CINCINNATI, OH -- (Marketwire) -- 04/27/12 -- Datalliance, the leading independent provider of Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) platform services, announced today that Mark Karavakis has been named as Director of Sales - Direct Store Replenishment. In this newly established role, Karavakis will be responsible for increasing Datalliance's business development and sales activities in response to growing interest from consumer product suppliers that are putting in place VMI programs with retailers where they do replenishment directly to individual stores rather than to distribution centers. Product categories where this practice is growing include apparel, sporting goods, entertainment products, cosmetics and others. Suppliers already using Datalliance VMI for this purpose include Agron, Asics, Thorlo, Entertainment 1, Elizabeth Arden and others.

Mr. Karavakis brings extensive experience in sales of web-based sales and marketing solutions, including cloud-based online marketing and CRM applications built on the Salesforce.com platform.

Describing the importance of this new position and industry focus, Carl Hall, Datalliance President, said: "More and more, retailers are looking to their product suppliers to help streamline their supply chains all the way to the individual store and shelf. Many consumer product manufacturers are already doing direct store delivery to provide more value to their primary retail partners. Now a growing number of retailers are asking suppliers to also take on the job of store level replenishment planning in order to further improve product availability while at the same time reducing administrative costs. Done on a collaborative basis, direct store replenishment can increase sales and margins while reducing costs for both the retailer and the supplier. That's why we're putting even more emphasis on providing solutions for this growing practice."

About Datalliance
Datalliance is a leading provider of collaborative commerce services, and the world's largest independent VMI service provider. Delivered via the Internet using the 'Software as a Service' (SaaS) model, Datalliance solutions make it easy for suppliers and their customers to establish sales and inventory management relationships that fully align business objectives, improve collaboration, and streamline supply chain operations. Datalliance manages billions of dollars in orders, millions of SKUs, and thousands of locations for leading Fortune 1000 companies in a number of industries. For more information about Datalliance, visit www.datalliance.com.