stores, ecommerce, mobile and social media. This change means that the ... Big Data agenda. Retailers will need to build
BIG FAST DATA Kx for Retail Solutions
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ABOUT US Kx has been the global software leader for complex analytics on massive-scale streaming data for over two decades. The Kx technology is an established and trusted standard for high frequency trading, surveillance and research in financial services. Kx for Retail brings the power of this cutting edge technology, combined with true retail industry and analytical expertise to help businesses unlock the full value of their data through innovative but simple and executable solutions.
Kx is a division of First Derivatives plc. Listed on the London Stock Exchange [FDP:LN] First Derivatives is a specialist software and consulting organization with a uninterrupted track record of customer success and profitable growth since it was listed in 2002.
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BIG DATA IN RETAIL IS HERE… Transformation is sweeping the retail industry. Consumers today are much better informed and more connected. They want mobile shopping, personalized service and instant gratification. These changes are giving rise to a host of innovations around omni-channel retailing, mobile apps, customer data mining, responsive supply chains and cutting-edge, in-store, self-help technologies. The proliferation of technology in retail is now generating huge amounts of data as retailing moves at an increasing velocity towards omni-channel. Consumer interaction with a retail brand now spans stores, ecommerce, mobile and social media. This change means that the customer journey is now traceable across channels, and with that comes the generation of vast quantities of Big Data. As a result, data collection has now become key to all retailers. As the number of interactions across multiple channels increases (with the volume, the velocity and the variety of data sources all expanding rapidly), so customer expectations of relevance and personalization is also growing. Through eReceipts, mobile payment and other @till technology, retailers are suddenly able to collect and store customer data, that had historically only been available to home shopping and digital retailers. As we move in to a data rich omni-channel world, being able to process large amounts of data in real time is becoming increasingly important to retailers looking to stay ahead of the competition.
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THE BIG DATA REVOLUTION THOSE NOT REACHING FOR THE SKY WILL BE LEFT BEHIND Retailers need to be focussed on evolving technology and how it will deliver an improved customer proposition. A foundation of data capability is critical to enable the Big Data agenda. Retailers will need to build on existing infrastructure in key areas such as Big Data and analytics, in-store technology, and customer-facing applications to take advantage of the vast data generated by these devices. Retailers that adopt data and technology to deliver their core brand proposition will win.
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KEY CONSIDERATIONS FOR RETAILERS AND BIG DATA
// Agility There is a need to be agile and move with new technology as it is developed. Retailers need to adopt a cost effective and flexible data solution that can integrate with new technologies. Big costly and inflexible enterprise solutions will become less relevant. Infrastructure-lite solutions that deliver ease and value to consumers will become key.
// Compatibility Retailers will need to think about the compatibility of multiple data warehouses from different sources, and how they integrate with other applications. There will be a need to process data quickly to create usable business intelligence, and sync immediately with consumer facing applications.
// Connectivity Solutions and data interchanges that optimize speed of queries for real-time analytics will become key in delivering services to customers. Connectivity of this data in a platform that can truly manage the scale and diversity of data, whilst intelligently processing in-to realtime insight, will be vital.
// Speed & Scale Real-time Big Data management will become increasingly important. Real-time inventory management, targeted advertising with supplier monetization will become standard, along with dynamic pricing based on customer location and demand. The ability to perform complex analytics and deploy solutions in nanoseconds will be the norm.
// Personalization The traditional advertising model of ‘above the line’ to drive footfall, with in store conversion, is no longer relevant. Brands now need to engage with customers on a 1 on 1 level across multiple channels. Data drives and enables this. High street retailers have not tended to have or need this experience or capability in-house, and this is where Kx can help.
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WHY Kx? As retailers continue to collect more information, the technologies to support Big Data evolve. Born from capital markets where Big Data has been the norm for some time now, Kx is a data management and analytics platform for the modern era. Key to leveraging Big Data in retail to lower costs or drive sales, is the ability to collect, store and integrate data with end user systems such as EPOS, mobile devices, or existing business systems. Kx technology lends itself to this perfectly, as it is able to take data feeds from multiple sources and formats and perform high speed analytics all in one stack. It also integrates seamlessly with applications allowing businesses to make real-time decisions and execute them on their website, a mobile device and on tills in stores. Performing analytics on real-time and historical data, processing queries, delivering results and feeding downstream applications requires an immediacy and agility that is often difficult to achieve. Kx is agnostic and can easily integrate with existing systems, whether that be supply chain management, EPOS, or digital data. Kx enables retailers to process their customer data in real time, and as a result, use that information to drive better decision making and better, more optimized retail decisions. Retailers able to leverage more of their data, faster than their competitors, are the ones that will step ahead.
saves you time, money and drives improved ROI
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Kx TECHNOLOGY ENABLES BIG FAST DATA Kx has a native 64-bit architecture that is essential for real-time execution of customer facing solutions using the massive amounts of data created from retail data sources. The basis for Kx Technology is a uniquely integrated platform which includes a highperformance historical time-series columnar database called kdb+, an in-memory compute engine, and a real-time streaming processor, all unified with an expressive query and programming language called q. Designed from the start for extreme scale, the kdb+ database has been proven to solve complex problems faster than any of its competitors.
Supports multi-threaded time-series analytics and aggregation queries across many billions of rows of data
Scalable to tens of terabytes of data with no degradation in query response times
Open architecture simplifies integration to new and varied data sources, ideal for retail
Historical databases allow users to access terabytes of records in seconds and is limited only by RAM & disk capacity
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Kx BIG FAST DATA SOLUTIONS BIG DATA ENTERPRISE SOLUTIONS Kx solutions are world renowned for industry leading, ultrafast extreme performance Big Data technology, analytical tools and rich visualizations. Kx enables successful delivery of real-time, streaming and historical analysis through its technology: 1. Big Data Integration: A single view of your business and customer data – ease of integration with no need for major infrastructure projects, and ability to analyse hundreds of millions of records a second. 2. Analytics: Powerful analytics engine for intelligent data-driven recommendations – ability to analyse, develop statistical models and execute machine learning algorithms all in one system. 3. Velocity: Real-Time reporting and execution of models, algorithms and machine learning driven decisions making a full end to end service, or can integrate our technology with existing processes and partners.
REAL-TIME BI & VISUALIZATION PLATFORM The first step in a retailer’s journey towards real-time Big Data, is being able to review all current and historical performance metrics immediately, and act upon the data. Kx deliver a platform to enable instant querying and decision-making: The Kx Real-Time BI hub can be deployed on your EPOS or sales platform, providing instant and real-time MI. Once in place, the real-time BI hub can then power real-time decision making using machine learning and algorithms to optimize retail decisions such as dynamic pricing, and supply chain management. Kx Dashboards deliver rich visualizations in HTML 5, and provide the capability to slice and dice your sales data with any variables such as region, store, customer segment, shopper missions and product categories. The in-memory processing delivered by Kx means queries take seconds to run, and unlock the power of your data.
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Kx BIG FAST DATA SOLUTIONS ‘IN ONE PLACE’ CONNECTED DATA PLATFORM Kx technology’s ability to integrate multiple data sources, and optimize through machine learning algorithms makes it ideal for connecting and automating data without the need for large scale infrastructure projects. Kx provides a cost effective solution enabling your business to have the best possible data for optimizing campaigns, that is easy to adopt and agile, allowing you to leverage new data sources as they arise. Kx is infrastructure lite and compatible with all key data sources. • Kx can sit at any level of the tech stack designed to connect data and bring analytics in one place • Flexible to build on top of multiple types of databases, with data blending technology for internal and external data • Powerful predictive analytics at every level with easy to interpret outputs • Beautiful visualizations to bring data to life, and can integrate with existing BI tools & software
INTELLIGENT ANALYTICS & OPTIMIZATION Kx deliver a number of solutions to help retailers deliver a more effective operating model. We deliver algorithm-led solutions across the following key areas: 1. Merchandizing & Range: Powerful range optimization tools to create actionable insights from basket data 2. Supply Chain: Assortment and supply chain optimization through realtime data insights & forecast optimization 3. Marketing Optimization: Harnessing connected data to build realtime marketing platforms for omni-channel strategies 4. Customer Analytics: Powerful customer journey analytics unlocking value through connected insights and data 4. Pricing & Promotion: Smart pricing algorithms and impact analysis built on usable technology
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Kx BIG DATA CONSULTANCY At Kx we recognize that the success of any technology project is dependent on the business problem it solves. We work with retailers to help them understand where they are in their Big Data journey, and help deliver solutions that drive genuine costs savings or sales increases. Kx provide a clear framework to support understanding of future and Big Data readiness built around our 3D Big Data principles:
1. Design Kx carry out a Big Data audit, reviewing retailers against the market, and a health check on your current and future data readiness. Outputs demonstrating areas of opportunities and risks are presented with clear recommendations.
2. Develop Development of a real-time Big Data platform that gives instant access to all your data, delivering shopper mission based insight and BI on key sales drivers
3. Deploy Kx deliver analytical solutions – tactical and strategic. We have vast experience delivering marketing, customer, product, price, range and supply chain analytics solutions.
Kx for Retail sits perfectly in the middle of software & solutions, advanced analytics and expert retail strategy. Our working model can be scaled up from simply providing and implementing technology solutions, through to fully mobilised data scientists, dedicated to bringing your data to life.
WANT TO LEARN MORE?
www.kx.com/solutions/retail Email us:
[email protected]
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