Data science is blending with emerging technology to create the ultimate customer experience. While these innovations are turning the fantastic into reality, there are hidden risks that lurk behind such new technologies. Booz Allen's commercial retail experts provide cybersecurity guidance for retailers in this new digital world.
In highly regulated healthcare environments, mobile technology advancements enable greater -flexibility, portability, interactivity and better patient care than ever before. This infographic presents different use cases for the latest technologies.
How Digital Is Becoming A Mobile First ExperienceYuan Wang
We present the latest 2016 mobile marketing statistics and insights, showing increasing consumer adoption and changing behaviour around how people use mobile. We explore various options for using mobile in your marketing such as advertising, apps and campaigns. We summarise the factors influencing how a mobile experience differs from others. We revisit the App vs responsive website debate and propose a new approach. We provide tips on managing your own mobile presence – dos and don’ts, as well as case studies of excellent brand mobile marketing – advertising vs app, larger budget vs smaller budget.
IT healthcare leaders are turning to mobility to find the balance between efficiency, security and optimal patient outcomes. Ubiquitous access to printing resources is rising in importance among mobility-enabled healthcare workers, who are discovering the link between improved digital workflow and more efficient delivery of patient care.
Digital insurance trends in Asia - Presentation to Allianz regional conferen...The Digital Insurer
This deck is an extract of a presentation given to Allianz CIO's and COO's in Singapore in May 2013.
Note : The presentation is an independent presentation by The Digital Insurer and does not represent or reflect Allianz policy or strategy.
How smart companies are leveraging advanced social business intelligence to understand customers, competitors and markets like never before and protect the enterprise from the myriad of risk and threats posed by social media everyday.
In highly regulated healthcare environments, mobile technology advancements enable greater -flexibility, portability, interactivity and better patient care than ever before. This infographic presents different use cases for the latest technologies.
How Digital Is Becoming A Mobile First ExperienceYuan Wang
We present the latest 2016 mobile marketing statistics and insights, showing increasing consumer adoption and changing behaviour around how people use mobile. We explore various options for using mobile in your marketing such as advertising, apps and campaigns. We summarise the factors influencing how a mobile experience differs from others. We revisit the App vs responsive website debate and propose a new approach. We provide tips on managing your own mobile presence – dos and don’ts, as well as case studies of excellent brand mobile marketing – advertising vs app, larger budget vs smaller budget.
IT healthcare leaders are turning to mobility to find the balance between efficiency, security and optimal patient outcomes. Ubiquitous access to printing resources is rising in importance among mobility-enabled healthcare workers, who are discovering the link between improved digital workflow and more efficient delivery of patient care.
Digital insurance trends in Asia - Presentation to Allianz regional conferen...The Digital Insurer
This deck is an extract of a presentation given to Allianz CIO's and COO's in Singapore in May 2013.
Note : The presentation is an independent presentation by The Digital Insurer and does not represent or reflect Allianz policy or strategy.
How smart companies are leveraging advanced social business intelligence to understand customers, competitors and markets like never before and protect the enterprise from the myriad of risk and threats posed by social media everyday.
Covering the top mobile trends and forecasts for 2014, the presentation includes information and recommendations on the top 12 trends for this year: including mobile payments, enterprise apps, beacons for in-store customer engagement and the issues surrounding privacy amongst others.
The “Internet of Things” , IoT, is one of the most discussed trends today, affecting virtually any industry.It enables us to personalize, customize and remote-control virtually any aspect of our lives.
This presentation aims to explore:
what is IoT?
where is the trend headed?
How can industries such as hospitality, financial services and insurance, automotive, and others, use IoT?
What is the added value for the consumer?
eMarketer Webinar: The Future of Digital IdentityeMarketer
As a consumer, you know how difficult it can be to manage your identity online. How many email addresses, usernames, passwords and profiles do you maintain across a variety of platforms and devices? We’re betting the answer is several. As a marketer, you know your target audience is in the same boat—so how can you make sense of it all and get the right message to the right person? Topics in this webinar include: What tools and strategies can marketers use to deal with the fragmentation of digital identity? How are consumers attempting to take control of their identity online? What changes in digital identity will come as the internet of things takes deeper hold?
Booz Allen Hamilton, a leading strategy and technology consulting firm, has long recognized the significant impact Cloud Computing would have on organizations providing services and “products” to customers and other stakeholders.
Mobile Business Applications can be devloped on a low budget and its value to business is increasing every day.
Best Business Apps is the lading mobile application developer in Australia.
Contact us now on 1300 655 517.
The Digital Insurer presented at this conference on 18th June 2014.
The aim of the presentation was to look at the digital trends that are impacting health insurance and to explore how digital thinking can transform face-to-face sales of health insurance in Asia as well as develop new business models.
Visit the-digital-insurer.com for more information on digital insurance in Asia
Disruptive innovation creates new market and reshapes existing one. To achieve growth in a fast-changing world, you want to be a disruptor, don't be disrupted!
The Art of Banking: How to Accelerate Your Customer JourneyAppian
Commercial bankers operate in a highly complex
environment. With a digital platform, bankers can take
advantage of immediate on-boarding improvements
and advance their digital transformation strategy to win
the customer at digital speed.
Learn even more about accelerating you customer journeys in this in-depth blog: http://ap.pn/2eYQQTo
Digital thinking to transform face-to-face insurance in Asia by Hugh TerryThe Digital Insurer
These are the slides presented by The Digital Insurer at the Insurancecom conference in HK at the Ritz Carlton on 2nd December 2014.
The theme of the conference was profitable strategies for growth in 2015 and this presentation focuses on the opportunity to use digital thinking and trends to create Agency 2.0 and Banca 2.0 models
Covering the top mobile trends and forecasts for 2014, the presentation includes information and recommendations on the top 12 trends for this year: including mobile payments, enterprise apps, beacons for in-store customer engagement and the issues surrounding privacy amongst others.
The “Internet of Things” , IoT, is one of the most discussed trends today, affecting virtually any industry.It enables us to personalize, customize and remote-control virtually any aspect of our lives.
This presentation aims to explore:
what is IoT?
where is the trend headed?
How can industries such as hospitality, financial services and insurance, automotive, and others, use IoT?
What is the added value for the consumer?
eMarketer Webinar: The Future of Digital IdentityeMarketer
As a consumer, you know how difficult it can be to manage your identity online. How many email addresses, usernames, passwords and profiles do you maintain across a variety of platforms and devices? We’re betting the answer is several. As a marketer, you know your target audience is in the same boat—so how can you make sense of it all and get the right message to the right person? Topics in this webinar include: What tools and strategies can marketers use to deal with the fragmentation of digital identity? How are consumers attempting to take control of their identity online? What changes in digital identity will come as the internet of things takes deeper hold?
Booz Allen Hamilton, a leading strategy and technology consulting firm, has long recognized the significant impact Cloud Computing would have on organizations providing services and “products” to customers and other stakeholders.
Mobile Business Applications can be devloped on a low budget and its value to business is increasing every day.
Best Business Apps is the lading mobile application developer in Australia.
Contact us now on 1300 655 517.
The Digital Insurer presented at this conference on 18th June 2014.
The aim of the presentation was to look at the digital trends that are impacting health insurance and to explore how digital thinking can transform face-to-face sales of health insurance in Asia as well as develop new business models.
Visit the-digital-insurer.com for more information on digital insurance in Asia
Disruptive innovation creates new market and reshapes existing one. To achieve growth in a fast-changing world, you want to be a disruptor, don't be disrupted!
The Art of Banking: How to Accelerate Your Customer JourneyAppian
Commercial bankers operate in a highly complex
environment. With a digital platform, bankers can take
advantage of immediate on-boarding improvements
and advance their digital transformation strategy to win
the customer at digital speed.
Learn even more about accelerating you customer journeys in this in-depth blog: http://ap.pn/2eYQQTo
Digital thinking to transform face-to-face insurance in Asia by Hugh TerryThe Digital Insurer
These are the slides presented by The Digital Insurer at the Insurancecom conference in HK at the Ritz Carlton on 2nd December 2014.
The theme of the conference was profitable strategies for growth in 2015 and this presentation focuses on the opportunity to use digital thinking and trends to create Agency 2.0 and Banca 2.0 models
The Government's Effective Migration to a Cloud Computing EnvironmentBooz Allen Hamilton
Booz Allen recognized early on the significant impact Cloud Computing would have on how the government procures, implements, and manages its IT investments. This article discusses Booz Allen's approach on transitioning to a Cloud Computing environment.
Booz Allen Mission Engineering® enables clients to reduce costs by eliminating redundant and irrelevant systems, while enhancing mission capabilities through enterprise system integration.
The professionals at Booz Allen Hamilton, a leading strategy and technology consulting firm, understand Cloud Computing. This model has emerged as a new computing paradigm that arrays massive numbers of computers in centralized, distributed data centers to deliver web-based
applications, application platforms, and services via a utility model.
We are need to obtain information from several local or external sources, Each source may be built in different ways, so we will face many various conflicts in the meaning or structure and other conflicts. We'll see also examples show why need data integration .
Vehicle Cyber Security: What Every Automotive Executive Needs to KnowBooz Allen Hamilton
Security is integral to developing a high-quality, high-performing vehicle. Automotive executives have begun to realize the critical ties between cyber and vehicle security, but there’s more work to do. Booz Allen experts provide four organizational changes organizations must make to get ahead of cyber challenges.
User Experience Strategy for Lean Startups & UX Designers - London Tour April...Jaime Levy Consulting
User Experience Strategy for Lean Startups & UX Designers (London, England)
Lecture tour by Jaime Levy, a User Experience Strategist based in Los Angeles, CA USA
With the surge in online startups, entrepreneurs and their teams need a User Experience Strategy to differentiate their product from the competition. Through business cases and current work samples, students will learn to how to conduct a UX Gap Analysis (on the online marketplace), perform Guerilla User Researcher (for your MVP), and scope a product's feature set using a Feature Value Matrix. This class will expose how online success can be achieved by focusing on disruptive innovation coupled with a customer acquisition strategy. Google cloud-based spreadsheet templates will be made accessible so students can implement these techniques immediately in their daily practice.
Booz Allen Hamilton has a clear understanding of and models for effective Cloud Computing-based life-cycle cost and economic modeling. This article focuses on Booz Allen's approach to using Cloud Computing as a "game changer" in IT-related financial planning.
Booz Allen brings its pioneering work in advanced analytics—and the industry-leading expertise of its more than 500-member data science team—to transform our clients’ data into actions that keep them competitive in today’s data-driven economy.
Booz Allen’s industry-leading tradecraft helps clients solve problems previously considered beyond reach. We employ groundbreaking approaches in virtually every area of data science, including analytic techniques, modeling and simulation, optimization, data visualization, and infrastructure development.
To further push that envelope, Booz Allen has made major investments in transformative technologies to help clients. For the first time ever, our Cloud Analytics Reference Architecture gives clients the ability to bring together and harness all of their available data, of all types. Our pioneering breakthroughs in computer vision, machine learning, natural language processing and other capabilities are now enabling clients to drive mission and business success in new ways.
Balancing the tension between Lean and AgileJames Coplien
Many people equate Lean and agile or claim that one is a subset of the other. In fact, they have almost opposite emphases: thinking versus doing; teams versus individuals; planning versus reacting; and many more. This talk will help you clarify the distinction in a way that will help you focus soberly on how to improve your environment, team, product and process, by going beyond the buzzwords to the fundamental building blocks.
Pre-Con Education: Effective Change/Configuration Management With CA Service...CA Technologies
Learn important IT service management (ITSM) tips and best practices for how to implement CA Service Management's CMDB for maximum change benefit. The session will include such topics as service modeling, discovery, change audit control, federation, reconciliation and synchronization, and will be taught by CA experts in CMDB.
For more information, please visit http://cainc.to/Nv2VOe
" I know where I'm going and I know the truth, and I don't have to be what you want me to be. I'm free to be what I want." ~Muhammad Ali, the former world heavyweight boxing champion and one of sport's most influential individuals dies leaving a legacy.
The Rise and Fall of Ellen Pao. Perpetrator or Victim?Sage HR
There’s always been an old adage in the advertising world – “All publicity is good publicity” – however the sheer stupidity of that statement is enough to give old PR hands heartburn.
And the prime examples to prove its invalidity are the ups and downs of ex-Reddit interim CEO, Ellen Pao.
Since 2012, Ellen Pao has gone through an unbelievable series of highs and lows worthy of earning its own mini-series, starting with her $16 million case against former employer – Silicon Valley venture capital firm, Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers.
Her current peak ended on Friday with her resignation from her post at Reddit, in the face of overwhelming negative responses from Redditors’ hivemind, a roughly 213,000 signature-strong petition demanding her resignation on Change.org, and the official reason of differences with higher ups over the future growth rate of the website.
And now, the statements coming in from Reddit Board of Directors and ex-head honchos possibly suggest that Pao may have simply ended up being a patsy for the decisions of others, rendering her pain and humiliation at the hands of disgruntled Redditors entirely pointless.
One obvious fact visible to anyone who followed this high-octane drama over the last month is that none of Pao’s decisions were evaluated at face value, and instead she faced constant uphill battles due to her sexual discrimination (not harassment; there’s a difference, people) lawsuit against KPCB, with accusations of everything from “suing her way to the top” to gilding her own comments on Reddit (the ultimate taboo) flying around left and right.
Over the last few months, we’ve seen this story unfold and encompass everything from gender discrimination in big-money Silicon Valley, to the insidious power of trolls on the Internet.
So, let’s take a quick look at the past few years of Ellen Pao, and let you readers evaluate facts as you would.
Ten Things You Should not Forget in Mainframe Security CA Technologies
Given the current state of security and breaches in the news every day, you won’t want to miss this session. We will cover the top 10 areas that you should be reviewing as a security practitioner that most organizations overlook. With the knowledge taken from this session, you will be able to better educate your staff and auditors about how to take security to the next level for your business and protect z/OS®.
For more information, please visit http://cainc.to/Nv2VOe
In the new omni-channel environment, retailers are facing demands for convenience, value, and connected solutions—all to create the ultimate consumer experience. The opportunity for game-changing success is stunning, but the benefits are matched by some daunting challenges. From cyber security to privacy, retail leaders must understand this revolution to reap its rewards while minimizing business threats. In this viewpoint, Booz Allen's experts explain the elements of the retail revolution as well as what retailers must do to thrive amid disruption.
India Vs Australia - A Social Media AnalysisGermin8
One of the world cup’s most anticipated matches and an HR nightmare! Even though India didn’t win the match, the social media was abuzz with support for the Men in Blue. We take a look at how the viewed and related to the #IndVsAus semifinals.
Paper Jam: Why Documents are Dragging Us DownAdobe
Professionals are eager to find a better way to work, but documents and processes are stuck in the past. See the full report: www.adobe.com/go/paperjam
It's no secret that Marketing Automation is being adopted by many organizations as an essential tool to nurture and manage leads, and streamline many marketing activities.
However, there seems to be ample room to improve so that marketers can make the most of their investments in this technology.
This infographic illustrates the undeniable growth of marketing automation over the years and the potential that still exists for the future of these platforms to further enable marketers.
Retailing Management unit - 5 - IMBA Osmania universityBalasri Kamarapu
Retail Management Information System and Retail Research:
Retail Technology and Automations;
Retail Technology and CRM;
Human resources and Executive information systems;
Developing a research Methodology;
Retail audit
IBM Retail solutions offer long-standing commitment and investment
in leading-edge mobile partnerships, cognitive computing solution
development, acquisitions and research that provide disruptive
creativity and take a new approach (new business models) to solve
business problems.
Your cognitive future in retail industryTero Angeria
Cognitive + retail = the future
Welcome to the age of cognitive computing, where intelligent machines simulate human brain capabilities to help solve society’s most vexing problems. For retail,cognitive computing has already arrived, and its potential to transform the industry is enormous. Cognitive systems are driving more personalized
shopping experiences and helping unearth customer trends. Our research reveals that retail leaders globally are poised to embrace this groundbreaking technology more holistically and, by doing so, will redefine the future in retail.
Your Cognitive Future in the Retail IndustryLuke Farrell
Taking from Tero Angeria IBM
Cognitive + retail = the future
Welcome to the age of cognitive computing, where intelligent machines simulate human brain capabilities to help solve society’s most vexing problems. For retail,cognitive computing has already arrived, and its potential to transform the industry is enormous. Cognitive systems are driving more personalized
shopping experiences and helping unearth customer trends. Our research reveals that retail leaders globally are poised to embrace this groundbreaking technology more holistically and, by doing so, will redefine the future in retail.
Technology will transform retail resulting in the growth of brick and mortar retail. Check Retail Technologies trends that will help retailers survive.
Technology will transform retail resulting in the growth of brick and mortar retail. Check Retail Technologies trends that will help retailers survive.
2016 IBM Retail Industry Solutions GuideTero Angeria
IBM offers everything retailers need to transform—roadmap
development, solutions, infrastructure, research sciences,
consulting and interactive user experience design—based on
what consumers are demanding. We help retailers deepen
customer relationships and offer differentiated assortment
while driving operational excellence enterprisewide to spur
profitable growth.
This guide showcases IBM solutions for retail. It provides a quick overview of what retailers need to do within each of these areas and of the IBM solutions that can support those efforts.
Through precise location analytics, retailers now can monitor the entire path to purchase. With this data, marketers better understand what led to the purchase providing the ability to move beyond the traditional blanketed “campaign” to a year-round interaction based on consumer behavior. Customers “opt-in” by mobile app to receive highly-targeted promotions, information about merchandise they may have “visited” but didn’t purchase, and discounts for major events – based on correlations like visits, dwell and intent – to drive sales like never before.
RIS November tech solutions guide - analyticsiinside
Through precise location analytics, retailers now can monitor the entire path to purchase. With this data, marketers better understand what led to the purchase providing the ability to move beyond the traditional blanketed “campaign” to a year-round interaction based on consumer behavior. Customers “opt-in” by mobile app to receive highly-targeted promotions, information about merchandise they may have “visited” but didn’t purchase, and discounts for major events – based on correlations like visits, dwell and intent – to drive sales like never before.
IBM Guide to Consumer Products Industry Technology TrendsTero Angeria
This guide provides a quick overview of what we believe manufacturers need to address within each of these
technological transformation areas and how IBM solutions can support that transformation.
IBM offers manufacturers the integrated solutions and services required to keep pace with today’s transformational business requirements. Based on the experiences and feedback from working with many leading consumer products clients around the globe, we have designed a portfolio of offerings that addresses the specific needs of consumer products companies from strategy and roadmap development to integrated software solution delivery all focused on using technology enablers to create new value across your enterprise.We help manufacturers deepen their relationships with their consumers, offer differentiated value to channel partners to generate competitive advantage, establish supply network improvements to increase efficiencies and achieve operational excellence—all for the express purpose of
supporting continued profitable growth.
You Can Hack That: How to Use Hackathons to Solve Your Toughest ChallengesBooz Allen Hamilton
“Hackathon” has become a trendy word in today’s business vernacular, and for good reason. The word “hackathon” comes from both “hack” and “marathon.” If you think of a “hack” as a creative solution and “marathon” as a continuous, often competitive event, you’re at the heart of what a hackathon is about. Hackathons enable creative problem solving through an innovative and often competitive structure that engages stakeholders to come up with unconventional solutions to pressing challenges. Hackathons can be used to develop new processes, products, ways of thinking, or ways of engaging stakeholders and partners, with benefits ranging from solving tough problems to broader cultural and organizational improvements.
This playbook was designed to make hackathons accessible to everyone. That means not only can all kinds of organizations benefit from hackathons, but that all kinds of employees inside those groups—executives, project managers, designers, or engineers—should participate and can benefit, too. Use this playbook as a reference and allow the best practices we outline to guide you in designing a hackathon structure that works for you and enables your organization to achieve its desired outcomes. Give yourself anywhere from six weeks to a few months to plan your hackathon, depending on the components, approach, number of participants, and desired outcomes.
Contact Director Brian MacCarthy at MacCarthy_Brian2@bah.com for more information about Booz Allen’s hackathon offering.
Booz Allen's U.S. Commercial Leader and Executive Vice President, Bill Phelps, recently released his list of 10 Cyber Priorities for Boards of Directors. As we peer into how business, technology, regulatory, and cyber threat realities are evolving in the coming year, here is a reference guide for board members to use in validating their company's cybersecurity approach.
We looked at the data. Here’s a breakdown of some key statistics about the nation’s incoming presidents’ addresses, how long they spoke, how well, and more.
Our Military Spouse Forum built a roadmap to help you navigate your career between deployments, moves, and the unpredictable. Interested in how Booz Allen can help you navigate your career? Check out our opportunities at www.boozallen.com/careers
In August 2016, Booz Allen partnered with Market Connections to conduct a survey of National Security Leaders and the General Public to understand their perspectives on the current threats. Fifteen years after the September 11 attacks, we wanted to know what keeps them up at night today, and what they will be worried about in 15 years. This infographic provides the high-level results of our survey and we will be releasing a more detailed report later in the month of September – so stay tuned. #NationalSecurity2031
Booz Allen convened some of the smartest minds to explore making healthcare more accessible. This report shares the latest healthcare payment trends and what policy experts discovered when planning for different health reform scenarios.
An interactive workshop that guides you through the many relationships that exist in an agile team, with a business value emphasis. Team members gain empathy, discover expectations of others and the importance of these agile team relationships.
An immersive environment allows students to be completely “immersed” in a self-contained simulated or artificial environment while experiencing it as real. With immersive learning, you can show realistic visual and training environments to teach complex tasks and concepts.
Nuclear Promise: Reducing Cost While Improving PerformanceBooz Allen Hamilton
To remain competitive, nuclear operators must take aim at all addressable costs, ensuring maintenance is optimized, taking proactive steps to minimize unplanned outages and, where possible, reducing administrative and other overhead costs. There are multiple opportunities to reduce capital and operational spending, while improving safety and reliability.
General Motors and Lyft; Target and Walmart; Netflix and Amazon - we call these “frenemies”. A strange trend is emerging as unlikely partner companies join forces, and they’re transforming industries around the world. Understanding what's driving the frenemies trend, knowing what options best fit your needs, and making yourself an effective partner are all critical to success.
Threats to industrial control systems are on the rise. This briefing explores potential threats and vulnerabilities as well as what organizations can do to guard against them.
Booz Allen Hamilton and Market Connections: C4ISR Survey ReportBooz Allen Hamilton
Booz Allen Hamilton partnered with government market research firm Market Connections, Inc. to conduct the survey of military decision-makers. The research examined the main features of Integrated C4ISR through Enterprise Integration: engineering, operations and acquisition. Two-thirds of respondents (65 percent) agree agile incremental delivery of modular systems with integrated capabilities can enable rapid insertion of new technologies.
Modern C4ISR Integrates, Innovates and Secures Military NetworksBooz Allen Hamilton
A majority of the military believe Integrated C4ISR through Enterprise Integration would provide utility to their organization. Check out other key findings from our study in this infographic http://bit.ly/1OZOjG2
Agile and Open C4ISR Systems - Helping the Military Integrate, Innovate and S...Booz Allen Hamilton
Integrated C4ISR is a force multiplier that significantly improves situational awareness and decision making to give warfighters a decisive battlefield advantage. This advantage stems from Booz Allen Hamilton’s Enterprise Integration approach http://bit.ly/25nDBRg: bringing together three disciplines and their communities—engineering, operations, and acquisition.
Booz Allen Hamilton created the Field Guide to Data Science to help organizations and missions understand how to make use of data as a resource. The Second Edition of the Field Guide, updated with new features and content, delivers our latest insights in a fast-changing field. http://bit.ly/1O78U42
C4ISR systems are vital in delivering critical intelligence to military decision makers and operators for mission success. If the U.S. maintains current C4ISR investment levels, spending will reach $74.3 billion in 2024, according to a recent forecast report by Strategic Defense Intelligence. Unfortunately, many legacy C4ISR systems were built in stovepipes to fulfill a single mission requirement, leading to interoperability gaps in today’s technical, user-centric, and secure operational environments. Improvements need to be made when developing and fielding C4ISR systems.
1. Commercial Solutions
RETAIL
REALITY CHECK
The Risks and Rewards of the New Digital World Order
Booz Allen Hamilton Commercial Solutions combines
industry knowledge and relevant experience with the right
people and technologies to reduce risk, improve safety,
and increase profitability for your business. Together, we
can enable you to thrive today, tomorrow, and beyond.
2. 2
THE FUTURE IS HERE
Data science is blending with emerging technology to create the
ultimate customer experience. Advances—such as facial recognition,
augmented reality, in-store location tracking, and mobile payments—
have intrigued retailers for years but presented challenges because the
ability to truly personalize and automate the customer experience was
missing…until now. While data science is turning the fantastic into
reality, there are hidden risks that lurk behind these new technologies.
As hackers look to take advantage of the personal information retailers
can now collect, knowing the risks and benefits of the new mobile digital
world will help you out maneuver your competition.
Emerging data science techniques are enabling retailers to collect and
analyze information about individual consumers and deliver insights via
targeted customer coupons in real-time, anywhere and to anyone. This
consistent understanding of who customers are, what they want to buy,
and how they want to purchase ties all of these technology innovations
together, opening up incredible new opportunities but also serious risks.
Innovation in the digital age brings emerging cybersecurity vulnerabilities.
With the amount of information retailers are now able to collect about
individuals, companies cannot separate using new waves of technology to
enhance the bottom line from addressing cybersecurity. Major retailers
need to be proactive in avoiding the crosshairs of potential threat actors
and minimizing risk. Strong brand loyalty and consumer trust is critical to
ensuring retailers thrive. Consumers want to know retailers can deliver on
promises while also protecting their personal information. To do that
effectively, retailers must understand the intersection of innovative
technology, data science, and cybersecurity—and what to do about it.
Figure 1—Strong Cybersecurity Underpins Retail
Opportunities
3. 3
The Rise of Omni-Channel Inventory
Retailers traditionally used different
inventory channels, with online sales
sourced differently than stores. Today,
supply chain and data science advances
are giving rise to “Omni-channel
Inventory,” allowing retailers to seize new
revenue opportunities and enhance
customer experience through dynamic,
responsive integration.
THE MARRIAGE OF DATA
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY
Predictive. Adaptive. Personalized. This is the promise of blending data science with emerging technology, and it is the new
mantra of retailers who seek competitive advantage. Savvy retailers are already using social media and mobile applications to
engage customers. Highly innovative retailers, however, are breaking new ground—using data science to tie technologies
together into one seamless, personalized customer experience.
The Segment of One
Marketers used to focus on segments of individuals to target key messages and engage consumers. Now, hyper-
personalization emphasizes a “Segment of One” through data science that provides the ability to gather, analyze, distill, and
deliver vast amounts of information in real time. And hyper-personalization pays off. Data from a Retail TouchPoints 2014
Technology Review shows that marketers who fully implement a customer-centric strategy can generate 15% to 25% higher
sales and improve customer lifetime value up to 500%.1
Retailers can now blend insights from individual
online and in-store purchasing habits to better
understand customers—when they buy, how they
buy, where they buy, preferences using social
media, and past purchases using loyalty
programs—to personalize promotions and tailor
offerings. By matching that information with
technology, such as geo-location and facial
recognition, they can also deliver targeted
promotions to mobile devices.
Mobile devices make in-store shopping an interactive experience as never before, while generating enormous amounts of
data for retailers. iBeacons, for example, wirelessly connect automatically to Bluetooth for in-store location tracking so that
individual customers receive customized coupons with dynamically changing displays that meet their unique needs. Retailers
can provide customers with instant online reviews and allow them to buy items as they walk rather than waiting in line.
Customers can have items sent home or send gifts to family and friends—all in store, from a handheld mobile device. And if
they need in-store help, representatives receive key information that is automatically transmitted, such as the customer’s
name and purchasing history, to provide tailored support. In-store retail associates are also now armed with mobile devices
and kiosks to provide the most up-to-date inventory information for tailored recommendations.
This technological revolution isn’t just occurring in front of the customers’ eyes.
It’s also happening behind the scenes, reshaping the way retailers manage
inventories and supply chains. Data science is taking the just-in-time concept one
step further, providing retailers with real-time inventory management. Retailers
are using a combination of radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags, cameras,
and data analytics to monitor inventory levels within the store aisles. As
customers take stock of the shelves, alerts are sent and new items are restocked,
even before the store runs out of the item. Using mobile technology to track
customer movements and patterns, matched with purchasing habits and even
social media trends, retailers can better anticipate inventory demands for specific
stores that would never had been visible without data science.
1 2014 Technology Preview: Exclusive Predictions from 22 Retail Executives; Retail TouchPoints; 2014
Life me Sales Increase When Applying a Customer-Centric Model
500%
Source: 2014 Technology Preview
Figure 2 — Retailers who focus on customer experience generate 5x more sales
4. 4
CYBERSECURITY IN THE
CHANGING LANDSCAPE
Capitalizing on emerging technologies and data science for a customized “Segment of One” is an ideal scenario for retailers;
however, it also creates an ideal scenario for hackers. Data science yields great power to collect enormous amounts of
information and develop insights about customers, but it also introduces new risk, with devastating impacts if it falls into the
wrong hands. Customer data—the new currency of the digital age—makes retailers a prime target for attacks.
As retailers launch new technologies and apply data analytics, cybersecurity risks increase in several key ways:
1. The attack surface increases exponentially.
Flowing data between online locations, mobile devices, in-store devices, and supply chains increases the opportunity for
attackers to break into systems by expanding the ways in which threats can infiltrate a system.
2. New technologies inherently bring unknowns.
Retailers often don’t identify vulnerabilities until after technologies are launched and are live on the network. Holes,
weaknesses, and unintended consequences won’t often show themselves until after going live with customers.
3. Automation increases the impact of an attack.
The sheer amount of data that systems consume and process necessitates automation. Yet, while automation may bring
speed to business, it also removes the “biological” safety net and allows malware to spread malware more quickly.
Even if attackers do not gain access to specific
financial information, they can use stolen data for
identity theft—impersonating customers to secure
fraudulent credit cards, open fake bank accounts,
or make other bogus purchases. Phishing attacks,
which are a common way to trick individuals into
sharing personal information, can now become
more advanced. With access to customer
movements, hackers are able to customize emails
based on location or transaction history to
increase their perceived legitimacy and, thereby,
the success of their attacks. Other hackers
conduct privacy extortion by holding personal
information for ransom to a retailer or consumer
for a specified amount.
These examples offer a mere snapshot of the ways in which hackers can exploit retailers and customers if they obtain this
critical information. The recent cybersecurity breaches of large, well-known retailers demonstrate the increased vulnerability of
the retail industry. Both physical store locations and online stores are now at risk.
5. 5
Key Cyber Controls
When assessing your program’s maturity,
pay particular attention to:
Threat Intelligence
Security Monitoring
Privacy Policies
Identity and Access Management
Incident Response
Mobile Technologies
STAYING OUT IN FRONT
Retailers are in a tough spot, working to balance competitive pressures and opportunities to innovate with unknowns and new
threats. Fortunately, you can get ahead of the changes, the risks, and the competition with a few smart moves.
Get serious about cybersecurity
Cybersecurity can no longer be an afterthought of technology development. You
need a comprehensive understanding of how threat actors exploit your
vulnerabilities and the cybersecurity implications that new technologies pose.
Strong cybersecurity comes down to effective risk management: The better you
understand your risks, the more confidently you can develop new technology. If
you do not have a formal cybersecurity risk management framework, you should
develop one to help you systematically identify risks, categorize risk options, and
guide policy and decision-making.
You should also consider leveraging a cybersecurity maturity model to assess
your cybersecurity program’s controls and operations against industry best
practices. You can then identify gaps and create a detailed roadmap to increase
the effectiveness of your program. This is not a compliance audit, but rather a
comprehensive evaluation of your program’s maturity. Compliance audits often
focus on a “yes” or “no” standard and do not account for how to best evolve your program given your specific strategic goals
and market circumstances.
Apply a disciplined approach to technology development
Technology is often pushed into the market before it is fully vetted, with the hope that the market will help shape the
technology’s development and that defects can be managed via updates and patches. This approach causes issues with
cybersecurity. It’s one thing to patch a minor glitch in performance; it is quite another to race to patch a major vulnerability.
This is why comprehensive and robust cybersecurity testing must be part of product development. You should not only test
individual aspects of your technology (e.g., specific functions or sections of code) but also test the entire technology, with all
elements integrated. Integrated testing often reveals vulnerabilities that individual, “siloed” testing does not surface. Pay
particular attention to the open source code. Given the incredible amount of code that must be developed for new technology,
open source code is a significant time saver; however, since this code is copied from the internet, it needs extra scrutiny.
If your technology interacts with other systems, particularly legacy systems, you also need to test for unintended
consequences and vulnerabilities when systems interact. Testing ends with the developed technology, but all of it must
function in an integrated, digital ecosystem that must be tested as a whole.
Use Big Data as a big stick
Retailers are also harnessing the power of data science and emerging technologies through predictive cyber threat
intelligence to protect against the new that risks big data and emerging technologies create. Predictive cyber threat
intelligence is transforming the retail industry’s ability to gather, mine, and analyze vast amounts of cybersecurity threat
information to protect against advanced persistent threats, fraud, and insider attacks. Analysts are using new technologies like
Splunk to comb social media sites to ingest and analyze terabytes of cyber threat data.
By combining big data, cloud computing technologies, and analysis tools, retailers can obtain additional fidelity into current
cybersecurity operations and use insights to make risk-informed and data-driven decisions. Predictive cyber threat intelligence
gives you insight into cyber threat actors—including their tactics, techniques and procedures—for proactive defense.
This predictive cyber threat intelligence “big data warning system’ uses the power of big data to help reinforce your
organization’s cybersecurity posture. Similar to the customer experience, retailers can be more predictive, adaptive, and
personalized in their response to prospective threats. And similarly, as competitive pressures propel retailers to find creative
ways to outmaneuver competition, emerging technologies and data science are new weapons in your arsenal.
6. Booz Allen Hamilton has been at the forefront of strategy and technology consulting for more than a century. The firm
provides business and technology solutions to major corporations in the financial services, heath, energy, manufacturing, and
other markets, leveraging capabilities and expertise developed during decades of helping US government clients solve their
toughest problems. Booz Allen is headquartered in McLean, Virginia, employs more than 22,000 people, and had revenue of
$5.84 billion for the 12 months ended March 31, 2014. To learn more, visit www.boozallen.com. (NYSE: BAH)
IT’S ABOUT TRUST
Imagine a scene: As customers enter a store, they pass electronic displays. Their faces are scanned and coupons appear on
Google Glass. Reality blends seamlessly with the digital world. Customers browse product reviews and compare prices via
real-time apps. Items are purchased from mobile devices with automatic delivery.
Now imagine a cyber-criminal hacking into this customer experience. Within an instant, personal information is gone—credit
card numbers, name, home address, date of birth, even smartphone-stored apps with unpurchased products.
This scenario is not science fiction. This technology exists and is fundamentally reshaping the retail industry. Leading retailers
are those who can effectively manage emerging technology and instill trust and confidence in consumers.
Retailers have long invested in developing brand loyalty with consumers. With the convergence of emerging technologies,
data science, and cybersecurity, trust is an even more critical part of your brand. Customers need to trust you to understand
their particular needs. They need to trust that you can deliver on increasing demands for convenience, flexibility, and mobility.
Most of all, they need to trust that their personal information is secure and will not be wrongfully used. The amount and kind of
personal information retailers collect and analyze makes most people a little uncomfortable. Companies that build the trust in
their systems, while leveraging the benefits of new innovations, will win market share.
To learn how Booz Allen Hamilton can help
your business thrive, contact:
Booz Allen Hamilton
Susan Maly
Commercial Solutions
Washington, DC
Tel +1 703-377-6448
Maly_Susan@bah.com
Boozallen.com/commercial
Ian Bramson
Commercial Solutions
Denver, CO
Tel +1 240-675-0840
Bramson_Ian@bah.com
Boozallen.com/commercial
Sedar Labarre
Commercial Solutions
Washington, DC
Tel +1 301-452-4996
Labarre_Sedar@bah.com
Boozallen.com/commercial