January 21, 2005

ON THE MOVE Deloitte has hired Philip Asmundson as the national managing partner of the U.S. branch of its technology, media, and telecommunications practice. Asmundson will head up Deloitte's consulting efforts on entertainment, wireless and wired telecommunications, and related technology and automation efforts in those spaces. NEW PRODUCTS Webmetrics and Fry, an e-commerce design firm, have teamed up to create a new e-commerce performance-reporting and -testing service for retail clients. Fry will offer Webmetrics' SiteStress and AppMonitor tools through its managed service offering to provide improved auditing of the robustness of e-commerce site operations. Lillian Vernon's Web operation is the joint venture's first announced customer. IN THE NEWS SafeHarbor Technology, a BI and customer experience specialist, has received $5 million in funding from three of its incumbent venture investors. Covestco, OVP Venture Partners, and Wheatley Partners provided the extra cash to accelerate marketing and sales efforts and validated the efforts of new CEO Annette Jacobs, who took over the company's top job in early 2004. Privately held analytic consultancy iKnowtion has released some details of its 2004 financial performance. The company says it enjoyed record growth in the past year, and anticipates increased revenues of more than 50 percent in the year ahead. The 6-year-old firm recently expanded staff and strengthened management in its consulting and data service divisions, and says it expects continued hiring growth over the next six months at least. CUSTOMER WINS Walgreen has selected SBC Communications for a large-scale telecommunications overhaul in more than 2,000 of its approximately 4,700 store locations. The project will combine voice and data services, along with managed maintenance services of the network infrastructure. Retailer The Container Store has tapped RedPrairie to provide labor management and productivity optimization solutions for the distribution arm of the company. The project effects more than 230 distribution center workers, and is expected to help The Container Store achieve better value for money in its labor scheduling, while carefully adhering to performance and fair labor-standards criteria. Related articles: The Age of Fluff-Free ROI 10 Technologies That Are Reinventing the CRM Industry