January 17th, 2024

BBM Partners with Centric Software to Power Full-Chain Digitalization

Famous Apparel Brand implements Planning+PLM+SCM project to enable localization, strengthen supply chains and improve consumer experience

CAMPBELL, Calif., January 18, 2024 – Baozun Brand Management (BBM) of Baozun Inc., the franchisor that operates Gap^® brand business in China, has partnered with Centric Software® to launch and implement a project incorporating retail planning, Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) and Supply Chain Management (SCM), to empower Gap’s transformation in the local market as it enters a new stage of development. Centric Software provides the most innovative enterprise solutions to plan, design, develop, source, buy, make, price, allocate, sell and replenish products such as fashion, outdoor, luxury, multi-category retail, grocery, food & beverage, cosmetics & personal care and consumer electronics to achieve strategic and operational digital transformation goals.

Gap is an iconic fashion brand and the namesake for leading global specialty retailer, The Gap, Inc.^TM. Since the opening of its first China store in 2010, Gap has achieved robust expansion throughout the country, amassing broad brand awareness in the region. Following the completion of the acquisition, Baozun Inc. runs Gap’s operation in China starting from February 1, 2023. Since then, Gap’s China business has become an important part of Baozun Inc, under the business line of BBM.

As the Gap brand entered a new chapter of development in the Chinese market, BBM sought a comprehensive digital technology solution for the brand’s operations on BBM’s development strategy. The goal was to enhance product design capabilities with a focus on localization, strengthen the responsiveness of the local supply chain and improve the shopping experience for consumers, guided by the principle of “In China for China”.

Given Centric’s rich experience in the fashion and footwear industry and excellent reputation in the field, BBM and Centric entered into a full-chain digitalization collaboration that covers retail planning, product development, assortment and supplier management. This collaboration involves the implementation of two core products from Centric Software: Centric Planning^TM and Centric PLM™^,, with an aim to establish a digital foundation for data and processes to enable Gap’s transformation from planning to product go-to-market through the deployment of Centric Software’s end-to-end solutions.

In March 2023, the two companies officially launched the Planning+PLM+SCM project. Through the joint efforts of their teams and relentless dedication, the project was completed ahead of schedule within five months.

“We are honored to have earned BBM’s trust to undertake such a substantial and important project,” says Chris Groves, CEO of Centric Software. “Centric Planning and Centric PLM will enable BBM to improve efficiency and profitability, spark creativity and accelerate product time-to-market. We look forward to continuing our collaboration with BBM in the future.”

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Baozun (www.baozun.com)

Founded in 2007, Baozun Inc. is the leader and a pioneer in the brand e-commerce service industry and a digital commerce enabler in China. With about 8,000 employees, it serves more than 400 brands from various industries and sectors around the world, including East Asia, Southeast Asia, Europe and North America.

Baozun Inc owns three major business lines, which includes BAOZUN E-COMMERCE (BEC), BAOZUN BRAND MANAGEMENT (BBM) and BAOZUN INTERNATIONAL (BZI). With the commitment to accelerate its high-quality and sustainable growth, three business lines are devoted to empowering its clients’ business and navigating the new phase of development driven by the aspiration of “Technology Empowers the Future Success”.

Baozun Inc. runs Gap’s operation in China starting from February 1, 2023. Since then, Gap’s China business has become an important part of Baozun Inc, under the business line of BBM.

Centric Software® (www.centricsoftware.com)

From its headquarters in Silicon Valley, Centric Software provides an innovative and AI-enabled product concept-to-replenishment platform for retailers, brands and manufacturers of all sizes. As experts in consumer goods like fashion, outdoor, luxury, home, multi-category retail, grocery, food & beverage, cosmetics & personal care and consumer electronics, Centric Software delivers best-of-breed solutions to plan, design, develop, source, buy, make, price, allocate, sell and replenish products.

· Centric PLM™, the leading PLM solution for consumer goods, optimizes product execution from ideation to development, sourcing and manufacture, realizing up to 50% improvement in productivity.

· Centric Planning™ is an innovative, cloud-native, AI solution delivering end-to-end planning capabilities to maximize retail and wholesale business performance resulting in a 110% increase in margin.

· Centric Pricing & Inventory™ leverages AI to drive margins and boost revenues by up to 18% via price and inventory optimization from pre-season to in-season to season completion.

· Centric Market Intelligence™ is an AI-driven platform giving insights into consumer trends, competitor offers and pricing to boost competitivity and get closer to the consumer, with a proven 12% increase in average initial price point.

· Centric Visual Boards™ pivot actionable data in a visual-first orientation to ensure robust, consumer-right assortments and product offers, increasing product portfolios by up to 90% using the same resources.

Centric Software’s market-driven solutions have the highest user adoption rate, customer satisfaction rate and fastest time to value in the industry. Centric Software has received multiple industry awards and recognition appears regularly in world-leading analyst reports and research.