Sopra Steria, a European leader in digital transformation, has today announced a new partnership with N Brown Group, a leading multichannel retailer, to help support its strategic direction of becoming a digital-first retailer. N Brown is undergoing the biggest business transformation in its 140 year history, refashioning itself from a direct mail-led to digital-first retailer.
Following a competitive process, Sopra Steria was chosen as a partner to assist in the creation of a unique platform to help N Brown drive technology change and business transformation. Sopra Steria will run a core applications and infrastructure support service responsible for the management of IT service sub-contractors, data centres, servers and mainframes. The company will also provide technical support across a number of N Brown locations including its national headquarters, call centres, stores, UK warehouses and other remote locations.
In delivering an agile, cost-effective, digitally focused IT department, N Brown was keen to ensure its new partner had a close cultural affinity to minimise any impact on colleagues whilst transforming their risk position.
“Sopra Steria was a natural partner with an impressive track record in delivering similar projects at scale, and whose culture and approach neatly matched our own,” said Andy Haywood, COO at N Brown. Adding “Together with Sopra Steria, N Brown will have the ability to become more agile, responsive and, most importantly, focused on customer experience and satisfaction. We will move towards being a technology company that sells fashion, rather than just a fashion company using technology.”
Undergoing a large organisational change, N Brown not only needed to create a strategic partnership to help them leverage new technologies, but also had to maximise the retention of existing customers with an unnoticeable change in service. Twelve weeks prior to the contract’s start, Sopra Steria began knowledge transfer with N Brown and took on all services during this time. This led to a seamless handover with no downtime in service.
Barry Fazackerley, Executive Director at Sopra Steria said, “We are delighted that N Brown chose us to be their strategic partner and help deliver their vision for the future of the company. In such a fast-paced and competitive market, the efficient and effective delivery of this transformation is vital to N Brown’s business. We are proud to be helping to deliver the desired changes to their core business and realise their strategic vision to be a digital-first retailer.”
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