The six biggest retail technology news stories of the week
It’s Friday, the week is nearly done, so let’s kick back and reflect on another eventful week for the retail systems space. Here's your briefing on the most important stories from the past five days, including Tesco, Shopify, REWE and Amazon Canada.
1. Tesco online grocery woes spark checkout free store concerns
Tesco’s recent grocery app and website outage doesn’t bode well for its checkout-free store, according to data and analytics company GlobalData.
2. Shopify hires new Chief Technology Officer and General Counsel
Canadian e-commerce platform giant Shopify has appointed Allan Leinwand as Chief Technology Officer.
Leinwand’s CV includes stints as SVP Engineering at Slack, and Chief Technology Officer at both ServiceNow and Zynga.
He has also been a Venture Partner at Panorama Capital (previously JPMorgan Partners), focusing on network and systems technology investments.
Shopify has also hired former White House Staff Secretary Jessica Hertz as General Counsel.
3. Amazon Canada opens landmark robotics powered sort centre
Amazon has opened YUL9, pitched as the e-commerce giant’s most advanced sort centre in Canada, in Coteau-du-Lac, Quebec.
The 720,000 square foot YUL9 facility will be the first sort centre in Canada to implement Amazon Robotics' mobile robotic order fulfilment systems.
The move will enable faster order fulfilment to communities in Eastern Canada.
4. Trigo enters German market with REWE grocery store deal
REWE has opened its first Trigo powered hybrid autonomous store in Cologne, Germany.
The move marks Israel-based computer vision startup Trigo’s entry into the German market.
5. Tesco announces Gorillas rapid grocery delivery tie up
Tesco is launching a pilot with rapid grocery delivery venture Gorillas.
Starting this week, the retailer’s customers will be able to order Tesco products to their doors, within 10 minutes, via the Gorillas app.
The latter will set up micro-fulfilment sites at five large Tesco stores to handle the deliveries.
The first store to be involved in the partnership is in Thornton Heath, London.
6. Glovo preps The Couriers Pledge global roll-out
On-demand delivery venture, Glovo, has announced a commitment to increase the social rights and benefits available to couriers.
This closely follows protests over Gorillas’ treatment of delivery riders and warehouse workers, fuelling criticism of Chief Executive Kağan Sümer.
The Couriers Pledge, which has been created with advice from the Fairwork project, establishes a new set of standards that includes fair hourly earnings (guided by WageIndicator’s data on fair earnings and living wages), improvements to insurance coverage and access to training, safety and maintenance provisions.
Glovo intends to roll-out the initiative to 40% of its fleet by the end of June 2022, with Morocco and Georgia to be the first countries included in the initial phase.
