Autumn 2007

The Merret multi-channel supply chain solution from Retail Assist, previously available only on IBM's i-series computer range (formerly the AS/400), has been ported to Microsoft's .NET arena. Both versions will now be developed alongside each other.

According to managing director Alan Morris: 'Retailers É like to have a choice. We're simply following the same approach, giving retailers another way to deploy Merret, to improve efficiency and achieve cost savings.'

Merret was launched in 2001, and the company says it is one of its industry's best-kept secrets. However, the cat seems to be getting out of the bag; it has won several awards, including this year's European Retail Solutions award for best use of e-commerce in a retail environment, which it picked up in partnership with Fresca and Rubicon Retail.

Merret is a real-time, multi-currency, multi-channel, retail supply chain solution, covering product content, purchasing, warehousing, replenishment, inward and outward distribution, store back-office, retail financials, in-season planning, CRM data capture and reporting.

It acts as a core centralised retail component, and includes standard interfaces to enable it to work with either best-of-breed peripheral solutions or bespoke applications. Clients include Harvey Nichols, Burberry, Paperchase, Principles and Warehouse.