Agile development at adidas – Salomon Canada

adidas-Salomon Canada is the vendor responsible for distribution of three very well-known brands: adidas, Salomon and Taylor-Made. Employing 220 people, the Canadian adidas organization has integrated several adidas world-wide ERP systems into a Canadian success story. Employing only 10 people, the Canadian IT department has developed both integration and business application suites specific to the Canadian market. The company’s website is found at www.adidas-salomon.ca.

As presented in a fascinating case study, the adidas-Salomon IT team has evolved towards an agile development practice involving early and continuous delivery of usable and important software. The small size of the adidas-Salomon team has been ideal for ensuring that IT works very closely with business – a lesson suitable for an organization of similar size to adidas or for a department in a larger organization.

Attendees to this month’s IRMAC event will be treated to a short, but fascinating demonstration of adidas’ agile development methodology. Adidas uses the Magic rules-based development framework for all its Canadian development. A scripted mini-development project from business case through development and deployment of a new web service will be part of this morning’s IRMAC event.

About the speakers

The main presenter for the adidas-Salomon case study will be Paul Leone, Vice President of Logistics and Information Technology at adidas-Salomon Canada for 12 years. He has built a development team most members of which have been together for almost five years. With a background in AS/400 development and supply chain-related projects, Paul is an excellent speaker and brings a special insight into the marriage of information technology and business.

Assisting Paul will be Lee Sutton and John Morris. Lee is a senior applications architect and John Morris is an account executive, both with Magic Software. Lee has extensive experience in both logistics such as covered in the case study under discussion here, and in the insurance business at such customers as American Express Financial Group. John has had a long time association with both Magic and with IRMAC, originally as a member of DBAO.

Reference

• Introduction to Agile Development, Lee Sutton and John Morris (zipped PowerPoint)