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| s.Oliver recovers $9.1
million in lost sales with IBM e-business
solution. |
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IBM
Business Partner: |
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LIS.TEC GmbH |
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"We just couldn't get data
where we wanted it, which made it hard for us to keep
abreast of demand in the ultra-competitive global
fashion industry."
-Jose Monteagudo, CIO, s.Oliver |
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Challenge |
International fashion house needed
near-realtime product and sales information for remote
order-entry and management information system |
Solution |
Showroom floor ordering application
enabled through DB2® replication solution and
high-availability e-business infrastructure |
Why IBM |
DB2 offered better performance and
availability and lower cost of ownership than Oracle;
IBM Global Services was perceived
as most capable of managing large infrastructure
project |
Key Business Benefits |
Projected sales increase of US$9.1
million;
savings of 40 employee-hours per
week by eliminating redundant data-entry tasks;
realtime initiation of
manufacturing fulfillment processes compared to
previous 1-day delay;
improved order accuracy and
customer satisfaction |
Business Partner |
LIS.TEC GmbH |
The fashion industry works at a feverish
pace to feed the insatiable appetite of consumers for the
freshest looks. Successful fashion houses, however, must do
more than create bold new styles ahead of their competitors.
Like s.Oliver Bernd Freier GmbH & Co. KG (s.Oliver), they
have to be able to keep their product information up to date
at their points of sale in order not to lose sales on the
showroom floor.
Based in Rottendorf, Germany, the DEM1
billion (US$465 million) company has 21 showrooms across
Europe where buyers for retail shops and chains preview and
purchase the latest in men's, women's and children's apparel.
Until recently, showroom sales associates would enter the
buyers' orders through a Delphi application from MobiMedia AG,
which--for security and operational reasons--was synchronized
only once a day with the central product database residing on
the company's IBM AS/400 server.
However, since inventory fluctuated rapidly
during the business day, buyers wound up ordering out-of-stock
items. When they were finally notified that their ordered
items were not available, they often took their business
elsewhere. s.Oliver estimated that the lack of inventory
visibility was costing the company approximately four percent
of its potential sales.
The company also saw the need to improve
the efficiency of its order processing. Four employees each
spent ten hours per week entering orders collected from the
field into s.Oliver's homegrown, proprietary ERP system so the
production department could order supplies and carry out the
processes of manufacturing and fulfillment. Not only did the
extra data-entry step waste valuable human resources, but the
delay in receiving order information also made it difficult
for product line managers to adapt their business plans. Says
Jose Monteagudo, CIO of s.Oliver, "We just couldn't get
data where we wanted it, which made it hard for us to keep
abreast of demand in the ultra-competitive global fashion
industry."
s.Oliver's goals were twofold: give buyers
clear inventory visibility and enable production to act
immediately on new order information. That meant putting
near-realtime data on the showroom floors and replicating new
showroom orders to the ERP system automatically.
| Key Components |
| Software |
- IBM DB2 Universal Database,
Enterprise-Extended Edition, Version 7.2
- IBM DB2 DataPropagator(tm)
- IBM Tivoli® Storage Manager
- IBM HACMP/6000(tm)
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| Servers |
- IBM AS/400®
- IBM eServer pSeries(tm)
660
- IBM RS/6000® H70
- IBM Netfinity®
- IBM Enterprise Storage Server(tm)
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| Services |
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"We also evaluated Oracle as the
staging database, but DB2 offered superior
availability as well as massively
parallel processing capabilities that would
allow us to process our e-business
transactions faster. Of course, the price
and total cost of ownership of DB2 also
made it a more sensible choice."
-Jose Monteagudo
Starting with a proven solution
A long-time user of IBM DB2 Universal Database on the AS/400
platform, s.Oliver was pleased with the performance and
reliability of DB2 in its existing applications. Consequently,
when the company wanted to extend these systems to meet its
new needs, it sought the help of IBM. Recognizing the burden
that the new influx of automated transactions would place on
s.Oliver's IT environment, Monteagudo also asked IBM to
implement a high-capacity, high-availability infrastructure on
which it could run these new systems.
IBM Global Services answered the call with
a solution based on DB2 Universal Database Enterprise-Extended
Edition, Version 7.2 for AIX®. Residing on two fully
redundant IBM eServer pSeries 660 servers, this database
functions as a staging platform, enabling the continuous
replication of data between the showroom and the AS/400 server,
while protecting s.Oliver's business-critical data and
applications. "We also evaluated Oracle as the staging
database," Monteagudo says, "but DB2 offered
superior availability as well as massively parallel processing
capabilities that would allow us to process our e-business
transactions faster. Of course, the price and total cost of
ownership of DB2 also made it a more sensible choice."
To help ensure continuous availability of
the staging database, IBM Global Services implemented IBM
HACMP/6000 software on the pSeries servers. It also boosted
s.Oliver's overall data storage capacity by connecting the
servers to two IBM Enterprise Storage Server systems.
Winning back buyer confidence
s.Oliver's new showroom floor ordering application is fully
integrated with its ERP system, enabling products to be
shipped a full day earlier than before, while ensuring
accuracy and eliminating 40 hours of data entry per week. More
important, increased orders are projected to result in a DEM20
million (US$9.1 million) annual revenue gain. The company's
management information system, which will enable managers to
access order, inventory and production information, is slated
for delivery in the next few months.
Comments Monteagudo, "Our customers
are happier because they are able to order what they want and
get it faster. DB2 and the infrastructure created by IBM
Global Services enable us to provide all of our users with the
information they need when they need it. Thanks to IBM,
s.Oliver is now an automated and efficient force in the
fashion market."
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"Our
customers are happier because they are able to order
what they want and get it faster. DB2 and the
infrastructure created by IBM Global Services enable
us to provide all of our users with the information
they need when they need it. Thanks to IBM, s.Oliver
is now an automated and efficient force in the fashion
market."
-Jose Monteagudo |
Clearing the path for orders
Approximately 250 s.Oliver sales associates use the Delphi
application on notebook computers to look up collection
inventory and place orders. The notebooks are connected to
s.Oliver's headquarters over a wireless virtual private
network, which routes the transactions through an IBM
Netfinity Web server to DB2 on the pSeries servers. DB2
DataPropagator replicates the latest orders from the staging
servers to the production AS/400 server, and the latest
inventory status from the AS/400 server to the pSeries servers.
Two mirrored Enterprise Storage Server
Model T20 systems--located in separate data centers for
disaster recovery--archive orders. IBM Tivoli Storage Manager,
Version 4.1.4 running on two RS/6000 H70 servers helps
automate the data backup, archival and retrieval process.
IBM Global Services assumed complete
responsibility for designing and implementing the
infrastructure and populating the new staging server database.
During the project, it enlisted the help of LIS.TEC, an IBM
Business Partner based in Ludwigsburg, to create the data
models that would facilitate the migration.
Going to the source for business
intelligence
Still in development, s.Oliver's management information system
is designed as a federated data warehouse, enabling queries
against multiple distributed databases, including DB2 on the
AS/400 and pSeries servers. When implemented, IBM DB2 Connect(tm)
will play a key role in providing Java(tm)
Database Connectivity (JDBC(tm))
access to these databases. "With extensions for
replication and remote connectivity, DB2 Universal Database is
enabling us to deploy e-business applications in ways that
make sense for our business," comments Monteagudo.
Continually improving its infrastructure
also makes sense for s.Oliver, which plans to adopt Java
technology as its application development platform. Developers
are already at work with IBM WebSphere® Application Server,
Enterprise Edition, creating trial Enterprise JavaBeans(tm)
that will serve as the business logic for the management
information system. WebSphere Application Server will manage
the transactions that will retrieve information from the
database.
Extending e-business down the value
chain
In the future, s.Oliver plans to create a supply chain
management application that will give suppliers access to its
database, enabling them to replenish inventory automatically.
The infrastructure created by IBM and s.Oliver will serve as a
platform for creating these new cost-saving efficiencies.
Concludes Monteagudo, "Although
technology changes rapidly, we cannot afford to chase every
fad and fashion in e-business. The software and hardware
infrastructure we've built with IBM has given us the
availability, scalability and reliability we can count on to
help ensure a fair return on our current and future e-business
investments."
For more information
Please contact your
IBM marketing representative or
IBM Business Partner.
Visit us at:
ibm.com/e-business
For more information about
s.Oliver, visit:
www.solivergroup.de
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