IBM announced that Russell’s Convenience is transforming
its business with cloud collaboration technology from IBM.
The company plans to better integrate and share data
across its 24 convenience stores across the western US and Hawaii management
teams and improve collaboration between employees, customers and partners.
Prior to working with IBM, Russell’s management team was struggling with
project management and keeping track of day-to-day business issues. As a
result, many tasks fell through the cracks.
Russell’s Convenience chose IBM’s LotusLive cloud to
transform how its employees collaborate with each other, their licensees,
vendors and partners and respond more quickly to customer demands.
According to AMI Partners, small- and medium-sized
businesses in the United States will spend more than $49 billion on cloud
services in 2015, nearly double the size of the market today.
Further, according to the 2011 IBM Midmarket CIO Study,
CIOs are now 50 percent more likely to pursue investments in cloud over the
next three to five years to take advantage of the flexibility and cost effectiveness
of using hardware and software resources offered through the cloud.
With the help of IBM Business Partner Alacrinet
Consulting Services, Russell’s licensee stores can now access and share
information regardless of their location.
They have instant access to cloud-based social networking
and collaboration tools, including file storing and sharing, email, instant
messaging and activity management. Instead of searching through emails or
making multiple phone calls, employees can now collaborate on the fly.
They can meet online to resolve issues, share sales
goals, network with co-workers, and track projects to completion. For
example, the Los Angeles, Calif. store is currently going through a remodel,
and seamless communication between the architect in Denver and the operations
center in Los Angeles is critical.
Russell’s management set up a guest account for the
architect to communicate with them and submit space plans for approval. Using
LotusLive, the convenience store chain has saved weeks of back and forth
travel.
“IBM is helping our licensee’s to operate as one
business one that is connected, informed, and cohesive,” said Raymond
Huff, president, HJB Convenience Corporation, Russell’s Convenience.
IBM is also announcing new security features to help
organizations collaborate more confidently in the cloud.
Many organizations, like Russell’s Convenience, are using
cloud-based services to facilitate collaboration while reducing IT costs and
increasing productivity. New cloud-based services from IBM give LotusLive users
more control over information that is shared both inside and outside a company.
According to IDC, there is still some lingering
apprehension over issues like integration, availability, security, and costs,
and how IT vendors address these concerns will continue to guide the adoption
of cloud computing over the next several years.
New LotusLive features can alleviate these concerns,
including increased protection for online meetings and real-time broadcasting
for getting urgent messages out to the entire organization.
LotusLive delivers even more cloud-based options for
collaborating, with integrated applications from business partners that help to
improve and simplify everyday business activities.
IBM is also announcing LotusLive integration with
TeamPoint from FreshTL, a Business Partner that helps companies publish
policies and procedures more easily, and deal with issues concerning
governance, risk management and compliance.
TeamPoint for LotusLive helps users easily track
and manage important documents to remain compliant with employment law, health
and safety regulations and standards such as ISO 9001, from within LotusLive.
“The ability to collaborate both internally and
externally in a security-rich environment is one of the clear differentiators
that the IBM collaboration cloud provides. Likewise, IBM business partner
integrations such as TeamPoint can help solve specific business pain points and
help clients embrace seamless collaboration across the organization,” said
Bethann Cregg, vice president, IBM Collaboration Solutions.
By Telecomlead.com Team
editor@telecomlead.com
