Maintaining standards at a high level

摘要

The joint trade and industry body Efficient Consumer Response (ECR) aims to improve the flow of information and goods between producers, trade and service providers. The GS1 organisation of the 《D-A-CH countries》 (Germany, Austria and Switzerland) devoted its 9th ECR meeting to the topic of transparent value creation. Some 1,400 participants from 600 companies took part in the intensive discussion and lecture marathon hosted by Switzerland in Zurich's ultramodern event arena, the Hallenstadion. The star guest was former German foreign minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher. Hansueli Loosli, chairman of the executive committee of the Swiss retail chain Coop, was honoured with the title of businessman of the year. Communication and process standards play a key role in the management of data and goods flows. Their use enables substantial savings to be achieved and allows potentials for automation to be efficiently exploited. Success factor number two is intercorporate cooperation, which brings further potentials for improvement, emphasised Zygmunt Mierdorf, a member of the board of directors of the Metro Group. No wonder, for although everyone at GS1 goes to the meetings to discuss common standards, the principle of competition still applies. The result is a highly heterogeneous picture such as is also commonly seen at trade congresses and conferences. On the one hand the participants aim to achieve greater transparency by ensuring that interfaces between companies and the flows of goods function in an optimal manner. On the other hand their first thought is still for their own advantage, which must be cultivated by a skilful exploitation of the market and carefully placed innovations.