DC Velocity - August 2018

T ec h no l o g y

Douglas Battery™ delivers reliable power, customer support and innovative battery and charger solutions to keep industrial equipment moving with maximum power and minimum downtime. We provide motive power solutions to customers around the world with trusted battery and charger solutions for material handling and airport ground support equipment – from forklifts to walkies and more.

We take great pride in
delivering great power.

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Subject to revisions without prior notice. E.&O.E.

Douglas Battery

2366 Bernville Road • Reading, PA 19605

1-800-DOUGLAS • www.douglasbattery.com

34 DC VELOCITY AUGUST 2018 www.dcvelocity.com
systems as tools that can provide
the level of visibility retailers and
their suppliers need to better man-
age inventory. These are order
management solutions that address
a range of functions, including
inventory, order routing, analyt-
ics, and shipping. Such systems can
unify inventory management across
all channels; manage order types
and channels all in one place; pro-
vide real-time visibility of demand
to manage vendor, store, and cus-
tomer orders; and prioritize tasks
and optimize inventory perfor-
mance, according to Symphony
RetailAI. McDonald adds that such sys-
tems make order management “sim-
ple, automated, and dynamic,” allowing
retailers to:

; View inventory availability across the supply chain so they can select sources depending on factors that matter most—leadtime, freshness, lower cost, and so forth.

; Split multiple product order fulfillment across locations based on availability.

; Use product returns in one channel for order fulfillment in another.

“It’s so important to have a platform
and process that support one [view] of
inventory and all the challenges that go
along with it,” McDonald says. “[You
also need] something to manage the
forecasting and fulfillment that needs
to happen for all of that inventory. You
really need a single platform that can
simplify all that.”
Salmasi agrees, emphasizing the dif-
ficulty brick-and-mortar retailers face
in today’s environment compared with
their online-only competitors.

“The expectations that come with
e-commerce now come with brick-and-
mortar stores,” he explains. “They now
have to do what they do well and what
the e-commerce giants do well. They
have to manage both pieces.”
Such challenges require a more
sophisticated approach to managing
inventory and to the technologies used
to do so. Order management solutions
that incorporate analytics and allow the
sharing of information between trading
partners can provide the visibility and
agility required of today’s supply chan-
nel, technology providers argue.

“There are a lot of demands on retailers and their suppliers for faster, better [service],” Salmasi explains. “Buy online, pick up in store, buy online and have it delivered the next day—those services put tremendous pressure on the supply chain. Even something as simple as free product returns can be complex.

“In order to do it all well, [retail-ers] need more sophisticated technology solutions than they’ve had in the past. They need systems that work together.”