NCR Pairs Up With French Retail Chain

NCR Corporation has announced that Casino Group, a leading French retail chain, is expanding the capacity of its data warehouse, which is built on the foundation of NCR's Teradata Warehouse, in order to implement a customer relationship management solution.

The expanded data warehouse, which is to be operational by the middle of next year, will run on an NCR WorldMark server and have a capacity of approximately 1.3 terabytes. A terabyte of information is the equivalent of 250 million pages of text. Casino is one of the first French companies to implement a data warehouse this large.

Casino said the new CRM solution is designed to improve the shopping experience for its customers by better assuring the availability of their favorite products, thus providing Casino with a competitive advantage. The solution supports Casino's strategy to improve turnover, margins and financial performance -- as well as customer loyalty.

The first phase of Casino's data warehouse program, implemented in 1994, allows the company to optimize decisions regarding assortment, promotions and inventory through analysis of daily sales. With the addition of CRM capabilities in phase two, Casino is now focusing on the shopping habits and preferences of its most loyal customers.

Casino Vice President Taha Husseini noted that sales volume -- the traditional method of analysis -- is no longer the sole basis for making merchandising decisions.

"Casino now can analyze detailed product and consumer data, which ultimately will enable us to improve the consumer's shopping experience and our profitability," Husseini said. "Today's shopper is more informed and demanding than ever before. Casino, therefore, needs to know what its customers want, better understand their behavior, and develop relationships with them-as well as with our suppliers."

"Casino is now able to gather accurate and precise information, ensuring that specific product lines are tailored to the needs of consumers on a regional and local basis," said Alberto Camuri, Vice President of NCR's Retail Solutions Group for Europe, Middle East and Africa. "As with all our retail industry customers, we have developed a program for Casino that is individual to their specific needs and requirements."

To learn more about Casino visit its Web site http://www.groupe-casino.fr.

More information about NCR and its products may be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.ncr.com.