There has been a explosion in the number of mobile communications devices, both on the consumer and business sides. Alec Saunders, vice president of QNX Cloud with BlackBerry subsidiary QNX Software System, talks about how that trend intersects with the development of the Internet of Things, and what the future of the technology looks like.
New product forecasting is one of the toughest demand management challenges, especially for the 15 to 20 percent of product launches that are "revolutionary." Charlie Chase, advisory industry consultant at SAS, explains how advances in technology are improving this process.
The technology surrounding point-of-sale data has improved tremendously in recent years and companies are making much better use of this information, says Tina Lalor, senior business consultant with John Galt Solutions.
Wireless broadband, with signals capable of passing through trees and buildings, is providing companies with a new means of reaching the "last mile" of their communications infrastructure, according to Barlow Keener, principal of the Keener Law Group.
InkaFarma has an ambitious plan to nearly double the number of stores it operates in Peru, with an emphasis on opening up new locations in some of the country's remotest areas. To make that happen, the company needed both a new, automated distribution center and a warehouse-management system with which to run it.
Technology is having a big impact on machine-to-machine applications, says Terra Bastolich, vice president of sales for North America with NetComm Wireless. She offers her views on the evolution of M2M, and talks about how it ties in with global supply-chain management.