SCCyberworld

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Mydin Mohamed Holdings運用ICT提高競爭力

Mydin Mohamed Holdings leverages on ICT to improve competitiveness


KUALA LUMPUR, 12 July, 2007 – Allied Telesis, one of the world’s leading companies in the networking industry, today announced that Mydin Mohamed Holdings, Malaysia’s largest local wholesaler, has begun deployment of a network solution from Allied Telesis to deliver timely communication, value-added customer service and efficient data management.

Said Malik Murad Ali, IT Manager, Mydin Mohamed Holdings, “In the fast moving hypermarket industry, having the right technology is key as it enables us to grow profitably and compete successfully in the market. We recognized the need for new technology solutions that would enable us to grow our retail model efficiently and profitably, as well as to ensure the company’s success to compete in the hypermarket business.”

The objective is to achieve marketing speed and overall efficiency of operations and supply chain management. From the suppliers to the logistics and warehouse, to Mydin’s ground staff and to the management team, efficiency and productivity are important factors for timely and accurate decision-making.

To differentiate itself, Mydin had to redefine the value it brings to its customers. Mydin’s brand name signifies convenience, quality and value for money. Thus, it looks into Information and Communications Technology (ICT) to achieve these goals.

Mydin manages over 200,000 unique items and processes millions worth of transactions daily. Its key challenge is to gain insight into these huge volumes of transactions. The company needs to track the exact products and volumes of goods flowing in and out of the company.

Next, a real-time network infrastructure is required to drive incremental sales and top line results. Mydin next move is to improve the communications with all its 28 branches nationwide.

“Our suppliers typically have a very small quota for promotional items. If we want to buy in bulk to enjoy greater savings, we need to act fast to place the orders on the same day. Therefore, determining each store’s inventory and quota at the shortest time possible is the real challenge. In the past, we are unable to take full advantage of the promotional offers when they are available,” said Malik.

It is therefore important that timely and accurate information can reach the right person at the right time to aid them in their daily operations and decision making. In this way, additional business value can be delivered to customers when real-time information can be accessed by the sales personnel and store managers.

In order to fuel their growth, Mydin sets out to look for a standard based solution that can complement and support its current IT systems; a solution that is reliable, scalable and robust. Tying and linking the systems together is very crucial because the network infrastructure is the backbone of the entire IT system as it is the bloodline of the ICT infrastructure that affects Mydin’s day to day operations.

The company’s previous networking systems were not able to complement and supports the complexity of their systems. As a result, enormous costs and additional resources are needed to reconcile the problems and transactions faced by the employees and customers.

After a thorough selection process, Mydin chose Allied Telesis, one of the leading global IP networking solutions leaders.

“Allied Telesis beat other vendors and emerge as the overall winner from our selection exercise,” Malik enthused. “Allied Telesis had a clear superiority in functionality and pricing. The initial and ongoing maintenance costs were reasonable and competitive. Most importantly is the record of accomplishment in successful projects implemented by Allied Telesis that was really impressive! That gives us the confidence and assurance that we need and we believe in Allied Telesis as it is a strong and reliable brand.”

The decision of choosing Allied Telesis and the investment proved worthwhile. Mydin started to see an improvement in its network infrastructure within the first few months itself.

Now, the IT department is able to monitor its network in a more proactive manner. And if there is a problem, the IT team will be able to know the issue/s in real time.

In the near future, the company expects more savings both in terms of business and IT management costs.

From the business aspect, the company now gains timely, accurate and consistent management and financial information that enable it to monitor activities and transactions more closely and react proactively to any changes in its environment and the supply chain management.

In terms of IT management costs, applications of the solution give Mydin the ability to attain a competitive advantage – improved services and communications, while internal and external customers gain operational efficiency and increased productivity.

Being empowered with real time information is very important as it meant that Mydin could better identify opportunities and threats in the market, reduce latency, enhance relevance and value of leads, and of course increase productivity. Such improvements built on their competitive advantage enable Mydin to deliver stronger intimacy and greater relevance in customer interaction and satisfaction.

Mydin will be adding another 14-15 branches in the next 36 months and all these branches will have to come into its network infrastructure systems.

“I look forward to work with the Allied Telesis’ team again in the near future. This will help strengthen our partnership ties and enhance our working relationship,” concluded Malik.

“We are happy to have been provided with the trust to fulfill Mydin’s requirements to enhance their business processes and help reduce the business and technical risks. This achievement is a major milestone for us not just in the retail industry but in the enterprise sector as well and proves that we have the expertise and extensive background to implement end-to-end networking solutions for customers of such size in Malaysia,” said Paul Choy, Country Sales Manager, Allied Telesyn International (Asia) Pte Ltd.

“We certainly hope this successful network infrastructure implementation at Mydin will be a case study which other companies in Malaysia can emulate,” he added.

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