It all begins with data. How are leading retailers and content holders collaborating to improve the flow of information and the quality of their data?  What lessons can be learned from build-outs in other industries that have adopted such systems?  

This will be the subject of a highlighted presentation at the Entertainment Supply Chain Academy, June 27-28, 2007 in Los Angeles, which will explore how retailers and home video companies are working closer to better align their data warehouses to assure better data synchronicity, resulting in more accurate business analysis.

One of the panelists, Cheryl Wiebe, Engagement Partner, Communications, Media and Entertainment for Teradata, has extensive experience working on both sides of this equation for leading retailers and home entertainment studios.  Her experience in organizing and implementing data warehouse and analytic application technology for numerous studios and retail clients.

In fact, Teradata built the foundational data platform for Wal-Mart's RetailLink vendor collaboration hub.  The $1.5 billon, San Diego-based division of POS giant NCR has over 1,000 installations worldwide and has been adding more than 100 customers worldwide annually.

As one leading IT magazine recently wrote: "Data warehouse may no longer be the best way to describe what Teradata customers are doing with their repositories of increasingly detailed data. The stuff doesn't sit around; companies such as Harrah's Entertainment and Continental Airlines employ Teradata's 'active' data warehousing to immediately improve customer experiences. Rival technologies and vendors try, but it's tough to dislodge the enterprise data warehouse as the best way to deliver a single, consistent source of 'the truth' to support all user's data views."

Wiebe further explains, "The time is right for home entertainment companies to pay closer attention to their data. They are seeing their ability to command high prices decreasing, thus, their margins are eroding, and there are continual increases in transportation; they are being squeezed from both directions and there are looming thoughts of digital download to deal with. If they are creative, by studying their data and the data on their vendors and customers they will probably find ideas that grow their top line and bottom line," Wiebe explains.


Teradata is a relative newcomer to home video, having launched their Media & Entertainment (M&E) practice only four years ago, but they bring to Hollywood extensive vertical market success stories, particularly experiences in other perishable consumer goods categories like groceries.

"The immediate opportunity that we always go for in a new space is to look at the data environment and make sure you are getting it right...not only within the walls of the home entertainment companies but also with their trading partners and with everyone in the supply chain. We have made huge inroads in financial, banking, retail, and communications this way and the end results have been significant.

"One of the things Teradata espouses is to begin by cleaning house for all business transactions and collecting and storing them in a normalized fashion – an approach that requires a significant amount of data organization.  Teradata advocates using one of its Industry Logical Data Models as the blueprint for this organizing task. Over time the programs you build to study the data may change, but at least the investment you made in collecting your data will remain stable.  You build upon your investment in the data infrastructure to making it resilient, reliable and fast.  Then, if all else fails, you still have your valuable information intact, which quickly is becoming one of the most important assets that any company has.

"Our specific idea for home entertainment is to collect all of your data into one place -- from the time you are conceiving a new title to when you are sending out replenishment DVD shipments for catalog sales. The new release may be all about getting the initial right quantity out to the stores, while the long tail is about getting the right product at the right time and having a lot of history in both cases is essential."

Wiebe explains that home video business traditionally views the DVD as having a three-part lifecycle: new release, the value or heavily promoted, and catalog.  However, Teradata's view is that those three segments are actually part of a single demand curve. The business also tends to plan the distribution of these segments separately, from first allocation, to replenishment, to returns, whereas returns are simply a final stage of the supply chain, in their perspective. "Returns are just the result of an inaccurate planning approach; planning and execution of these processes should be more holistic;  in this respect retailers have already made strides in bringing about integrated approaches to demand/supply planning."

How will the digital supply chain alter this approach?  It won't.

"It will be a long time before the physical supply chain will ever go away.  But in a digital world, it will be even more all about the data.  The economics of delivering a product will now be the same for a hit as well as a long tail item."