RedPrairie forecasting tool wins customers

Supply chain software company RedPrairie says that its Collaborative Forecasting tool—which allows point of sale (POS) data to flow from retailers to distribution centers (DCs) and back to suppliers&mdash: has been adopted by both a major retailer and a large food manufacturer. (The company was prohibited by its customers from releasing their names.)

A spokesman for RedPrairie said that the Collaborative Forecasting tool provides item-level information from retailers, creating fewer out-of-stocks and less safety inventory throughout the supply chain. The previously mentioned major retailer, for example, has seen a measurable increase in sales as a result of the reduction in out-of-stocks, he said.

The tool works by segmenting fast movers from slow movers, allowing it to keep track of the fast movers on ordinary servers. Past efforts to capture and transmit POS data were difficult to scale over thousands of stock-keeping units (SKUs), the spokesman said.