Retail in Asia

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CEO Talking Shop: Liu-Jo strengthens e-commerce with CEVA logistics

With 5,407 stores in Europe, 89 in Asia, 16 in Africa and 1 in North America, Italian fashion store Liu-Jo has a truly global operations and needs a sophisticated solution for managing online sales, packaging, gift packaging, management of returned goods as well as transporting goods across continents and personalization of products on an individual basis.

Recently, it has signed a new five-year e-commerce contract with CEVA Logistics to manage its warehouse in in Cortemaggiore, (near Piacenza) and provide highly customized value-added services for consumers.

"A distinctive element of this contract is the integrated collaboration with Liu-Jo’s marketing department, where we provide customized service to the end consumer. This helps Liu Jo gain a critical advantage in its market," said Giuseppe Chiellino, Managing Director of CEVA in Italy.

Under the terms of the contract, CEVA manages Liu-Jo’s items through its warehouse and handles transport activities across Europe.

In an email interview with RetailTech Innovation, Aymeric Chandavoine, Vice President, Consumer & Retail, Asia-Pacific, said that CEVA owns established competence in reverse logistics management and provides efficient and integrated solutions that deliver progressive cost optimization and constant visibility of all goods within the supply chain, including returns.

"In this way, CEVA can offer guarantees of respect for delivery times and provide the flexibility to support customers in their sales activities online," he said, adding that the company also has a deep experience in the fashion market and delivering e-commerce supply chain solutions, handling both flat and hanging garments, accessories and shoes for many leading fashion brands.

As Liu-Jo has presence in several Asian countries such as China, Hong Kong SAR, Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines, Chandavoine said it can also support Liu-Jo’s business development and growth in other areas of the world and in developing countries.

"CEVA would be able to replicate the innovative Italian solutions also in these strategic areas, guaranteeing high-level performances and excellent solutions," he said.

Only recently, it has launched its new China to Europe railway service that connects Suzhou in China with the Netherlands in Europe. The total transit time for the whole journey is approximately 28 days, covering an 11,000-kilometer northern route, moving from Suzhou in China, across Russia to arrive in the Netherlands.

"CEVA’s presence in the Far East enables the logistics operator to know local opportunities, challenges, laws and procedures, being a reliable and strategic partner also in these peculiar countries," he added.

Chandavoine expounded more on the CEVA solutions for retail:

RetailTech Innovation (RTI): Please give an overview of CEVA’s solutions tailored for retailers.

Aymeric Chandavoine (AC): CEVA is focused on delivering integrated supply chain solutions to customers across a variety of sectors, including consumer and retail. For retailers, our integrated solution covers the entire supply-chain from supplier management across all sourcing countries (China, India, Bangladesh, Vietnam etc.) to delivery to the stores and/or to the final destination in customers’ homes.

We provide customers with supply chain visibility and predictability, to control and optimize each of their supply chain activity with our CEVA Matrix as the technology enabler for warehouse management, transport management and supply chain management solutions.

CEVA’s sector specific expertise and strong local presence enable us to deliver seamless implementation, consistent processes and execution reliability across sourcing countries and retail countries.

RTI: Please cite examples of implementations of these solutions.

AC: We have many retail customers in Asia where we have implemented different supply chain solutions. A couple of notable examples are the launch of on-line business in Taiwan for a lifestyle beverage retailer where we were able to demonstrate our operations excellence (white gloves operations) as we represent the brand at the customer house, and the opening of the first fashion store in the Malaysia market for a leading fashion retailer where flexibility and responsiveness, as well as the ability to manage fast volume increase were needed

Both projects came with stringent demand and pressure for on-time and “do-it-right first time.”

RTI: What do you consider as the greatest need of Asian retailers such as Liu-Jo in the area of logistics, storage and transport services?

AC: Standardization of process and systems “inside the box” (warehouse) and flexibility while interfacing with the reality of each market (depending on maturity, infrastructure, legislation…) is an area where retailers can look at, to increase efficiency and reduce costs.

Retailers of today are facing the challenges of multiple channels: brick and mortar versus online business. Exploring ways to deal with an ever-growing on-line market is another area where retailers are focusing on. How CEVA can help them to manage both and simplify the flows to optimize their supply chains as an integrated solution provider is key.

Many retailers are also looking for more value added services (VAS) to meet their individual or specific demands such as home delivery or installation of equipment.

Fast-pace of growth and increased complexity in sourcing requires acute network analysis as part of their focus in ensuring that they are building the right network backbone. Cost effectiveness, agility and flexibility, compliance, speed to market are considerations that CEVA takes into account when we work with the customers to design their supply chain solutions.

RTI: How do you see the market landscape in Asia for your services? What is your competitive edge over other companies offering the same solutions?

AC: CEVA is an end-to-end solutions provider right down to our approach to market with extensive global network and strong local expertise in each country.

We leverage our global scale and network to proactively provide customers with tailored solutions through our solution design teams to answer specific customer’s strategy and supply chain needs. For example: managing multiple flows (VMI, DC bypass…) and helping to reduce costs and improve our customer’s margins; scalable and flexible solutions to manage the customers’ growth plans; and the CEVA Matrix platform as a network of supply chain technologies to provide systems and visibility to customers’ supply chains, and the ability to integrate to the customers’ network and systems as well.

CEO Talking Shop is the Retail in Asia section devoted to interviews with brand CEOs and retail industry leaders.