Five Questions With: Ryan McCarthy

Ryan McCarthy, of Retail Solutions / COURTESY RETAIL SOLUTIONS
Ryan McCarthy, of Retail Solutions / COURTESY RETAIL SOLUTIONS

Ryan S. McCarthy, director of global customer experience for Retail Solutions Inc. in Providence, talked with Providence Business News about the company, and its partnerships with local universities. The company, which is based in California, tracks retailer data. Including Providence, it has five offices in the United States, and eight internationally.

PBN: Tell me about Retail Solutions and how it uses data to help its clients.

MCCARTHY: Retail Solutions Inc. (RSi) turns retailer data into opportunity – in the store, on the shelf and with shoppers worldwide. Designed to automate the path to purchase and drive value across the supply chain, RSi’s proprietary algorithms, business processes and suite of intelligent, cloud-based applications help the world’s leading consumer goods manufacturers listen and respond quickly to consumer demand – ensuring the right product, is in the right store, at the right time. Each day, the RSi platform processes billions of records from nearly 100 major retailers in more than 150,000 locations throughout the world and turns the data into actionable insights for immediate decision making. From solving out-of-stocks, to identifying inaccuracies in the supply chain, to optimizing digital marketing efforts, RSi maximizes product availability, uncovers new business opportunities and drives sales.

PBN: Who are Retail Solutions’ main clients?

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MCCARTHY: The RSi platform is trusted by more than 500 global consumer packaged goods companies including such household names as Colgate-Palmolive, Nestlé and Procter & Gamble.

PBN: How has technology changed the business?

MCCARTHY: As a global leader in innovation, technology is the lifeblood of RSi. The evolution in technology has enabled RSi to deliver essential business solutions to the retail ecosystem, and helped facilitate RSi’s global expansion. RSi has adopted an agile and flexible strategy to keep up with the rapid changes in technology. RSi’s breadth of employee talent and relentless pursuit of innovation drive our leadership position in this market.

PBN: Tell me about your partnerships with local universities and how it has strengthened your organization.

MCCARTHY: For over 4 years now, RSi has been partnering with local Rhode Island universities to bring the best young talent in business and computer science into our organization to help manage the world’s largest retailers and consumer goods companies. Our internship program started with Brown University and has since expanded to the University of Rhode Island, Providence College and Bryant University. The interns have brought a diverse skillset to RSi and its customers, ranging from creative marketing to project management to technical development. Their energy and youthful spirit has been invaluable, helping facilitate a world-class customer experience to an extraordinarily demanding customer-base.

PBN: Is this continuing, and what do you have on tap for 2015?

MCCARTHY: Yes, we are planning to continue and expand our academic partnerships in 2015. In 2014 we expanded intern programs beyond customer experience into other organizational functions, including project management, product management and production operations. We plan to continue that trend into 2015. We will be active participants at the URI Career Fair in April and are planning to conduct on-campus interviews at the other local institutions. Our partnership with these local institutions has been phenomenal experience and a major contributor to our success as one of the world’s fastest growing technology companies.

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