Retail changes fast, especially with emergent technologies like cloud and augmented reality (AR) in their ascendancy. To keep from falling behind and being outpaced by competitors, retailers need to adapt even faster. That means staying nimble in the face of evolving customer expectations and IT innovations—which brings us to today’s topic: Oracle Retail Cloud services.
Are your outdated Oracle Retail systems keeping you from achieving new opportunities? Is your application infrastructure too expensive to maintain? And, if so, will upgrading to Oracle Retail Cloud help address these challenges—or just add more fuel to the IT fire? Today, we’ll be exploring the process of upgrading to Oracle Cloud to help you make the best IT investment for your retail enterprise.
Why Are Retailers Investing in Oracle Cloud Solutions?
As the first Oracle Partner to work with multiple Oracle Retail clients on their SaaS implementations, Logic has deep (and practical) experience with cloud migration. And from our perspective, retailers are shifting core retail business applications to the cloud for three key reasons: agility, simplicity, and continuous improvement. Let’s dive a bit deeper into these benefits to demonstrate why leading retailers find such promise in cloud-based retail technology.
1. Agility
The problem with old retail systems is that they’re designed for old ways of doing business. Once these systems become outdated, they create barriers to efficiently delivering the fresh, inspiring retail experiences customers crave. These roadblocks can prevent retail businesses from exploring new business models, shopping channels, fulfillment methods and much more—putting their brands leagues behind the competition.
When your retail systems are out-of-sync, it creates a cascading ripple effect throughout your organization, leading to inefficiency and frustration for all parties involved. By upgrading to Oracle Cloud, your IT team can implement continuous improvements to your retail infrastructure—making it compatible with new technologies, business models and customer experiences. In other words, cloud technology brings greater flexibility to your system infrastructure updates compared to on-premise solutions.
2. Simplicity
Retailers are also investing in Oracle Retail Cloud Solutions due to their capacity to streamline operations. Cloud-based technology from Oracle can give retailers a single, highly accurate vision of end-to-end merchandising, inventory management, supply chain planning and more—simplifying the coordination of assortment and inventory across many brands, channels, categories, and locations
Because cloud technology makes managing IT infrastructure so simple, it empowers retail employees to stay focused on driving customer-focused initiatives that deliver meaningful business value. These increases in efficiency also support more productive and coordinated IT efforts—bringing greater clarity and innovation to your retail workflows.
3. Ongoing Innovation
One key reason to select packaged software solutions from Oracle is because they invest strongly in each platform—whether that takes the form of newly added functions, features, or even services. Thanks to the flexible development of the cloud, it’s easy to upgrade your cloud-based retail solution quickly and seamlessly without interrupting business operations—fostering simpler and more intuitive user experiences.
Consequently, the continuous release and uptake of new development makes Oracle Cloud solutions highly appealing for retailers—particularly those interested in exploring emergent technologies, channels, and fulfillment methods. This “agile development” and delivery also help users prep for upcoming changes, with on-premise customers and cloud customers alike benefiting from a simple upgrade process.
The Importance of API-Driven Integrations
There’s been growing demand among retailers for API-driven integrations in recent years—which is partially why cloud-based retail technology has become so highly valued. As opposed to a pure EDI approach, API-driven integrations connect a wide range of technology solutions with cloud initiatives via APIs, combining the data each amasses into one complete picture. API-driven integrations are the most elegant way to adopt new technology and link it with the old—enabling seamless integration and adoption of solutions as they emerge.
On-Premise VS. Cloud Solutions?
Once retailers see that their old systems are inhibiting opportunities or simply too expensive to maintain, they often struggle with the choice between Oracle Retail’s on-premise and cloud solutions. This may seem like a difficult decision at first glance until you dig into the major return on investment (ROI) offered by cloud applications. In fact, according to recent findings from Nucleus Research, the average company achieves about 3.2 times greater ROI from cloud technology compared to an on-premise solution.
According to that same report, the payback period for cloud deployment is 2.2 times faster than on-premise solutions. It’s also important to note that cloud-based solutions continue to provide value by maintaining lower initial and ongoing costs—while deploying faster and consuming fewer internal resources. Last but not least, cloud-based technology creates less business disruption, enabling a greater focus on strategic priorities.
Logic: Your Cloud Implementation Partner
Whether you decide to invest in an on-premise Oracle Retail solution, you may need help implementing it across your retail processes. As of now, Logic is the only Oracle Partner to successfully implement cloud upgrades for retailers. We have the experience and deeply rooted knowledge of Oracle Cloud to make your IT transformation simple—regardless of whether you’re set on implementing Oracle Cloud Services or being hosted by a 3rd party.
Adopting new technology is an exciting opportunity for your business to explore new solutions, create stronger customer experiences, and grow. And by partnering with Logic, you can keep all of your focus on managing your business—not your infrastructure—throughout this process. To learn more about Oracle Cloud technology and how Logic can serve as your Retail Cloud implementation partner, be sure to connect with us. We can’t wait to get started.