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Object Management Group
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Object Management Group Forms Retail Domain Task Force
Assumes management for standards previously led by National Retail Federation Association for Retail Technology Standards division
Needham, MA – June 26, 2017 – The Object Management Group® (OMG®), an international, open membership, not-for-profit technology standards consortium, today announced that it has formed a new Retail Domain Task Force to assume management of standards developed by the National Retail Federation (NRF) Association for the Retail Technology Standards (ARTS) division, as part of a long-term partnership between OMG and NRF.
The creation of the OMG Retail Domain Task Force follows the formation of the partnership between NRF and the OMG announced in March. Members of various ARTS committees were invited to participate in comparable leadership positions at OMG and were elected at the quarterly OMG member meeting in Brussels this month. The chairs of this new task force are: Bart McGlothin, Solutions Architect, Cisco; John Glaubitz, Principal Architect, Vertex Inc.; and Leonid Rubakhin, Senior Principal Software Developer at Aptos, Inc.
The OMG will now develop, manage and maintain standards for the retail industry, which in the last 20 years, have helped make technology less expensive for retailers. These standards enable retailers to build or acquire integrated business applications, help developers and analysts understand basic retail business principles, and overcome the obstacles of diverging data formats to allow different data management tools to communicate.
"Putting ARTS standards under the OMG umbrella provides us with a time-tested framework for developing and maintaining standards, which OMG has used for almost 30 years," said Bart McGlothin, Solutions Architect for Cisco Systems and Chair of the OMG Retail Domain Task Force. "The OMG manages standards across many domains and is well suited to evolve the standards that have been adopted by the retail industry in the past 20 years."
"The OMG process for building specifications has been used more than 1400 times over approximately 30 years on standards that are used in almost every industry--from energy to consumer electronics to healthcare," said OMG Chairman and CEO Dr. Richard Mark Soley. "We're confident that members of NRF's ARTS division will enjoy a smooth transition to membership in the OMG Retail Domain Task Force and engage in our processes to evolve retail standards."
"NRF remains committed to keeping merchants on the cutting edge of technology and our Technology Leadership Councils will continue in their mission to educate policymakers and develop resources that help retailers innovate," said NRF Vice President for Retail Technology Tom Litchford. "NRF will continue to be involved with providing critical requirements for retail standards that the OMG Retail Domain Task Force will pursue."
The agreement allows the OMG Retail Domain Task Force to assume responsibility for the following standards:
- Retail Data Model including an operational data model and a data warehouse model. ARTS' operational data model offers a transaction-oriented view of retail enterprise data supporting the day-to-day management of a retail enterprise while the data warehouse model supports business reporting and analysis.
- Unified POS standards for communication between retail point-of-sale equipment such as cash registers, card readers, barcode scanners and receipt printers whether physically attached or web-based.
- A2A Messaging - Application-to-application messaging "schemas" that allow software applications to communicate and share data.
- BPM - Retail business process models that map how retailers manage their businesses.
Member organizations from NRF ARTS, both producers of standards and consumers of standards, who are in good standing, will receive membership in the OMG Retail Domain Task Force for two years before an annual fee is required. NRF will continue to handle standard request-for-proposal templates that help retailers research and evaluate technology and software they seek to purchase, and publication of white papers on technology issues ranging from cloud computing to cybersecurity.
About NRF
NRF is the world's largest retail trade association, representing discount and department stores, home goods and specialty stores, Main Street merchants, grocers, wholesalers, chain restaurants and internet retailers from the United States and more than 45 countries. Retail is the nation's largest private sector employer, supporting one in four U.S. jobs - 42 million working Americans. Contributing $2.6 trillion to annual GDP, retail is a daily barometer for the nation's economy.
About OMG
The Object Management Group® (OMG®) is an international, open membership, not-for-profit technology standards consortium with representation from government, industry and academia. OMG Task Forces develop enterprise integration standards for a wide range of technologies and an even wider range of industries. OMG's modeling standards enable powerful visual design, execution and maintenance of software and other processes. Visit www.omg.org for more information.
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