A&P Launches Phase II of Project Great Renewal; Will Upgrade Supply Chain, Business Process Systems.Business & Retail Editors MONTVALE Montvale may mean:
- determine the company's business strategy and key opportunity areas; - define the business functionality needed in A&P's technology systems; - evaluate and select key software solutions; - analyze business processes; - define strategic business initiatives; - and, develop an information technology strategy and plan to support the strategic initiatives. The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company, Inc. (NYSE NYSE See: New York Stock Exchange :GAP) today announced Phase II of its ongoing Project Great Renewal - an after-tax investment of approximately $250 million over four years to develop a state-of-the-art supply chain and business operations Business operations are those activities involved in the running of a business for the purpose of producing value for the stakeholders. Compare business processes. The outcome of business operations is the harvesting of value from assets technology system. Christian Haub, President and Chief Executive Officer, said the initiative will upgrade all processes and business systems related to the flow of information and products between A&P-operated offices, distribution points and stores, and between A&P and its suppliers. A&P has selected IBM (International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY, www.ibm.com) The world's largest computer company. IBM's product lines include the S/390 mainframes (zSeries), AS/400 midrange business systems (iSeries), RS/6000 workstations and servers (pSeries), Intel-based servers (xSeries) as its strategic partner for Project Great Renewal to implement business process changes, a new application portfolio and a new technical architecture, and assist in project and change management. A&P expects to achieve cash benefits over the period in the range of $325 million net of tax, derived from improved margins, lower operating costs operating costs npl → gastos mpl operacionales , reduction of working capital and improved product availability. When this new phase of Project Great Renewal has been fully implemented, the Company anticipates improvement of ongoing annual pre-tax operating income Operating Income The profit realized from a business' own operations. Notes: This would not include income from things such as investments in other firms. Also referred to as operating profit or recurring profit. of approximately $100 million. A&P said it expects these initiatives will enhance its ability to increase sales by attracting more customers and increasing sales per transaction. However the cash and ongoing profit benefits stated above do not include such impacts. In support of Project Great Renewal, IBM and Retek, Inc. (Nasdaq:RETK) -- a leading provider of business-to-business (B2B (Business to Business) Refers to one business communicating with or selling to another. See B2B e-commerce, B2C and B2G. B2B - business to business ) solutions for the global retail marketplace -- today announced they will work together to create a merchandising merchandising Element of marketing concerned especially with the sale of goods and services to customers. One aspect of merchandising is advertising, which aims to capture the interest of the segment of the population most likely to buy the product. solution to help food and drug retailers determine the right mix of products, pricing and promotions across all sales channels including the store, phone, Internet Internet Publicly accessible computer network connecting many smaller networks from around the world. It grew out of a U.S. Defense Department program called ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network), established in 1969 with connections between computers at the and catalog catalog, descriptive list, on cards or in a book, of the contents of a library. Assurbanipal's library at Nineveh was cataloged on shelves of slate. The first known subject catalog was compiled by Callimachus at the Alexandrian Library in the 3d cent. B.C. . A&P will be the first retailer to use this new merchandising solution as part of its new business operations and technology system. Initial work on Project Great Renewal will focus on re-engineering systems supporting such functions as purchasing, inventory control, warehouse and transportation management, category management, pricing, promotion analysis, store space allocation The apportionment or designation of an item for a specific purpose or to a particular place. In the law of trusts, the allocation of cash dividends earned by a stock that makes up the principal of a trust for a beneficiary usually means that the dividends will be treated as , automatic replenishment replenishment the addition of an appropriate quantity of properly prepared solution containing the correct concentration of chemicals to the developer solutions used in radiography. , direct store delivery and store operations. According to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. Mr. Haub, the resulting new technology and communication platform also will enable A&P to utilize Internet-based, business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce e-commerce, commerce conducted over the Internet, most often via the World Wide Web. E-commerce can apply to purchases made through the Web or to business-to-business activities such as inventory transfers. with its suppliers, to improve supply chain efficiencies and develop more customer focused and mutually profitable supplier relationships. "This landmark investment in A&P's future follows the people and store development improvements launched just over a year ago, and therefore represents the third critical component of the Great Renewal strategy we charted in 1998," said Mr. Haub. "Combined, these initiatives will drive the top and bottom line improvements we have already achieved to leadership levels, by maximizing the impact and productivity of our market offering." In October 1999, IBM retail industry consultants began working with A&P senior management to build a comprehensive business case for the transformation of A&P's supply chain and business operations systems, as the next phase of A&P's Great Renewal program. IBM consultants worked with A&P to: - determine the company's business strategy and key opportunity areas; - define the business functionality needed in A&P's technology systems; - evaluate and select key software solutions; - analyze business processes; - define strategic business initiatives; - and, develop an information technology strategy and plan to support the strategic initiatives. A key component of A&P's new technology platform will be the new merchandising solution being created as a result of the new alliance between IBM and Retek. Merchandising solutions allow retailers to enhance customer service by improving all aspects of the supply chain, including purchasing, replenishment, space allocation, receiving, inventory management and price/promotion management. The new offering will be developed using IBM's Application Framework for e-business, a technology roadmap The context of product management The existence of product managers in the product software industry indicates that software is becoming more and more commercialized as a standard product. with IBM's leading software -- based on industry standards -- that helps developers integrate Internet technologies with traditional information technology. In addition, IBM will become the preferred hardware, middleware Software that functions as a conversion or translation layer. It is also a consolidator and integrator. Custom-programmed middleware solutions have been developed for decades to enable one application to communicate with another that either runs on a different platform or comes from a , services and financing provider for Retek solutions and create and staff a Retail Development Center in Minneapolis, MN, to provide training, benchmarking and product demonstrations. IBM and Retek estimate that the market opportunity for this type of solutions exceeds $3.5 billion. The Retek/IBM agreement is the latest in a growing number of alliances that IBM is forming with leading independent software vendors (ISVs) based on a developer alliance initiative announced in November 1999. Under the initiative, Retek will gain access to new customers and revenue opportunities through IBM's extensive marketing, sales, solutions and resources while positioning IBM as its leading implementation and integration provider of middleware, server platforms and services. Under terms of the IBM/Retek alliance, the development environment for Retek's B2B solutions also will be based on IBM's Framework for e-business, and will include IBM middleware -- MQ Series and the Websphere family of products. A&P said it is entering Project Great Renewal Phase Two from a foundation of solid improvements generated by the campaign's initial phase launched in December of 1998. "At the outset, we said the most important measures of success moving forward would be customer satisfaction and operating results. The structural moves and total Company culture change set in motion 15 months ago have clearly generated the improvements and forward momentum we believed they would. Now, our goal for Great Renewal Phase Two is to develop this all-important systems and process platform for our customer focused marketing proposition," Mr. Haub said. He concluded, "We are proud to be the first major food and drug retailer to partner with this alliance of IBM and Retek, leaders in the development of retail process, system, information and e-business solutions. We are convinced that this initiative, combined with our ongoing people and store development efforts, will in due course elevate el·e·vate tr.v. ele·vat·ed, ele·vat·ing, ele·vates 1. To move (something) to a higher place or position from a lower one; lift. 2. To increase the amplitude, intensity, or volume of. 3. our performance and results to the leadership levels we are committed to achieve." |
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