Industry News - February 26th, 2010
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RETAIL AND TECHNOLOGY NEWS
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Mercury, RetailPro Integrate Payment Processing
Software
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Mercury Payment Systems and Retail Pro International announced their fully integrated,
PA-DSS compliant payment processing solution for Retail Pro's point-of-sale
(POS) system. The new solution delivers seamless, high-speed payment processing
to Retail Pro users in the U.S. and Canada.
The interface was jointly developed by both companies to meet the needs of
Retail Pro's diverse customer base. It supports credit, PIN debit, and gift card
transactions.
With more than 35,000 merchant locations, Retail Pro is one of the largest
providers of POS software to small and mid-size retailers.
"The Retail Pro/Mercury integration enables value-added services our retailers
can use to grow their businesses," said Mike Bishop, Retail Pro's Director of
Business Development. "For example, Mercury really makes it easy for retailers
to add a new profit center with a robust gift card program."
With Retail Pro and Mercury, retailers get unlimited free gift card transactions
for one store or an entire chain. Online transaction reporting and ACH funds
transfer streamlines program management with automated cross-store
reconciliation. The integration also enables an internet backup solution,
ensuring continuous payment processing regardless of an internet outage.
Mercury will be working with Retail Pro and its resellers to upgrade legacy
system users to PA-DSS compliant versions of the Retail Pro software by offering
marketing assistance and financial incentives
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Cabela's Reports Double-Digit Web Traffic Gains
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Cabela's announces it has increased Web traffic on www.cabelas.com by 11 percent in its most recent
financial quarter.
"Cabelas.com remains the most visited Web site in the sporting and recreation
industry," says Tommy Milner, president and CEO, Cabela's.
The outdoors retailer, which also operates a robust catalog business, recently
announced it had no plans to aggressively reduce catalog pages as it did last
year. However, according to Milner, the retailer will shift spending from
traditional paper catalogs to more electronic means as the Internet continues to
become a bigger piece of its direct business.
Beyond ramping up its Web division, the retailer remains focused on improving
its retail and direct segment, and improved distribution efficiencies.
"Improvements in distribution are being led by improvements in vendor
compliance, better utilization of freight carriers, SKU reduction and better use
of existing systems and automation," says Milner. "For the quarter distribution
cost as a percent of merchandise revenue improved 20 basis points."
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Dexrex Gear Gets $1M to Boost Cloud Channel
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Dexrex Gear, a developer of cloud-based
enterprise data management solutions for businesses mobile text and instant
message communications, has secured $1M of private investment.
The new funds were provided by new and existing private angel investors as part
of a strategic financing that complements its initial seed round investment.
Dexrex Gear will use the new funds to support the go-to-market activities for ChatSync,
its recently launched cloud-based enterprise data management service, which
provides small, medium and large enterprises with a comprehensive managed
solution for the secure and seamless capture and active archiving of a
business's real-time messaging.
With millions of instant messages sent on a daily basis, and a similar number of
SMS messages navigating wireless networks, the sheer volume of real-time
communications has made management difficult, particularly in a business
setting. Dexrex Gear has taken years of real-time message research and applied
it to fulfilling the personal, business and compliance issues surrounding the
management of such data in a cloud-based environment. Dexrex Gear's ChatSync
alleviates the expense, the time consumption and the storage constraints
inherent with most message archiving and e-discovery tools, including a
Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) product that saves messages from all major
platforms so they can be archived, retained and retrieved for reporting, all
over an existing IT infrastructure.
ChatSync also includes extensible APIs to plug into users' devices, messaging
clients or messaging servers, providing the ability to push archived content and
metadata to message powered services like Web access portals, monitoring
applications or compliance tools.
Dexrex Gear ChatSync supports enterprise platforms including IBM Lotus Sametime
and Microsoft Office Communications Server (OCS); consumer IM platforms such as
Yahoo, Google Talk, Windows Messenger and AOL Instant Messenger; and for SMS it
supports BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Symbian and Google Android, as well as
other SMS and messaging services.
Dexrex Gear's multi-tenant architecture allows resellers to set up their own
customized and branded solution on Dexrex Gear's managed platform directly
though Dexrex Gear's data centers.
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Arrow ECS Signs Disty Agreement with McAfee
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Deepening its relationship with McAfee Inc., Arrow Enterprise Computing Solutions (ECS) has signed an agreement for the
first time to distribute the entire suite of McAfee security solutions
throughout North America and has been designated the premier value-added
distributor for McAfee in North America.
"McAfee is seeking to create strategic business alliances with select North
American distributors in order to deliver further value through the McAfee
Security Alliance Program," said Fernando Quintero, vice president of channel
operations for McAfee in the Americas region. "Our focus was on selecting
distributors that were capable of supporting the global requirements of McAfee's
current and future distribution needs. Arrow ECS fit our requirements and has a
proven record of supporting our growth and the growth of our resellers."
Since 2002, Arrow ECS has distributed solutions from Secure Computing (acquired
by McAfee in 2008) in the United States and Canada, and it has distributed MX
Logic's line (acquired by McAfee in 2009) in the United States since 2003,
through its Alternative Technology group. Arrow ECS also distributes McAfee in
several countries throughout the Europe, Middle East and Africa region.
Arrow ECS was the first to distribute the Secure Computing line in North America
and was named Secure Computing Distributor of the Year in North America in 2006
and 2007.
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Intermec Project Features Registration Program, Financial Incentives
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Intermec recently announced PartnerNet,
the company's new global channel program designed to provide better
predictability, profitability and growth for partners.
Introduced earlier this month at its partner conference in Orlando, Intermec
PartnerNet members can capitalize on new business opportunities by leveraging
Intermec's deep industry knowledge, strong sales support, and compelling new
program features to achieve greater results.
Intermec is significantly investing in the channel with its new Independent
Software Vendor (ISV) program, enhancing ISVs abilities to develop and more
efficiently deliver innovative solutions. The ISV program empowers members to
provide differentiated solutions and measurably grow business through access to
a rich partner ecosystem, robust technical support, and go-to-market resources.
The following PartnerNet benefits will accelerate new growth opportunities:
Project registration: protecting
member return on sales investments.
Partner Relationship Management (PRM) system: equipping members with easy to use
enhanced communication and tracking capabilities.
Performance-based rewards: rewarding
members with financial incentives for high performance in delivering Intermec
solutions.
Predictable account management: providing members with clear customer
account rules of engagement.
"We are strengthening our focus on the channel to improve the ease of doing
business with Intermec," said Jim McDonnell, Senior Vice President of Global
Sales. "With these new program features PartnerNet members will be strategically
positioned to find new markets and further take advantage of growth
opportunities together with Intermec as the economy continues to recover."
Ingram to Unveil First Digital Signage Certification
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Ingram Micro Inc. announced a new
proprietary version of the Digital
Signage Certified Expert(DSCE) certification aimed specifically at the
Ingram Micro solution provider community. A first for IT distribution, this new
solutions-oriented certification will be launched during the 2010 Digital Signage Expo (DSE) in Las Vegas February 23rd
-25th.
Available Feb. 24th as a SKU'd offering to IT solution providers in the U.S.,
the new Ingram Micro Digital Signage Certified Expert certification (IM-DSCE)
will enable channel partners to more effectively market, sell and support the
growing portfolio of digital signage solutions and services offered by the
Ingram Micro Digital Signage Division.
To further accelerate channel partners' growth, the new IM-DSCE will include
online, instructor-led training courses, as well as several face-to-face
trainings presented by the creators of the industry-wide DSCE certification
program. Facilitated by the Ingram Micro Digital Signage Division and its
alliance partner Digital Signage Experts Group, a subsidiary of
Brawn Consulting, the comprehensive certifications
will focus on areas such as Digital Signage market and segments, the value chain
for vendors, business models and ROI as well as differentiation and selling
value.
"This flexible, new solutions-oriented certification will not only help us to
grow our digital signage practice faster than we could on our own, but it will
also enable us to build stronger, more successful working relationships with the
IT vendors supported by the Ingram Micro Digital Signage Division," says Dave
Sallander, president, Sherlock Systems. "We've been an Ingram Micro partner for
nearly 20 years and continue to see tremendous value in the new vendor
relationships, as well as the training, education and resources Ingram Micro
brings to the table -- especially when it comes to digital signage."
"With demand for digital marketing reaching an industry high, digital signage
continues to be one of the fastest growing and more profitable market
opportunities for channel partners in the U.S.," says Kevin Prewett, vice
president, vendor management for the Ingram Micro Digital Signage Division.
"Our new IM-DSCE certification is designed to fuel this growth and provide our
channel partners with a much greater market advantage that will earn them more
and cost them less. Together with the Digital Signage Experts Group, we are
bringing to market an exclusive certification program that offers the building
blocks channel partners need to successfully market, sell and support digital
signage solutions."
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