Microsoft claims SRI will "fundamentally change the retailer's rules of engagement with customers and the customer's in-store experience."
Microsoft describes SRI as being comprised of the following three key areas of focus:
- Smarter Shopping -- enables retailers to leverage their IT investments to create a seamless and personalized retail experience to satisfy consumers who demand service, convenience and information. Some focus areas include leveraging the digital devices that employees and customers already know, such as cellular phones and personal digital assistants, to differentiate product and service information.
- Smarter Selling -- helps retailers maximize sales and customer satisfaction through labor deployment and by empowering employees with production location and inventory information as well as customer relationship management skills. The sales associate and customer interaction is improved through a more efficient and informed process, enabling employees to confidently address each customer's question or need and even anticipate the customer's needs before they are expressed.
- Smarter Operations -- offers increased efficiency by providing real- time visibility into the metrics that drive profitability. This includes tools to easily manage the adoption of transforming technologies such as wireless devices and radio frequency identification (RFID). Focus areas include store management and flexible infrastructure.
The SRI technology platform includes the Microsoft Windows XP Embedded operating system, Microsoft SQL Server, for native retail analytics and reports; and BizTalk Server for superior integration.
Microsoft says SRI was created through in-depth industry and consumer research with many of Microsoft's key partners and numerous customers worldwide. The initiative was formed in part to help retailers respond to consumer demands for convenience and information on their own terms and across multiple channels, business demands for streamlined operations, and store demands for associate efficiency and customer service capabilities. The company says it is considering ways in which small and midsize retailers can leverage the initiative's findings.
Companies said to be supporting Microsoft's Smarter Retailing Initiative include: Accenture; BlueCube Software; Cap Gemini Ernst & Young; CRS Retail Systems; Dell; Fujitsu Transaction Solutions; HP; Infosys Technologies; Intel; JDA Software Group; Manhattan Associates; NCR; NSB Group; ProClarity; Retalix; Sysrepublic; Trax Retail Solutions; and Wipro.
In a related announcement, Microsoft disclosed that Windows XP Embedded powers some 300,000 POS terminals and kiosks worldwide. Specifically, the technology is in use at
more than 5,000 RadioShack stores and that by year end, RadioShack will have deployed a total of 21,000 systems to cash lanes and PC systems.
Additionally, Microsoft says Circuit City and Meijer have deployed POS systems running Windows XP Embedded across their retail chains. Other enterprise retailers which have already adopted Microsoft-based solutions include 7-Eleven, Costco, Meijer, and Rite Aid.
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