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The purview of this partnership covers leading store-operations software products, which are tightly integrated with SAP software. These include applications such as SAP Point-of-Sale by GK, SAP Open Scale Management by GK, SAP Store Device Control by GK, SAP Label and Poster Printing by GK and SAP Offline Mobile Store by GK, which offer state-of-the-art omni-channel capabilities for international retailers.
Wipro will offer end-to-end implementation services for joint projects. Wipro consultants have completed an advanced training program at the GK Software Academy in order to develop expertise in the software products, which will be key to this partnership. GK Software will provide consultancy services and customer support. The SAP Store Management applications by GK will be sold directly by SAP.
“This partnership is in line with our consistent focus on delivering real-time, transformational agility to our customers in the retail and consumer packaged goods industries,” said Natarajan Srinivasan, Global Head, SAP Application Services, Wipro Ltd. “Our partnership with GK Software AG will enable better collaboration across business functions to consistently provide end-to-end integrated solutions for omni-channel retailers. The solutions enabled by this partnership are capable of organizing thousands of stores and devices, hundreds of thousands of articles, and catering to millions of consumers, while providing a unified shopping experience,” he added.
Rainer Glaess, CEO of GK Software commented, “The partnership with Wipro permits a very attractive joint product and implementation offer for retailers around the world. Wipro is a highly experienced partner with a strong global network that we expect will give our international customers confidence that industry-leading solutions will be implemented for them, on time and in a cost-efficient manner. For GK Software, the partnership offers the opportunity to scale our international business, further accelerating the growth of the company.”
“As a trusted SAP global service provider, Wipro is an ideal implementation partner for SAP Store Management applications by GK. We expect that the combined expertise between GK Software and Wipro will help achieve our shared vision of providing best-in-class, differentiated solutions to our retail customers across the globe,” said Lori Mitchell-Keller, senior vice president and head of Global Retail IBU, SAP.
Wipro Ltd. (NYSE:WIT) is a leading information technology, consulting and business process services company that delivers solutions to enable its clients do business better. Wipro delivers winning business outcomes through its deep industry experience and a 360 degree view of "Business through Technology" - helping clients create successful and adaptive businesses. A company recognized globally for its comprehensive portfolio of services, a practitioner's approach to delivering innovation, and an organization wide commitment to sustainability, Wipro has a workforce of over 150,000, serving clients in 175+ cities across 6 continents. For more information, please visit www.wipro.com
Both parties have agreed not to disclose the purchase price of this acquisition.
(End of the obligatory announcement)
For further information about the acquired business segment we refer to our ad hoc announcement from March 17th and the explanations to this notification. http://www.gk-software.com/en/public-relations-en/news/gk-software-plans-acquisition-in-north-america
Both parties have agreed not to disclose the purchase price of this acquisition.
(End of Ad-hoc News)
DBS Inc. was established in 1977 and has since been managed by its founders. The company is focused on solutions for hospitality and retail industries and in the course of its history, has served more than 2,000 customers. The planned acquisition is strictly related to the DBS business segment „Retail“, focusing solely on the retail sector. This business segment is geared on the one hand toward project development and consultation, and on the other hand complements with its solutions GK Software’s offering for the retail market.
The DBS segment „Retail“, which focuses on the implementation of store projects, has successfully administered countless roll-outs of the former SAP-POS solution (Triversity). Therefore, long-standing and grounded customer relationships exist within a market setting that is of particular interest to GK Software. The most important software solution in the portfolio of DBS „Retail“ is oriented toward the connection of various hard and software components for the implementation of Electronic Payment Processing in North America. An uncomplicated and quick integration of this solution into GK Software’s world of solutions will bring a simplified and accelerated implementation of customer projects within this market sector.
As a result of this acquisition, GK Software anticipates a defined and boosted growth in the North American Market. A reputable team with customers and partners alike, possessing many years of experience managing complex store projects, will reinforce the visibility and proven implementations record in this market. With this move, GK Software precedes one more step in the further development of one of the largest retail markets in the world.
This project has been realized in conjunction with IKB Deutsche Industriebank AG.
GK Software is the leading European provider of integrated store solutions - and is opening up offices in South Africa in support of the recent success they have had in securing 3 customers in the SA market.
“Being directly present in the market place is an important commitment to our customers and to our future success in the African market”, says Achim Sieren, Chief Operations Officer and member of the Group Management Board for GK Software AG in Germany.
“The Store Solutions supplied by GK Software enable genuine end-to-end processes integrated with SAP solutions,” said Sieren. “These solutions provided by GK Software and resold by SAP will be game changing for our retail customers. For example, the new SAP Point-of-Sale by GK application based on the SAP HANA® platform is the first to leverage this in-memory technology and it will provide our retail customers greater ability to service their customers. Following the success we have achieved with these solutions in Europe, North America and Asia, we’re looking forward to continuing this successful course in Africa.”
GK Software has appointed Emma Murray as the Managing Director for GK Software Africa. Murray has spearheaded GK’s entry into the market as the CEO of IP Inc., which is the exclusive sales partner for GK in the African market. She has extensive experience in growing and developing the local market for international vendors, having done so successfully for Software AG previously.
“GK Software is an innovative company with an impressive track record in delivering retail solutions to a broad range of retailers. The opportunity to bring such an international leader into the local market and develop and grow the local skills base to support our customers is immensely exciting” says Murray. “In support of our success in the Africa market, we understand that our solutions are a critical part of a retailer’s business and their daily operations, and we are serious about being a strategic partner to our customers”.
GK Africa has points of presence in both Johannesburg and Cape Town and will be actively growing the team in the coming months.
At Europe's largest trade fair for the retail-IT sector, taking place from 24-26 February 2015 in Düsseldorf, Germany, GK Software AG will be displaying its comprehensive product portfolio. At stand D49 in Hall 9 of EuroCIS, the German market leader is presenting new store solutions which will enable retailers to implement complete omni-channel concepts. It will also be demonstrating how it is blurring the distinction between traditional branch-level applications and solutions for other areas − such as e-commerce − in order to offer end-to-end enterprise applications which enable all sales channels to be connected together seamlessly.
With its new solutions, GK Software is responding to the current trend towards cross-point-of-sale (X-POS) systems within retail solutions, which represents a paradigm shift. Since the mid-90s, retailers have increasingly been replacing the simple, PC-based checkout solutions in their stores with online-compatible applications extended with countless additional functionalities; these are known as "enterprise POS" solutions. X-POS solutions are taking that development to the next level, removing the barriers that have up until now existed between physical stores, the webshop and other sales channels. In GK Software's new world of solutions, the in-store functionalities which are also required with the same level of quality in other channels are available as open services. These include, for example, fundamental business processes such as price calculation, shopping basket and stock-, product- or customer-related data. As a result, identical processes are performed transparently and without redundancies by a single system in an omni-channel environment.
The solutions by GK Software have been especially designed and/or further developed for use in omni-channel retail environments. EuroCIS marks the launch of a new version of a POS solution specifically for clienteling. Clienteling represents the new standard in the relationship between retailer and customer whereby all the available information relating to customers themselves, to their activities in the various channels, to the stock levels in store or in the webshop, to current promotions, etc., is provided in real time, e.g. via a mobile device. The clienteling solution utilizes the innovative GK/Retail app-enablement concept which allows external applications to be connected through seamlessly integrated apps without the standard software having to be changed. The apps even automatically react to events such as item registrations or customer logins. Hence the webshop or the CRM system, for example, immediately also becomes part of the clienteling POS. A ready-made connection is in place thanks to the Omni-Channel Store Connector by GK, which is available in the hybris Extend & SAP CEC Marketplace. One of GK Software's partners, prudsys, provides an app for displaying real-time product recommendations at the POS − which is already common practice in online shopping − in the form of its Realtime Decisioning Engine. This prudsys solution is one of the world's most successful personalization tools for webshops. With the further addition of enterprise-wide master data and customer data as well as extra information (e.g. from social media channels), the clienteling version of GK/Retail POS represents an innovative sales instrument for retailers.
The backend systems by SAP and the online business solutions by hybris combined with the GK/Retail Business Suite applications form a Unified Omni-Commerce Platform which offers a complete solution. This is founded on the SAP HANA®-based Customer Activity Repository (SAP CAR®), which has enabled SAP to create a unified data pool enriched with cross-channel services for all master data and transaction data in the omni-channel environment. For that purpose, GK Software makes key data elements from the GK/Retail portfolio of solutions available as services in CAR for subsequent use by any of the other components. As a result, a consistent price calculation can be made or returns can be handled accurately and securely across all channels, for instance, thus avoiding redundancies and eliminating sources of errors.
Within the framework of continual further developments to the GK/Retail Business Suite, the underlying architecture concept has been developed and new solutions have been made ready for market. These activities have helped to enable all centralized solutions and services to also be used on SAP HANA or in the cloud. One new version of the store solution is based on SAP Fiori and offers a wide variety of applications in combination with a web platform (UI5). Hence GK/Retail covers the entire spectrum, from classic fat clients to very thin clients with online connections as well as hybrid variations on all types and classes of devices. These flexible deployment options plus the use of modern enterprise servers enable a lean branch-level IT set-up with a small footprint and optimal total cost of ownership. In the area of mobility the company's EuroCIS highlights will include, in addition to POS and consumer-related solutions, the new version of Mobile Merchandise Management for the first time, which is now also available for Android in addition to iOS.
The GK FutureLab is continually focused on new technologies and devices, and explores how they could benefit retailers. One such technology is 'wearable' devices of all kinds, such as 'smart' watches, glasses and clothing. At EuroCIS, to illustrate the potential of such advancements, GK Software is demonstrating a retail app for Google Glass. The app enables consumers to fill their basket based on a shopping list, to scan their items in store, to call up additional information and to subsequently pay for their purchases. Wearables will undoubtedly play a growing role in retail in the future, and this concept shows one way in which they could be used.
A North American specialist retailer with 250 stores in the USA and Canada decided to purchase SAP Point-of-Sale by GK. This project will involve equipping about 500 systems with the POS software developed by GK Software and sold by SAP. It is the first project where a customer has migrated from the old SAP POS solution to SAP Point-of-Sale by GK. The project will be handled by a local partner with support from GK Software US Inc. This is the first new project being completed in the USA and it will therefore provide an important reference for this market.
GK Software was therefore able to gain five new customers (including this project) during 2014; three of them are based in South Africa and two in North America.
Bentley Leathers is the first joint new customer of SAP and GK SOFTWARE AG in North America.
Started in 1987, “Bentley Leathers Inc.” is a chain of retail stores operating throughout Canada. The company from Quebec currently has 400+ stores which retail luggage, purses, backpacks, briefcases, Sport Duffles and related accessories under various banners.
GK SOFTWARE will be presenting the only complete omni-channel software package for retailers at the EuroSHOP fair for the first time in Europe; all the systems components will set new standards in their areas. The market-leading components GK Store Solution, SAP Backend, SAP Hybris Webshop and the Customer Mobility platform from “valuephone” have all been integrated for the first time and will be presented as a seamless package; this is a world first and the elements are already available for use. The central component is the GK Retail Bus, which enables operators, for example, to manage an open transaction through all the channels, change it at various points and complete it online, on a mobile phone or from a fixed position. As a result, GK SOFTWARE is able to map typical and future omni-channel issues end-to-end and in a transparent manner. The market-leading solution in Europe for mobile payments and mobile loyalty, which has been developed by “valuephone”, forms a fully integrated part of GK SOFTWARE’s omni-channel package. This means that the comprehensive GK/Retail store package now includes all the processes related to mobile customers too – and in absolute top quality. The new customer apps provide a completely new shopping experience for consumers.
A cloud makes it all possible: GK SOFTWARE offers the fastest till in the world based on the HANA technology. But the till is not the only element to benefit from the use of cloud technology: the other components in the store suite can all be accessed in real time too. And there is another important factor: the cloud reduces the complexity and costs of store infrastructure many times over. To summarise, the technology is known as “GK-in-the-Cloud”. This new distinct form of the GK/Retail Business Suite allows operators to make use of all the GK software solutions – ranging from POS to Backoffice and even solutions for corporate-wide systems management or sales and marketing (promotions, loyalty etc.) – and this takes place either at the retailer’s data centre (a private cloud) or in a public cloud in future. GK SOFTWARE can now guarantee the necessary performance for real-time processes on every channel because all the latest GK solutions fully operate with the SAP HANA inMemory technology. The slim GK Smart Clients developed by GK SOFTWARE ensure reliability in stores. As long as the GK Smart Clients are online, all the processes take place directly in the cloud on central servers and the terminal device in the store, e.g. a tablet, is only used to input data and for visualisation purposes. It is possible to continue using the Smart Clients in offline mode without any network connection too.
Another highlight at the retail fair on GK SOFTWARE’s stand will be the new distinct form of the till software designed to integrate apps. New apps can be downloaded directly into the POS system without any outlay for development and configuration work; they can then be quickly put into operational use without any migration or rollouts. This will enable retailers to use apps to easily integrate new issues like dynamic pricing, awarding or recommendations in the till environment in future without any major effort.
Loblaw Companies Limited is Canada’s largest retailer and was founded in 1919. The corporation’s portfolio of products not only includes food and pharmaceutical items, but also banking and telecommunications services. The group generated sales exceeding the equivalent of EUR 22 billion in more than 2,300 corporate or franchise stores in 2013; it employs more than 192,000 people.
The solutions will be rolled out at the retailer's operations in more than 10 countries in southern Africa on well over 7,000 stationary and mobile devices in total. The project comprises the SAP Offline Mobile Store omnichannel-compatible point-of-sale solution, Mobile POS (a mobile ERP management solution), the automatic SAP Label & Poster Print and the SAP Store Device Control integration platform. As a result, essential processes within the retailer's very large stores will in future be running on SAP Store Solutions by GK.
GK Software will work locally with its own team to adapt the solutions to the customer's specific requirements. Virtually simultaneously, another customer in South Africa, this time from the public sector, has also chosen SAP Point-of-Sale by GK. That smaller project will be handled by a GK Software partner in South Africa who has already successfully completed the relevant stages of training in the GK Academy and is hence fully certified.
The Retail Innovators