Click Commerce advances post-ITW merger with solutions to connect enterprise trading partners

Click Commerce used Chicago's Promat 2007 show in early January to announce a new warehouse management solution—called Click Commerce WMX—as well as a new president, Nancy Koenig, former executive VP of operations.

Click says WMX demonstrates the vendor's commitment to providing value to its customers following its late-2006 acquisition by Illinois Tool Works (ITW). Koenig will manage the merger transition, with former CEO Michael Ferro now working as a consultant to ITW.

ITW has more than 700 businesses in its portfolio, offering disparate hard goods ranging from welding supplies to appliances. According to Dwight Klappich, a supply chain analyst with Stamford, Conn.-based Gartner, “In the case of ITW, selling software solutions is different from selling commodity products through a distribution channel. It's a much longer sales cycle and very competitive. Right now it looks like [this merger] will be done the way 3M manages its software acquisitions: Leave them alone to take care of business, but have targets and goals that the group needs to meet.”

Click Commerce evolved from an early e-commerce start-up in the 1990s into a supply chain solutions vendor through a series of acquisitions of its own. “What's intriguing about Click's strategy is it's not just offering a shopping cart of oddball items, but is building out a go-to-market strategy targeting different areas within the supply chain solution space where it can leverage its application and domain expertise,” says Klappich.

“There are many facets of software for connecting the enterprise, including the supply chain, which the new WMX release is part of,” says Keith Forshew, Click's general manager of supply chain business. “We focus on connecting enterprise trading partners within the supply chain to deliver higher-quality service to the end consumer for less cost.”

One of Click's key strategies is post-sales support.

“Going forward, that will be a key differentiator for manufacturers and supply chain partners: delivering a higher quality of service as products reach end of life,” explains Forshew. “WMX supports light manufacturing and kitting within the warehouse, as well as reverse logistics—both of which are common characteristics in our key verticals.”

The new release also supports multiple warehouses in a single instance of the software. Forshew says it can be licensed or deployed as software-as-a-service, making it more cost-effective for smaller clients.