The myth of showrooming - the suggestion that tons of shoppers are flooding stores to only use them as a physical showroom as they had always intended to purchase the product at Amazon - lives on. But a survey conducted in late April by Bizrate Insights is helping to add a little clarity. First, showrooming really doesn't happen very often. But more interestingly, when it does, it's more likely to be within the same chain. That's a problem all right, but the name of that problem isn't showrooming. It's internal politics.

Dual sourcing is becoming more common as companies heed the supply chain risk management lessons of 2011.

The Indian IT infrastructure market, comprising servers, storage and networking equipment, will total $2.1bn this year, according to Gartner, and surpass $2.9bn in 2017.

Britain's manufacturing companies are driving a trend towards greater use of automated storage and handling systems. That is the view of Steve Richmond, director of Jungheinrich UK, systems and projects division.

Globalization has had an overwhelmingly positive impact on supply chains. Purchasers can now search further afield for goods and services to achieve better value, quality, price or reliability. But for all their benefits, truly global supply chains are not without issues. The trends for reduced inventory, just-in-time ordering and end-to-end automation mean that many companies are hugely reliant on their IT infrastructure and underlying communication services.