NRF24: SAS spotlights customers driving results with retail AI & analytics

Whether a retailer or a consumer goods manufacturer needs to better plan assortments, optimize pricing schemes or get a handle on supply chain visibility, SAS retail solutions deliver. And with new consumption-based pricing, customers can use as much – or as little – SAS as they need to crunch large analytic workloads anytime. Because SAS enterprise applications are built on the SAS^® Viya^® AI and analytics platform, they offer customers trusted analytical transparency coupled with endless cloud flexibility.

Learn how SAS AI and analytics can help maximize profits in your organization in the e-book Profitability under pressure: 5 imperatives for maximizing value through analytics.

“Given the volatility of the retail industry and the geopolitical landscape, modern retailers and consumer goods manufacturers need a trusted analytical platform to help them thrive when confronting challenges,” said Brian Kilcourse, Managing Partner at Retail Systems Research. “This configuration of SAS’ comprehensive retail AI and analytics offerings is a solid option for a company with a data-first, cloud-first strategy.”  

Jump into any aspect of the platform, see results fast, add more as needed

“Retailers and CPG companies are no longer shackled by a one-size-fits-all approach to deploying analytics solutions in the cloud,” said Dan Mitchell, Global Director of SAS Retail and Consumer Goods. “You can get started with demand planning, for example. If you need to add assortment planning or financial planning later, it’s easy to do that. The flexibility of cloud deployment allows our customers to turn on the analytics they need when they need them at a manageable cost. The best part? There are no surprises – the platform uses a shared data model, so the total cost for using the solution is the same no matter what parts you use.”

The SAS Intelligent Planning suite comprises three critical solutions for retailers:

• SAS Demand Planning helps retailers and consumer goods companies model and forecast products and locations with a patented, advanced statistical forecasting engine.
• SAS Assortment Planning creates and manages local assortments with built-in analytics driven by consumer and trade-area demand. The solution helps users meet their objectives based on the relationships between customers, product mix and shopping locations.
• SAS Financial Planning allows you to set merchandise financial goals using past, present and future demand using embedded retail best practices. The solution also helps users control merchandise spending and optimize inventory investments with intelligent open-to-buy.

In addition, these popular SAS retail solutions are also available using the “one price, one deployment” model:

• SAS Intelligent Pricing optimizes pricing strategies with in-depth, real-time insights into price elasticity, product affinity, promotion lift and seasonal trends for each item in each store and channel.
• SAS Intelligent Inventory Management helps optimize inventory purchasing, size assortments and inventory distribution to maintain adequate stock, minimize carrying costs and improve customer satisfaction.
• SAS Intelligent Performance Management increases understanding of the profitability of customers, products, services and channels by precisely measuring activity costs and process overhead.

Today's announcement was made during the 2024 National Retail Federation Big Show & EXPO. Keep up with the latest news from SAS by following @SASsoftwareNews on X/Twitter.

About SAS Viya

SAS Viya is an AI, analytic and data management platform that runs on a modern, scalable architecture. It is cloud-first software, designed to be delivered and updated continuously and bring the power of analytics to everyone, everywhere. SAS Viya integrates the art of decision making with the science of AI and advanced analytics, helping organizations to make better decisions, faster.