The five biggest retail tech 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 Scalapay, Target, Amazon and Majid Al Futtaim/Carrefour City+.
1. Scalapay bags $155 million Series A at a $700 million valuation
Buy now, pay later (BNPL) venture Scalapay has raised $155 million in equity funding, at a $700 million valuation, as part of a Series A investment round led by Tiger Global.
Along with Klarna’s recent $46 billion valuation, this underscores just how hot the BNPL market is right now, given that Scalapay was only founded in 2019 and $155 million is a serious amount of money for a Series A round.
2. Majid Al Futtaim opens Carrefour City+ just walk out store
Majid Al Futtaim, which owns and operates shopping malls, retail, and leisure establishments in the Middle East, Africa and Asia, has announced the launch of checkout free store, Carrefour City+.
A first for Carrefour worldwide and opening this week in Mall of the Emirates, this taps AiFi powered artificial intelligence technology.
Store access and shopping payment is enabled via the MAF Carrefour app. Once inside Carrefour City+, every item picked up by customers is automatically added to a digital shopping basket and the purchase is completed by walking out.
3. Amazon makes Just Walk Out technology announcements
Amazon has opened an Amazon Fresh location in Dalston, London.
Situated at 28-31 Kingsland High Street, it is the sixth such UK convenience store to feature Just Walk Out Shopping tech, which was pioneered at the Amazon Go offering in the States.
The other five are in Camden, Ealing, Wembley Park, White City and Canary Wharf.
Also this week, Amazon said that Just Walk Out tech would be deployed in two Whole Foods locations Stateside.
4. PayPal to buy BNPL venture Paidy in $2.7bn deal
US payments giant PayPal is set to acquire Japanese buy now, pay later venture Paidy in a $2.7 billion largely cash deal.
This closely follows Square’s announcement that it would buy Australian BNPL firm Afterpay for $29 billion.
5. Target CIO Mike McNamara discusses retirement announcement
Target Chief Information Officer (CIO) Mike McNamara, who has headed up the retailer's IT operations since 2015, is set to retire in 2022.
“I’ve always been planning for Target to be my last job. I’ve loved every minute of my time here, but professionally and personally, the timing is great to begin the process of retiring and transitioning to a new CIO,” he says in an online post.
“The technology team and platform are in brilliant shape and our business is already taking on its next growth chapter.”
