Pharmaceutical companies are running hard to keep pace with changes brought about by digital technology. Mobile communications, the cloud, advanced analytics, and the Internet of Things are among the innovations that are starting to transform the healthcare industry in the ways they have already transformed the media, retail and banking industries. Pharma executives are well aware of the disruptive potential and are experimenting with a wide range of digital initiatives.
Analyst Insight: The retail cut of the 2014 SCM World CSCO Study reaffirms that for most companies omnichannel is a major retail supply chain disruptor and that, for a few, progress has been made. Fulfillment changes have been driven by a desire for greater speed and agility. Battle lines are drawn between online and bricks-and-mortar supply chains. As omnichannel leaders look to move from walk to run, retail’s best weapon is harnessing demand data to make smart trade-offs. – Matt Davis, SVP Research at SCM World
With mobile commerce sales growing quickly, Staples is jockeying to hold onto its role as an ecommerce leader by opening its dedicated mobile site to direct sales from vendors.
The digital revolution is penetrating the consumer packaged goods space more and more, says a report that highlights how CPG companies can best position themselves for growth and unlock digital and e-commerce opportunities.
Social media and digital, customer data and brand awareness are the top three challenges in retail marketing, and digital advertising is among the most important tools in that arena, says a survey by SAP AG.
In China, three-quarters of online shoppers make e-purchases at least weekly, according to a new survey by PricewaterhouseCoopers. And mobile is king. Of those online shoppers, 77 percent made at least some of their purchases online using smartphones.
A report from IDC Manufacturing Insights evaluates the progression of commerce networks for manufacturers from traditional point-to-point communications to collaborative commerce networks that support many-to-many interactions among manufacturers and their trading partners.
A study says that 30 percent of internal social networks will be viewed as essential as email and telephones are today. Gartner research suggests that enterprise social networking software has several advantages over traditional collaboration when it comes to group organisation and social filtering.
Mobility is important to retailers, but it is not mobility for the sake of mobility. Instead, the focus is convergence of e-commerce, mobility and social. And despite the doomsayers on the concepts of social commerce, the greatest increase in the intended use of mobile is to fuel efforts in social commerce.
