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The Raheja Group promoted Shopper's Stop is India's largest departmental store chain having a net turnover of around Rs 9,000 mn. With twenty-two stores in more than eleven cities, Shopper's Stop houses many international and domestic brands under a single roof. Automation and inventory management of a chain of stores the size of Shopper's Stop has not been a cakewalk for CIOs. But Arun Gupta, customer care associate & CTO, Shopper's Stop is a great master of technology. Since he joined, in March 2007, he has blended ICT and business like never before, and he now aims at connecting all its stores in various cities wirelessly by March 2008. He shares his views with VOICE&DATA about the company's plans and technologies that can redefine the shopping experience of customers, making sure that shoppers never stop. Excerpts:

Any major expansion plans for the future?
Over the next three years, we have significant expansion plans across different formats. We see ourselves evolving as a multi-channel retailer of choice for the Indian consumer who loves experiential shopping and demands the best of products and service.

Arun O Gupta, customer care associate & CTO, Shopper's Stop

You are looking at expansion plans. What are your investment plans in IT in the next couple of years?
The IT infrastructure plays a key role in the deployment and use of IT within our company. However, an IT infrastructure without the enabling applications is of no value. Our investments in the next 2-3 years focus on ensuring that we are able to meet the expansion and growth of our business. At the same time, we continue to explore opportunities to reduce our operational expenses. This achieved with a mix of hardware renewal and use of technologies like virtualization.

What are some of the recent technologies deployed within the organization and what technologies are in the pipeline?
Implementation of new and advance technologies has been the key strategy for us. We always deploy the best technologies available to use. We use a mix of technologies and systems comprising JDA suite of applications for our retail business; Oracle Financials for financial accounting; Business Objects for reporting; SharePoint portal for internal and external collaboration; and Microsoft Exchange and Communication Server for messaging. We also use blade servers and multi-core servers with VMWare for application deployment, NetApps' SAN and NAS technologies for storage consolidation and virtualization, and Wi-Fi networks in our offices, stores and distribution centers for operational activities with Symbol wireless scanners.

In the future, too, we will be using the most efficient technology, and we are in the process of implementing various solutions like PeopleSoft HRMS, business intelligence solutions, e-learning solutions, customer feedback systems and mobile point-of-sale systems. There are some technologies on the evaluation stages and we would want to deploy. The evaluation for the same is going on for technologies like promotions and markdown optimization systems, CRM systems, analytical solutions, RFID-based solutions, mobile applications, and archival and retrieval solutions.

You follow best practices when it comes to security. What are your data security measures?
Security is managed with a mix of technology and process/policy. We have deployed technology solutions to address the perimeter and internal security, and we continue to engage with users to highlight the awareness of good practices, which result in information protection. In a connected enterprise spread across multiple locations, security concerns will always exist. Moreover, an enterprise like us, where the customer is the focus, security becomes very critical. Therefore, we follow the best practices when it comes to security. Regarding management of IT risks, the first step is recognition and acceptance of the risk. We have defined criteria and teams responsible for monitoring key performance indicators.

How do you align technology deployment with your business goals?
All the IT and telecom that we use is influenced by business requirements. No technology solution is adopted unless it has a direct correlation to our customers, employees or statutory compliance. Our business colleagues participate in every engagement and are part of the decision for every piece of technology we deploy. The exception to this is the decisions on basic computing and telecom infrastructure is where the technology team scans for available solutions and takes a decision.

All our IT and telecom investments are linked with each other. All investments in IT are decided with our business teams. This ensures that we do not hit any roadblocks when deciding on our budgets. This includes telecom investments too on voice and data infrastructure.

As a retail chain, reliability on ERP becomes vital. What are you looking for in such implementations?
Alignment of business processes and capabilities of the system are the primary decision criteria. If the system leaves open many manual processes, the ERP will not deliver to expectations. Thus, system mapping to existing and expected needs is a key step toward success. The seamless functioning of the system in terms of uptime and performance are basic hygiene factors.

What is your organization's outsourcing strategy?
We outsource most of the operational activities, including facilities management and hardware maintenance, network, server and application administration and monitoring application development and sustenance.

How can convergence play a key role in attaining customer satisfaction and profitability for a retail chain like yours?
We are exploring convergence technologies on how we can reach out to our customers more effectively at terms defined by the customer. Communication technologies, as they evolve, can influence the way we interact with our customers in the long term by connecting with them on demand and assisting them in their shopping experience enabled by our multi-channel storefronts.

What new technologies and value added services can a country like India expect?
Web 2.0, RFID, converged communication, NFC (near field communications), and mobile applications are a few technologies that would further revolutionize IT in India. We intend to implement these technologies as and when they are required.

As I earlier mentioned, all technologies hold promise and retail organizations are watching them closely. Although some are already in experimental stages, we would implement them as they become successful and ready for deployment.

Ruchi Phadke
ruchip@cybermedia.co.in