VDC Research Blog




Sitting on $4.3 Billion of Unsold Inventory, H&M Falling Victim to their Low Tech Approach to Inventory Management

by Nick Elia, with Chris Kondracki | 04/25/2018

While a decent chunk of retail organizations over the past few years have been increasing their in-store and online sales via investment in Omni-channel initiatives to keep up with the likes of Amazon, retailers like H&M have fallen behind. This can be seen most notably in H&M’s struggle to sell off $4.3 Billion of unsold inventory. As a way to combat their inventory problem H&M has been increasing the amount of markdowns they have, but this in turn has led to slipping sales and more importantly, lower profits. Learn more

The IoT & Embedded Technology Beat: with Alexander Bufalino of 1NCE

by Steve Hoffenberg | 04/24/2018

This interview is part of an ongoing series VDC conducts with IoT and embedded solution providers to share views on their company, products, and state of the market. At Mobile World Congress in February 2018, the new company 1NCE announced a cellular-based NB-IoT communications service for the revolutionary price of only 10 euros for 10 years of service with up to 500MB of data transfer. Read more

MODEX 2018 Highlights the Drive Towards Industrial Automation

by Michael Clarke | 04/23/2018

MODEX is the premier tradeshow for supply chain and logistics solutions, powered by the MHI and held biannually in Atlanta, GA where industry leaders in AIDC and robotics display their latest technology. This blog will detail the latest announcements and provide commentary on the newest innovation unveiled at MODEX 2018. Read more

The IoT & Embedded Technology Beat: with Nils Herzberg of SAP

by Roy Murdock | 03/26/2018

This interview is part of an ongoing series VDC conducts with IoT and embedded software solution providers to share views on their company, products, and state of the market. Nils Herzberg is the Global Head for the Go to Market Strategy for Internet of Things & Strategic Partnerships. Reporting to the General Manager for IoT & Digital Supply Chain, he drives major elements of SAP’s partnership strategy, customer strategy, and OEM strategy as well as focus scenarios, market units, and industries. Read more

The Digital Union of Spectrum and Smartflow Is Poised to Bolster Loftware Inc.’s Enterprise Labeling & Artwork Solutions

by Michael Clarke | 03/23/2018

As a global leader in enterprise labeling solutions with over 5000 customers in over 100 countries, Loftware Inc. aims to extend and synergize its global capabilities with its acquisition of UK based company and artwork management solutions provider, GAP Systems. This combination of enterprise labeling and artwork management solutions is poised to drive innovation and offer singular enterprise platform for labeling and packaging artwork requirements. Read more

IBM Think Recap

by Roy Murdock | 03/22/2018

VDC analysts Chris Rommel and Roy Murdock attended IBM’s new flagship conference Think 2018, held at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. IBM rolled a few of its previous conferences such as InterConnect, World of Watson, Amplify, Edge, and PartnerWorld into one mega conference attended by almost 40,000 customers, partners, and executives. Read more

MWC18, Part 2: Notes from the Show Floor

by Steve Hoffenberg, and Roy Murdock | 03/14/2018

In Part 1 of our MWC18 coverage, we featured info from the Mobile IoT Summit, and VDC’s pick for our Embeddy Award from the show. In Part 2, we highlight a selection of notable vendors on the trade show floor, as seen by VDC’s Roy Murdock and Steve Hoffenberg. Read more

MWC18, Part 1: 1NCE IoT Service Named Winner of VDC’s Embeddy Award

by Steve Hoffenberg | 03/12/2018

At this year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, IoT products and services took a giant leap forward. Unlicensed spectrum LPWAN products and services for IoT communications (such as LoRa, Sigfox, and Ingenu) have been available for several years. In prior years, offerings for licensed spectrum IoT services such as LTE Cat-M1 (a.k.a. LTE-M) and NB-IoT were mostly in the discussion and demo stages. Now, the sheer volume of announced IoT wireless modules and services for the licensed spectrum has ramped up, and many are already on the market. Read more

Meet with VDC at Hannover Messe 2018

by Jared Weiner | 03/12/2018

VDC Research will once again be attending Hannover Messe, the world’s leading trade show for industrial technology. This year’s show—which takes place from April 23-27 at the Hannover Fairground in Hannover, Germany—will feature more than 5,000 international exhibitors, 1,400 lectures and panels, and 200,000 attendees. Among the industry trends expected to emphasized by exhibitors, lecturers, and panel members at Hannover Messe 2018 are Industrie 4.0, integrated energy, smart supply, predictive maintenance, cobots, lightweight construction, and the digital twin. Learn more

Hardware Highlights from Embedded World 2018

by Dan Mandell | 03/10/2018

Last week, the embedded engineering community migrated to Nuremberg, Germany for the 16th annual Embedded World conference. Embedded World is the epicenter of the IoT and embedded technology conference calendar with all of the global juggernauts coming together in one place to launch new products, unveil strategic collaborations, and set the future of embedded engineering. Read more

Mentor Named Winner of VDC Research Embeddy Award for Software – Nuremberg 2018

by Andre' Girard | 03/09/2018

VDC Research attended the Embedded World 2018 conference in Nuremberg, Germany through three days during the week of February 26th packed full of face-to-face meetings with dozens of exhibitors. This year’s event was the 16th Embedded World conference and it continues to grow as the leading exhibition for global IoT and embedded technology providers. 1,021 companies from around the world exhibited throughout 6 massive halls and showcased to more than 32,200 embedded experts from 78 countries. Read more

Silicon Labs Named Winner of VDC Research Embeddy Award for Hardware – Nuremberg 2018

by Dan Mandell | 03/09/2018

VDC Research attended the Embedded World 2018 conference in Nuremberg, Germany through three days during the week of February 26th packed full of face-to-face meetings with dozens of exhibitors. This year’s event was the 16th Embedded World conference and it continues to grow as the leading exhibition for global IoT and embedded technology providers. 1,021 companies from around the world exhibited throughout 6 massive halls and showcased to more than 32,200 embedded experts from 78 countries. Read more

Business Benefits Crucial to Wearables

by Spencer Gisser | 02/26/2018

Wearable solution providers are discovering the importance of focusing on the business benefits that they can provide. It is not enough to offer a flexible platform upon which customers can build – wearable companies must work with partners and prospective customers to learn what metrics their solutions can improve and map a specific path to those goals. Many wearables companies have not approached the market with a business benefit framework, and these organizations have become mired in “pilot purgatory.” Appealing to forward-thinking research and development units, many wearable companies expect prospective organizations to view their products as enabling new workflows and driving business benefits. Learn more

Major Takeaways from Embedded Tech Trends 2018

by Dan Mandell | 01/31/2018

Embedded Tech Trends 2018 highlighted several important trends impacting the markets for critical and intelligent embedded systems. Embedded Tech Trends is an annual business and technology forum where technology suppliers and media come together to discuss technology advancements, standards, and other important topics for anyone developing boards, systems, and software for critical and intelligent embedded computing. This year’s event was hosted last week in Austin, Texas with a focus on the “biggest technologies and brightest solutions” behind high performance computing problems in mission-critical environments. Read more

CES 2018, Part 2: Smart Home, A View Through the Pipes

by Steve Hoffenberg | 01/19/2018

In Part 1 of our post about CES 2018, we looked at the rise of automotive technology at the show. In Part 2, we’ll discuss how and why consumers adopt smart home technology. And we’ll do so through a specific lens: five different products we saw at CES that can monitor and/or control the flow of water through the pipes. Unlike a Nest Thermostat or a Samsung Family Hub Smart Refrigerator, most visitors will never know these plumbing-related products are installed in the home. They have no bling value. Just to reiterate, we’ll be discussing these products as examples primarily to help illustrate the reasons consumers purchase smart home devices. Read more

Checkpoint Systems Aims to Further its Connected Store Ambitions with Latest Announcements at NRF 2018

by Michael Clarke, with Richa Gupta | 01/18/2018

Checkpoint Systems Inc. (a division of CCL Labels), a leader in electronic article surveillance (EAS) and RFID solutions for the retail industry, announced two new product offerings at the recently concluded NRF conference in New York. Thus, this blog will detail the latest products and the company’s outlook for the retail space in 2018. Read more