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Roche on Retail |
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Platform, Flexibility, and Price are Key for LS Travel Retail
Here’s the recap of my conversation with Mario Bartolozzi, Vice President of Information Systems at LS Travel Retail, North America. If you would like to share your story, feel free to reach out to me.
Being a veteran IT executive and knowing all the proven solutions out in the market place, why did you choose Microsoft Dynamics® AX for Retail?
We chose Dynamics for a couple of reasons. The first was the ability to leverage our existing Microsoft® infrastructure. As a medium size company, we went through a process of redefining our architecture and had selected all of the core Microsoft infrastructure products as our enterprise platform. Dynamics integrates well into that platform so we can better support it while keeping our infrastructure cost down.
The second reason we chose Dynamics is the flexibility of the product. Our business is not a typical retail environment. We sell a broad range of products and different locations have different business processes, so we needed an application that could be easily configured to meet our changing needs. There was also a good fit between our processes and Microsoft’s vision for retailing.
Finally, the price was right.
What are some of the key differentiators from other retail solutions?
We liked Microsoft’s vision for an end-to-end retail platform including the core infrastructure. Other vendors talk about it, but none could articulate it as comprehensive vision. To the point, Microsoft has done a good job in selecting, purchasing and integrating the components that would make it happen.
Knowing Microsoft Dynamics does not have all the applications, did that create concern?
It did at first, especially with me. However, we did our research and understood where the gaps were. In our case, it was primarily in the area of demand forecast replenishment. We found a Microsoft partner that fulfilled that requirement.
Microsoft and the partners agreed to a comprehensive proof of concept that helped convince us that this was a viable product. We documented all of our core processes as we wanted them to be and then over three months walked through all of the process with the software installed at our site.
We found gaps but overall the fit was about 85%. The fact that the total cost of customizations was less than 12% of the project budget attests to the fit.
How did you go about selecting the additional partner-built solutions you purchased with Dynamics AX and AX for Retail?
We created a competitive process. We looked at several partners and picked the one we felt was the best fit from a process, functionality and integration perspective.
Microsoft talks about the integration and interoperability with products such as SQL and Office; did you find this to be true?
Definitely, it was one of the key decision points in selecting Dynamics AX for Retail.
Did you find your Microsoft Dynamics solution integration partner knowledgeable and of high quality?
Our integration partner had a very good knowledge of the Dynamics AX product. Given that we were early adopters of the AX for Retail product, we learned together, but our partner did a great job getting on top of the product and helping us implement. We are very happy with their efforts
Have you found Microsoft Dynamics Product Support team responsive and helpful when needed?
Very good! We are very pleased with the support we’ve gotten from the Dynamics team.
Did you realize the benefits you were looking for?
It’s still early, but we have seen some of the technical benefits we expected from Dynamics. As for the business benefits, it will take several months more before we know for sure. However, early indications are very promising.
Would you recommend Microsoft Dynamics for Retail to other customers?
Absolutely. The product is fairly complete. It does have some holes but the competitor’s products also have gaps or different challenges. There is no perfect solution in the market place. In my opinion, Dynamics AX for Retail is a solid player in the enterprise space.
