IBM, in collaboration with its business partner in Saudi Arabia Brmaja Commercial Company, has announced that Virgin Megastore KSA, a major entertainment retailer in the Kingdom, is migrating its SAP ERP application workloads to IBM Cloud as part of its hybrid cloud strategy. The migration from on-premises to a cloud environment is designed to help the retailer create operational efficiencies and provide a platform for new digital services to its clients.
Habits formed during the COVID-19 pandemic have raised consumers’ expectations for digital engagement, especially in service industries like retail. This is encouraging retailers to transform their operations to deliver an efficient, secured, and seamless experience across front and back-end business processes. Now retailers are modernizing operations, including mission-critical workloads such as finance and inventory reporting, as well as customer-facing processes to enhance experiences while protecting their data.
Fahad Alanazi
By migrating its ERP workloads to IBM Cloud, Virgin Megastore KSA will aim to boost productivity across business functions to help meet the evolving needs of its growing network of shoppers. With a secured and open hybrid cloud approach from IBM, the retailer aims to significantly reduce administration and reporting time, allowing its sales teams to stay focused on driving client experiences.
“Modernizing our infrastructure will allow us to enhance our customer-facing and back-end performance, allowing our employees to focus on delivering world-class experiences for shoppers,” said Russel Bacha, head of technology and loyalty, Virgin Megastore KSA. “Through working with IBM to accelerate our journey to the cloud in a way that helps ensure we’re able to protect client data, we can uncover new ways to reduce time-to-market and streamline operations — that will enhance the digital and real-life experiences of our customers.”
“As the COVID-19 pandemic continues, the challenges facing many retailers in the region are extensive. By adopting a secured and open hybrid cloud strategy with IBM, Virgin Megastore KSA can modernize applications and access an innovative infrastructure, designed to be agile and easily adaptable to the expanding needs of the company, while offering a more personalized and secured experience for shoppers,” said Fahad Alanazi, general manager, IBM Saudi Arabia.
“By working with Virgin Megastore KSA to accelerate their digital transformation, we are able to support their business vision and fuel their growth.”
