Global Commerce Initiative: CEOs Push Ahead with Global Standards (with link)


BANGKOK, Thailand, Oct. 30, 2001 (PRIMEZONE) -- Chief executives of four of the world's leading consumer goods companies announced today a succession plan for the accelerated management of the Global Commerce Initiative ("GCI"), the world's largest advisory group for the development of voluntary electronic-transaction standards for business.

Celebrating the completion of their two years as founding co-chairmen of GCI, Luc Vandevelde, chairman and CEO of Marks & Spencer plc, and Christian Koffmann, worldwide chairman of Johnson & Johnson, Consumer and Personal Care Group, announced at a worldwide board meeting in Bangkok the appointment of two of industry's most influential CEOs to succeed them.

Effective today, Cees van der Hoeven, CEO of Royal Ahold, and Antony Burgmans, chairman of Unilever, will take over as co-chairmen of an increasingly influential initiative representing the interests of some 850,000 companies, large and small, and spanning the entire supply chain for consumer goods.

Commenting on the first two years of GCI's existence, Luc Vandevelde pointed to the accelerated pace of change in the conduct of business transactions across continents: "When we first came together in Paris in 1999 we had an instinctive notion of the need for global standards in the way we conduct our business. Today, with the rapid emergence of Internet Exchanges and improved information technology, the pressure on all of us to develop a common language of business is more intense and more immediate than we could ever have imagined."

Christian Koffmann looked back on the beginnings of GCI as a defining period for the consumer-goods business with far-reaching consequences for industry: "GCI has demonstrated that a committed commercial user group can work effectively with existing standards bodies to help all companies, irrespective of size, with an extraordinary fund of expertise in the modeling of business processes. We are emerging with a usable set of powerful strategic tools accessible to industry across the world. Let's not repeat the mistakes of the past: we hope the days of designing different electrical plugs for different countries are over."

The new co-chairmen acknowledged the foundations laid by hundreds of managers working collaboratively across functions and continents to develop practical recommendations for consolidation and implementation by the standards bodies. "We've seen GCI work with EAN International and UCC to build infrastructure to facilitate better business transactions," said Cees van der Hoeven. "What we are now doing is translating those foundations into commercial and consumer realities. We are almost at a point where we can begin to implement real business processes for the worldwide traceability of products and the eventual elimination of out-of-stocks and system inefficiencies. This should benefit all consumers around the world."

Antony Burgmans sees the work of GCI as a broad-based basket of practices capable of serving the consumer better at a lower cost: "Through the implementation of global standards we can integrate retailer and manufacturer processes and systems to ensure consumers optimal availability of our products, when they want them, where they want them and how they want them delivered. Standards and underlying business processes are matters of core strategy and deserve the attention of chief executives everywhere."

Founded in October 1999, the Global Commerce Initiative is the result of joint industry efforts in North and South America, Europe, Africa and Asia where, since the early-nineties, working collaborations have been developing between stakeholders of all sizes across the complex supply chain for consumer goods. Made possible by some of the world's best-known companies, they include the Efficient Consumer Response (ECR) movements in Europe, North and South America and Asia, together with the Voluntary Interindustry Commerce Standards Association (VICS) in North America, EAN International and UCC, CIES -- The Food Business Forum, the Food Marketing Institute (FMI), AIM -- the European Brands Association, and the Grocery Manufacturers of America (GMA).

You may view this release in its entirety, as well as ASSOCIATIONS SUPPORTING THE GLOBAL COMMERCE INITIATIVE and CORPORATE MEMBERS OF THE GLOBAL COMMERCE INITIATIVE BOARD at the following link: http://reports.huginonline.com/838373/95971.pdf.



            

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