BlueStar Inc., a global distribution of ADC, mobility, point-of-sale, radio frequency identification, digital signage and security technology, is enhancing its warehouse and logistics services to resellers across North America.

Analyst Insight: From humble beginnings at the machine control layer, warehouse systems have matured and expanded to allow visibility and control over what is happening at the machine, parcel, associate and order/wave level. When combined with data from wearables and other Internet of Things technologies, warehouse control software will drive new opportunities for distribution efficiency. – Nikko Pianetto, Group Vice President, Integrated Technology Solutions, Fortna Inc.

Panasonic has developed the Toughbook 54, the latest in its series of light, semi-rugged laptops.

Janam Technologies LLC, a provider of rugged mobile computers for scanning barcodes and communicating wirelessly, has entered into a partnership with T-Mobile distributor One Shop Witness.

Analyst Insight: The Internet of Things is really three interrelated phenomena. As a technology phenomenon and as an application phenomenon, IoT has been steadily evolving for several decades. It is the recent surge of IoT as a marketing phenomenon that is driving all the attention and excitement at this time. That attention thereby drives investments, accelerating the development and adoption of IoT technology and its applications. – Bill McBeath, Chief Research Officer, ChainLink Research

Analyst Insight: The last two years have seen a rush to provide store fulfillment services - similar to the efforts to deploy e-commerce FCs back in 1998-2000. To date, store fulfillment initiatives have largely been tactical, technology-driven initiatives chartered to leverage existing applications-integration in order to support “save the sale" functionality as well as offload growing FC volumes to the retail store. The coming years will experience a "financial-efficiency" driven effort to maximize profit margin and optimize network inventory efficiency under the new age of constrained IT investment. – Kevin Hume, Principal, Tompkins International

Analyst Insight: Keeping talent has risen to be a concern for managers, directors and CEOs across the country. It's even caught the attention of academics. What policies employed at the DC level gets the most out of the money spent on training, and gets the best results? Our 2014 study starts to answer that question. – Karl B. Manrodt, Professor of Logistics, and Donnie Williams, Assistant Professor of Logistics, Georgia College and State University

With a new year comes a renewed focus on inventory and how to manage it. All systems and aspects of the supply chain must match up with customer demands in the ever-present and evolving omnichannel environment. After all, customers can order goods from anywhere on any smart device, and their expectations are that they will pick up their goods, or have their merchandise delivered to any place – on their terms. People want quick results – or else they will find another outlet from which to shop.