Plano, TX, Aug. 11, 2020 — SML RFID, the leading item-level RFID enterprise software solutions provider and RFID tag provider, has today announced that it has added four new features to its Clarity® software application suite in order to assist retailers as they emerge from COVID-19 related shutdowns.
Retailers have used Clarity® software in thousands of stores and manage billions of inventory items around the world. Its best-in-class stock count, receiving and replenishment features have allowed retailers to open stores more efficiently than their retail competitors that don’t use the Clarity® solution or RFID at all. However, the changes to consumer engagement models have caused retailers to consider new innovative and reactive ways to manage inventory, fulfil customer orders and improve in-store labor efficiency. There are a wide range of retail segments utilizing Clarity® and reaping the benefits that the solution delivers: Apparel, Footwear, Home Goods, Electronics, Sporting Goods and Cosmetics/Fragrance.
As the retail industry prepares to enter the post-COVID-19 model of operations, SML RFID has introduced four new features to the Microsoft Azure™ cloud delivered Clarity® application suite to help retailers on their journey: eCommerce BOPIS/BOSFS picking, Intelligent Mark Downs, Store to Store and Store to DC transfers, and Integrated Task Management. These configurable features are sitting on top of the rollout proven / high performance Clarity® technology stack that was supporting over two hundred million items being stock counted in retail stores every week prior to the COVID-19 shutdown.
The arrival of the four new Clarity® handheld terminal features come out of the SML team listening to existing customers about their new needs and from new customer engagements leveraging the three new SML Retail Ideation Spaces (RIS) launched during 2019. The RIS facilities, located in the US, UK and China, host the complete SML RFID offering of RFID tags, encoding solutions and software solutions. These facilities have become a valuable tool to provide retailers and brand owners a remote item-level RFID immersion experience on how Clarity® can improve operational efficiency and inventory accuracy in factories, distribution centers and stores.
Furthermore, SML has seen dramatically growing evidence that retailers and brand owners are recognising the essential value that item-level RFID solutions from SML provide, with the resultant >95% inventory accuracy in a cost effective solution for this post-COVID-19 era of retailing. 100% of SML retail customers use the simple handheld and cloud based Clarity® solution as a ‘step one’ technology in order to get a handle on their in-store inventory. SML has gone live in over 700 new stores during Q2 and early Q3 2020, and has been awarded three new RFID solutions projects during the COVID-19 crisis.
“The COVID-19 crisis caused mass disruption for retailers in all regions of the world and the need for higher inventory accuracy has never been more obvious,” said Dean Frew, CTO and Senior Vice President of RFID Solutions at SML Group. “Our team has added the four new features for additional process innovation within the Clarity® application suite targeting these new priority requirements.” Frew adds, “ We are seeing many new retailers and brand owners that pre-crisis were thinking they could get by with 65% inventory accuracy that are now acknowledging that they can’t effectively service customers with BOPIS and BOSFS models without fundamentally rethinking inventory management in the stores and they are finding that the ROI’s are very compelling.”
To experience the immersion of SML’s Retail Ideation Spaces, sign up for a live virtual demo at https://sml-rfid.com/