Here are this week's coolest retail technology reveals
RTIH Editor, Scott Thompson, brings you his top ten ‘future of retail systems’ deployments from the past week, including burgers with a side of cryptocurrency, delivery robots in the Middle East, and tech on London takeaway menus.
Carrefour UAE/Yandex
Majid Al Futtaim, which specialises in shopping mall, communities, retail, and leisure across the Middle East, Africa and Central Asia, is teaming with Russian tech giant Yandex to explore autonomous technology solutions that enhance Carrefour UAE’s last mile delivery capabilities.
This makes Carrefour the first omnichannel retailer to use self-driving robots for online order delivery in the region.
A pilot, involving customers in select neighbourhoods across the UAE, is set to launch in early 2022.
Currys
Currys has partnered with Uber on a London-based delivery trial that gets small tech products from stores to shoppers in as little as 30 minutes.
Launching the week of 15th November, this is Uber’s biggest UK retailer partnership to date and builds on Currys’ online and delivery proposition, which includes the ShopLive 24/7 video shopping service and its one-hour Order & Collect service.
Amazon
Amazon is gearing up to open an Amazon Fresh location in Holborn, London.
No news on the exact launch date. But we can reveal that this will be the e-commerce giant’s seventh such UK convenience store to feature Just Walk Out Shopping tech, which was pioneered at the Amazon Go offering in the States.
The other six are in Camden, Ealing, Wembley Park, White City, Canary Wharf and Dalston.
Azteco
Azteco reports that Brits can now purchase Bitcoin from over 700 retailers across the UK and Ireland.
To do so, they can download a “Wallet of Satoshi'' app on the App Store and Google Play, go to one of the aforementioned retailers and ask for an Azteco Bitcoin voucher at checkout. They then redeem the voucher and, hey presto, they have their cryptocurrency.
Physical retail stores earn a commission for selling Bitcoin and Azteco takes a small percentage of the transaction. Vouchers can be bought in denominations from £10 - £100.
Azteco has been testing the system for several months and is now officially launching at the likes of Fultons, Cash Generators, Phone Convertors, PhoneHouse, GoMobile as well as hundreds of independent retailers.
The company also says that it is in advanced discussions with a number of large high street retailers.
Circle K/Grabango
Checkout-free technology venture, Grabango, has announced a roll-out across six Circle K stores in Arizona, USA.
“I’m thrilled to announce that we’re working with Circle K and its parent company, Alimentation Couche-Tard, on the largest roll-out of checkout-free retrofits to date,” says Will Glaser, CEO at Grabango, which was founded in 2016 and has raised $73 million in total capital to date.
“Couche-Tard is a sophisticated global partner that’s a leader in delivering technology to benefit its customers. Together, we’re fulfilling the promise of making convenience stores more convenient.”
New Look
New Look is teaming up with re-sale platform Re-Fashion and offering customers the chance to extend the life cycle of unwanted or unused clothes.
New Look x Re-Fashion will allow people to request a donation bag, which holds up to 12 items, and then drop it off at the nearest Collect+ destination for free.
The clothes will then be “reborn” on the Re-Fashion website and put up for sale.
Sue Fairley, Head of Sustainability at New Look, says: “We recognise that, as a broad appeal fashion retailer, we have an important responsibility to both our customers and to wider society, to consider the lifecycle of the products we sell, from design stage to end of life.”
“As part of our ongoing commitment to reduce the environmental impacts of shopping for clothes and to promote circularity within the industry, we are excited to partner with Re-Fashion and offer our customers an easy and convenient way for them to get involved.”
Burger King
Burger King is teaming up with investment platform Robinhood to offer US-based Royal Perks loyalty members the chance to win a "side of cryptocurrency”, including Dogecoin, Ethereum and Bitcoin.
Customers need to make a minimum $5.00 pre-tax Burger King food and/or beverage purchase, either online, using the fast food giant’s app, or at participating restaurants.
They will receive a prize code via email. This can be redeemed through the Robinhood Crypto trading app.
Kiwibot
US-based Loyola Marymount University, LMU Dining and Kiwibot have partnered to deliver hot, fresh meals on campus via zero-emission robots.
Since launching a trial run in September, more than 500 deliveries have been completed.
Through the Sodexo Bite U app, Loyola Marymount students, faculty and visitors can order from two Sodexo serviced campus locations. The initiative will expand to additional locations in spring 2022.
AMC Theatres
American cinema giant AMC Theatres is currently updating its technology infrastructure to allow customers to pay online for gift cards with Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin and Dogecoin.
And there could be more to come.
In a Twitter post, Adam Aron, the company's CEO, asked if there was interest in also paying with Shiba Inu.
At the time of writing, almost 145,000 votes had been cast, with approximately 81% of people choosing "Yes."
IWC Schaffhausen
Luxury Swiss watch brand, IWC Schaffhausen, has launched a content partnership with social audio strategist, Abraxas Higgns.
Creator’s Time will position IWC at the centre of a six-week series of discussions on Clubhouse which will also be developed and released as podcasts.
