beyond desktop environments and moved in-store via Web-based kiosks and consumers’ personal mobile devices. One of the biggest hurdles for retailers is delivering a consistent, rich, user experience across all digital channels. Eager to overcome this challenge, Best Buy Canada sought a solution to streamline digital information delivery.

Denver -- Junction Solutions announced that Renys, which operates 16 discount stores in Maine, has selected Junction Solutions to implement Microsoft Dynamics AX 2012 and help launch its multichannel retail strategy, while automating manual processes and improving visibility and collaboration throughout its store locations.

Burlington, Mass. -- OrderMotion, a web-based platform for direct-to-consumer (D2C) campaign and order management, announced that Midwest consumer goods retailer Alco Stores selected OrderMotion's OMX platform as the back-office technology best suited to grow with its online volume demands while also leveraging its Magento eCommerce front-end system.