AGCO, Hubbell, Inc. MORSCO, Rexel Holdings USA Headline "One-of-a-Kind" Industrial Workshop at Wrigley Field in Chicago

CINCINNATI, OH--(Marketwired - May 18, 2016) -  Datalliance today announced that they recently hosted a one-of-a-kind business event for executives from select electrical, plumbing and industrial manufacturers and wholesalers. The exclusive one-day event was held at Brixen Ivy, adjacent to Wrigley Field. It focused on the growing need for trading partners to embrace change and innovation in order to remain relevant and increase sales in industrial wholesale markets.

The event started with a keynote presentation by Dirk Beveridge, Founder of UnleashWD, who shared top-line results from research he recently conducted with the National Association of Electrical Distributors (NAED) around the need to "Reimagine Distributor and Manufacturer Relationships." In his presentation, he stated: "Market forces and competitive pressures necessitate that manufacturers and distributors take a refreshed look at their business partnerships. Success in this current business environment requires that trading partners fully understand each other's business models, trust more authentically and extend the partnership planning horizon."

"Dirk set the stage for the rest of the morning's presentations," said Tom Hoar, Datalliance Director of Sales. "We wanted to start the day with material that would get the audience thinking about their current business performance and how new business processes and automation could be leveraged to improve results. Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) is one such business process that drives business partners to work together in new collaborative ways for their mutual benefit."

The session continued with two different manufacturers sharing their respective approaches to collaborative business processes and specifically, vendor managed inventory. Ruchir Patel, Director of Strategic Marketing, Connected Services and VMI at AGCO, a global leader in agricultural machinery, shared how their Managed Dealer Inventory program has dramatically improved parts availability, which is critical during peak agricultural seasons. Patel also explained how, AGCO is leveraging "master item" functionality exclusive to Datalliance to better manage over 600,000 SKUs and an average product life cycle of 22 years. John Riley, Director of eCommerce and Business Automation at Hubbell Incorporated, an international manufacturer of quality electrical and electronic products, then shared his team's approach to vendor managed inventory, focusing on the collaborative nature of the relationship. Riley shared how Hubbell has leveraged the returns automation capabilities from Datalliance to drive cost out of the process while at the same time improving customer satisfaction.

Two industrial distributors then took the stage explaining, from their perspectives, the benefits of a well-run vendor managed inventory program and why they are looking to strategically expand their involvement with VMI. Lisa Scinta, VP of Strategic Operations for Rexel USA, a global leader in the distribution of electrical supplies and services, shared how participating in VMI with strategic suppliers supports three key improvement initiatives around productivity, product availability and trade working capital improvement. According to Scinta, "greater interdependency with our suppliers paves the way for sustainable improvements for our customers." John Wisniowski, Purchasing/Product File Manager at MORSCO, a leading U.S. distributor of commercial and residential plumbing, heating and cooling equipment, also discussed the strategic benefits of VMI given their current hyper-growth. He emphasized the improved replenishment and inventory metrics they experience with VMI, as well as the additional benefit of having both the supplier and distributor leveraging consistent data for performance reviews and forecasting. Wisnioski said that Morsco is looking to participate in up to 20 more supplier VMI programs.

"We were pleased to be able to organize this first of its kind business meeting in order to bring together industrial manufacturers and distributors to discuss real, practical strategies for better collaboration around inventory and supply chain management," said Carl Hall, Datalliance President and CEO. "Market forces and competitive pressures are straining the existing relationships between suppliers and their trading partners. But it's clear that innovative business processes built around advancements in data-sharing technology can dramatically improve collaboration in a way that drives increased sales and better inventory metrics."

About Datalliance
Datalliance is the world's largest independent Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) service provider. Delivered as a cloud-based platform backed by extensive customer service, Datalliance VMI makes it easy for suppliers and their customers to establish sales and inventory management relationships that fully align business objectives, improve collaboration, and streamline supply chain operations. Datalliance manages billions of dollars in orders, millions of SKUs, and thousands of locations worldwide for leading companies in consumer, industrial and healthcare markets. For more information about Datalliance, visit www.datalliance.com.