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Consumer confidence remains flat in Q2 amid continued economic uncertainty, according to the Deloitte Consumer Tracker Survey. 

Sharma continues: “Regardless of whether the consumer is interacting with a brand from behind a screen, over the phone or in-person, they want their issue or query solved as quickly as possible. 96 per cent of customers who have to expend a high level of effort to get their issues resolved become more disloyal, compared to just 9 per cent who have a low-effort experience, according to Gartner.

“AI-powered chat bots act as an enabler for customer service teams and companies need to ensure they do not underestimate the emotional intelligence which only comes from human agents. While confidence in the economy remains low and the rate of spending growth slows down, it’s the businesses that recognise the human nuance that will be the ones that stay afloat in the UK’s extremely competitive marketplace.”

Citizens Reserve, the high tech startup led by several entrepreneurs and former Deloitte blockchain executives, has unveiled SUKU, an industry agnostic supply chain solution aimed at tackling the issues of transparency, efficiency, and product visibility in legacy systems.

A blockchain-based platform, SUKU expects to open new markets, improve operations and reduce the cost of running supply chains. The SUKU ecosystem intends to provide key advantages to trading partners such as access to real-time, transparent data around the precise location of goods, the privacy of partners, a bid and order marketplace, auditability of activities and the automation of contractual agreements.

Eric Piscini, Citizens Reserve CEO, said, “The current supply chain environment is complex and difficult to navigate. Almost all enterprises require a supply chain to some extent, but the technology supporting them remains expensive, inefficient and fragmented. With SUKU, we’re planning to build the decentralized supply chain as-a-service platform that can span across industries, enabling our trading partners to interact in a way that’s been all but impossible up until now.”

"With today’s businesses often working with myriad partners on a global scale, the challenges presented by supply chain management are increasingly vast..."

With today’s businesses often working with myriad partners on a global scale, the challenges presented by supply chain management are increasingly vast. Whether locating a Chinese supplier or finding a carrier to haul products from LA to Toronto, these challenges are amplified by the lack of one global governing body or a set of standards to ensure end-to-end visibility.

Eric Piscini said, “Recent contentious incidents such as the Chinese pharmaceutical scandals have showcased the need for one layer of connection for trading partners to communicate and transact. From hardware to energy, all industries utilizing a supply chain take risks working with untrusted partners. The true value of a decentralized ecosystem comes in its nature of being trustless and having no single point of failure.”

SUKU’s unique ‘supply chain-as-a-service’ concept expects to eradicate the three primary obstacles in supply-chain by providing visibility of products, access to capital and innovation, and engagement between stakeholders. In order to bring greater visibility to the supply chain, SUKU aims to display the precise location and status of goods in real-time, which is essential in ensuring that all parties can act proactively, instead of reactively when an issue arises.

The platform anticipates to provide companies with access to new marketplaces and technologies, and better connect suppliers, manufacturers, distributors, and retailers.

Designed to be industry-agnostic, from farming to pharmaceuticals, to electrical goods, the SUKU platform anticipates the use of two blockchains, Ethereum and Quorum, to maximize the benefits of both networks. The public Ethereum blockchain used extensively for smart contract deployments, is expected to handle supply chain payments.

The permissioned Quorum blockchain aims to facilitate transactions such as bids and offers, where confidentiality is critical. SUKU’s native token is necessary to incentivize and reward partners of the platform.

The platform’s built-in transparency and auditability also project to empower more socially responsible practices amongst trading partners by providing greater awareness about the provenance and origin of goods, as well as the values of the organizations they work with.

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Driven by substantial year-over-year growth in 2012 and a large and rapidly growing multi-billion dollar market, Telogis was listed among Deloitte’s Technology Fast 500 for the sixth consecutive year.

The company, which has its UK operations based in Bracknell, once again topped the list in the location-based technology industry. Telogis provides a comprehensive SaaS-based location intelligence platform for companies that require commercial navigation, real-time work order management, dynamic routing, telematics and mobile integration services for their mobile workforces.

“The 2013 Deloitte Technology Fast 500 companies are exemplary cases of those spurring growth in a tough market through innovation,” said Eric Openshaw, vice chairman, Deloitte LLP and U.S. technology, media and telecommunications leader. “This year’s list is a who’s who of companies behind the most exciting and innovative products and services in the technology space. We congratulate the Fast 500 companies and look forward to what they do next.”

“As the world’s mobile workforces grow exponentially over the coming years, demand for sophisticated location-based technology and services such as those offered by Telogis will become increasingly mission critical to businesses with workers outside the four walls,” said David Cozzens, CEO, Telogis. “Our ranking on Deloitte’s Technology Fast 500 for six consecutive years represents our continued commitment to innovation and delivering crucial data and insights that drive our customers’ bottom lines.”

Telogis recently secured a $93 million institutional financing round led by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB). Telogis intends to use the investment to further capitalise on the market and continue to focus on providing technologies and solutions that enable enterprises and organisations to optimise the management of their mobile assets including better data collection and analysis. In the UK this will translate into investment in the current product line to target new markets, and a significant increase in staff numbers and office space to provide local support for its growing customer base.

“The fastest growing companies in the U.S. are drivers of constant innovation and operate with the agility to stay ahead of a quickly evolving marketplace, and software, biotech/pharma and internet companies continue to be at the forefront,” added James Atwell, national managing partner of the Emerging Growth Company practice, Deloitte Services LP. “Companies that are excelling in these sectors have a startup mentality that allows them to be nimble and adapt quickly, which is why they consistently lead the list of fast-growing companies each year.”