Technical Excellence
7-Eleven Powers 7Rewards with ReactorCX
DALLAS, February 10, 2020 – Loyalty Methods (LM), a Customer Experience and Loyalty Management company has partnered with 7-Eleven, a leading convenience store retailer, to deliver a full implementation of LM’s new cloud CX platform – ReactorCX – powering one of the most feature-rich, innovative, customer-centric, and high-scale loyalty programs in the retail world – 7Rewards.
ReactorCX connects more than 9,500 retail stores throughout the US and Canada to deliver a real-time experience to the millions of 7-Eleven customers frequenting stores as well as all 7-Eleven digital properties including 7Rewards, 7Now, Mobile Scan and Pay, Augmented (AR) Gamification, and Fuel Rewards.
Deployment of the new system with LM’s proven Threadsync™ methodology ensured that the parallel cutover would result in a zero-downtime switch between the legacy system and ReactorCX. LM carried out the cutover instantly without any disruption to the end customer or the internal 7-Eleven marketing teams.
7-Eleven is one of the biggest digital innovators in retail and with the help of ReactorCX the road is clear for exciting future development. Our team at LM is thrilled to be able to contribute to this success and is looking forward to setting new standards for customer obsession, customer-centric innovation and validated-learning in a fast-paced retail environment.
Technical Excellence
Advanced Program Capabilities
Rythmos Ports Microsoft’s AirSim to Unity 3D
Extending the capabilities of your 3D engine to reach more artificial intelligence developers is critical to maintaining your reputation as the world’s most performant real-time development platform.
Unity 3D recently added the capabilities of Microsoft’s AirSim autonomous vehicle simulator to Unity’s Core Platform and needed a trusted partner to do it - they chose Rythmos to bring their initiative to reality.
The Rythmos Unity Development Team (UDT) utilized their Unity 3D Core Platform expertise to create the AirSim wrapper and to maintain Unity’s principle of being the most performant real-time platform. The first hurdle was to analyze and understand the AirSim libraries. The majority of the AirSim code resides in AirLib.
It is what contains the key components, such as the physics engine, sensor models, vehicle controls, and the control library. AirLib is a native C++ library that uses standard C++ libraries and thread management. Since the Unity Core Platform is native to C#, it can not communicate with AirLib.
UDT worked directly with Unity3D to ensure that the solution contained all of the required libraries and wrappers from AirLib to create and import a package into any Unity project to use for drone and car simulation.
Key benefits of the project include the following:
Another thank you goes out to Rythmos, who helped create the AirSim wrapper code. These partners share our passion for advancing autonomous simulation research and embody the quality and diversity of companies in our ecosystem.
- The Unity Blog
Real Estate Companies can ArchViz for Sales
If you’ve ever played a Virtual Reality game, you would be familiar with the incredible detail found in those virtual worlds. With more than 44% of real estate customers searching for properties online, the real estate industry is taking notice of VR and is demanding more ways to showcase their properties better.
Customers can spend countless hours touring many properties before choosing one they like, and if the properties are far away, the cost to visit them can quickly skyrocket. The Rythmos Unity Development Team (UDT) created Archviz, a VR application that allows realtors the ability to feature their inventories in a 3D environment and to solve those sales problems.
Archviz, or Architectural Visualization, leverages the power of the Unity Core Platform to create 3D models and adds real-world elements that a customer can manipulate themselves. A user can virtually tour a property using a VR headset such as Oculus headset or on the web and easily add different carpet designs, reorganize furniture, hang a painting on the wall, switch on a light, and even see a reflection in a mirror.
The Rythmos UDT-developed app also benefits architectural firms by extending their design capabilities to add VR models of a building design. Being able to change building materials or to visualize spatial arrangements of building elements before the start of construction can help solve quality issues and cost estimation.
Making it easier for realty customers to view and tour properties has always been a time-consuming effort for both customers and real estate companies, Archviz solves those problems and helps to increase sales.
Key Features of ArchViz include the following:
Southwest Airlines partnered with Loyalty Methods, a Rythmos company, to revamp their existing Rapid Rewards loyalty program. The All-New Rapid Rewards solution was built on the Oracle Siebel Loyalty platform and was the largest Siebel Loyalty implementation ever done for an Airline at the time. The innovative program rewards customers based on value and profitability has better value proposition for both customer and Southwest. The Program now allows members to redeem their points for every seat available, with no blackout dates or seat restrictions. According to Gary Kelly, Southwest Airline’s CEO and President, the new program will generate several hundred million dollars in revenue through strategic cross-industry partnerships.
Joe Migis, VP, Product Solutions - Technology, stated that “Loyalty Methods’ strength was the people they brought to the project. They have a phenomenal understanding of the product and a get it done attitude that matched up well with the legendary Southwest Airlines Warrior Spirit.”
Starbucks and Loyalty Methods, a Rythmos company, partnered to deliver a high-performance Siebel Loyalty, Marketing and OBIEE solution for the My Starbucks Reward program. This program recognizes and rewards loyalty when customers pay with a registered Starbucks Card and is a very popular program for millions of Starbucks customers. Given the popularity and visibility of the My Starbucks Rewards program as well as its impact on incremental revenue, the stakes were high. We are happy to report that the Loyalty Methods and Starbucks team worked together to deliver a successful, scalable and powerful solution. Some of the key features and benefits are:
We are currently providing 24x7 monitoring and support for the "My Starbucks" system from our Delivery Center in Hyderabad, India.
Seattle-based, Alaska Airlines partnered with Loyalty Methods, a Rythmos company, to become the first US-based airline to replace its Loyalty mainframe system with the Oracle Siebel Loyalty module. This innovative and ground-breaking project set the bar for the rest of the industry by making significant strides in enhancing customer loyalty through the use of a more flexible, faster, better, and more usable application. We also provided support for infrastructure components such as the Tibco-service bus. Some of the key benefits that Alaska Airlines realized are:
“If there is such a thing as an insurance policy when commencing a project of this magnitude, then Loyalty Methods is it. They provided solutions, reassurance, and strong technical expertise throughout. I look forward to continuing our relationship with Loyalty Methods.”
Ann Ardizzone
Managing Director - Customer Experience
Century 21 Department stores partnered with Loyalty Methods, a Rythmos company, to successfully deliver a unified Siebel CRM loyalty-marketing platform for the well-known New York discount retailer.
The newly released system will provide C21 with improved capabilities for segmentation and target marketing; faster and more flexible Business Intelligence reporting; and omni-channel, bi-directional integration. The system is a core foundation necessary to obtain the goal of a 360 degree view of their customers.
In addition, C21’s new system is completely hosted on CRMCloudBox, Loyalty Methods’ Amazon Cloud-based Siebel hosting services. The combination of Loyalty Methods’ expertise in the area of marketing-analytics platforms and the flexibility of building development, test, and productions environments using CRMCloudBox, allowed C21 to realize a fast go-to-market initiative.
With the success of this effort, Century 21 Department Stores has established core marketing capabilities and a solid foundation for building further channel integration, advanced predictive modeling and campaign targeting, as well as further insight through Business Intelligence tools.
“Loyalty Methods brought a very high level of expertise within the OBIEE technology platform, and a keen understanding of our downstream business needs.”
Harry Roberts
CIO, Century 21 Department Stores
Seattle-based Holland America Line (HAL) partnered with Loyalty Methods, a Rythmos company, to complete their largest ever IT project, to deliver an end-to-end solution for brand new Loyalty Program, Marketing automation and Master Data Management (MDM).
The partnership resulted in the successful delivery of a brand new Loyalty program that spans across the entire HAL enterprise including their entire fleet, and smooth launch of Siebel Marketing, which now provides HAL with the ability to lower the cost of their marketing operations as well as improving internal efficiency and accuracy in targeting its customers with relevant offers.
The new system provided improved visibility and recognition of customer loyalty status and reward eligibility, at every customer touch point. The success of this solution gave HAL one more way to increase customer brand affinity in the highly competitive cruise-line industry. In the new economic reality of today, only the truly analytical competitors will thrive and grow their businesses. It is nothing short of exciting to see a veteran of the industry like HAL join that club by acquiring new business and technology tools to better recognize their loyal customers and drive repeat business.
“Loyalty Methods was a critical partner in insuring a successful launch of our new marketing & loyalty CRM platform. Their dedication, vision and experience was evident from the first day of the engagement.”
Rick Meadows
Executive Vice President, Marketing, Sales, Guest Programs
Southwest converted its reservations systems to a new platform in a complex, $500 million
Gary Kelly, Southwest Airlines Chairman & CEO, said “Transitioning to a single reservation system is a transformational milestone for Southwest, and in fact, it’s the single largest technology initiative in our company’s history. I want to congratulate and thank thousands of our employees and our Partners who have worked tirelessly and diligently for several years to bring this home.”
As part of transforming from Customer Service focus to a Customer-centric organization, Southwest partnered with Rythmos to build an integrated real-time Customer Data Warehouse (CDW) solution to deliver customer insights from any channel and help drive customer engagement, response, and loyalty. The CDW Solution enables Southwest Airlines to drive Customer insights, improve Customer acquisition and retention, dramatically expand Customer segmentation and fully leverage its investment in its new reservation system, Amadeus Altea.
Teradata EPIC Award Winner for Customer Insights and Engagement.
Mexico City-based, Ampersand, selected Loyalty Methods, a Rythmos company, and their Implementation and Advisory Services (IPAS) to review and optimize their Fiesta Rewards loyalty program.
We conducted a thorough review of Ampersand’s program and database, covering all areas such as program configuration; real-time interface designs; batch processing; data integrity; and database performance. Provided recommendations and helped Ampersand in implementing these recommendations. This effort allowed Ampersand to quickly reap the benefits of IPAS, with improved server performance during batch processing and a better understanding of resolving data issues. Some of the key benefits that Alaska Airlines realized are:
“Since the first approach with Loyalty Methods we felt we were in the right hands. Besides their deep technical expertise they focus highly in results, always applying a practical approach to bring optimal solutions.”
Cuauhtemoc Galvez
CTO, Ampersand
© 2020 Rythmos.