RTIH reviews the retail technology space in December
RTIH takes a look back at an eventful month for the retail systems sector, including the 2021 RTIH Innovation Awards, AutoStore vs Ocado Group, Delivery Hero partnering with Glovo, and adidas entering the metaverse with its debut NFT collection.
Good month for…
Veho, a startup that enables personalised next-day package delivery, announced a $125 million Series A raise led by General Catalyst at a $1 billion valuation.
Zepto, an India-based startup that operates a 10-minute instant grocery delivery service, boosted its valuation to $570 million from $225 million after raising $100 million in a Series C round.
adidas Originals landed in the world of Web3 with what it called “one of the most widely distributed NFT drops in history”.
Nigeria-based B2B e-commerce and embedded finance platform, TradeDepot, raised $110 million in an equity and debt funding round.
Rapid delivery venture, Jokr, landed $260 million in Series B funding and ventured into unicorn territory with a valuation of $1.2 billion.
Metapack, Asda, Carrefour UAE, Situ Live, Starbucks, Oracle, Go Instore and Halla were among the companies who emerged victorious at RTIH’s 2021 retail technology awards.
The awards, sponsored by PMC, StoreSpace, Critizr, Marxent, QVALON and Selazar, celebrate global tech innovation in a fast moving omnichannel world.
We received a record number of submissions this year across 14 categories (you can find a full rundown of the 2021 shortlists here).
Our winners and highly commended companies were announced during an exclusive event that took place in central London in early December and was attended by retailers, members of our judging panel, and sponsors.
Bad month for…
SPAR was this month forced to close a number of stores following a cyber attack.
More than 300 stores were affected by the incident, although some avoided closing by switching to cash payments.
The attack impacted all of the retailer’s IT systems and left staff without access to emails.
UK-based Ocado Group won a patent infringement lawsuit filed by Norwegian robotics firm AutoStore in the International Trade Commission (ITC).
AutoStore had filed the lawsuit last year in both the United States and the United Kingdom, claiming Ocado’s grocery picking robots infringed on its automated designs.
The ITC's Chief Administrative Law Judge held three of the four AutoStore patents were invalid while the fourth one was not infringed by Ocado. A fifth patent was abandoned by AutoStore the night before the trial.
The judge also rejected AutoStore's request for barring Ocado and its partners from making and selling the products involved, and from importing them into the United States.
Also this month…
German food delivery venture Delivery Hero was set to acquire a 39.4% stake in Spanish quick commerce startup Glovo.
It currently holds around 43.8% in Glovo shares on a non-diluted basis. The transaction will value Glovo at Euro 2.3 billion on a fully diluted and debt free basis before certain adjustments.
Delivery Hero will also provide a back-stop financing of up to approximately Euro 250 million to Glovo in several tranches.
Glovo will continue to operate under its existing brand and platform and current management team.
Asda started testing out new technology which aims to make it easier for blind and partially sighted customers to navigate their way around its Stevenage store.
To coincide with the UN International Day of Persons with Disabilities, Asda’s flagship technology store became the first supermarket in the UK to be integrated into the GoodMaps smartphone app, specifically built for use amongst the blind and partially sighted.
A new decentralised autonomous organisation (DAO) said it was looking to buy the Blockbuster brand from Dish Network and turn it into a film studio and streaming platform.
Buyk, a startup that promises grocery delivery from dark store to doorstep within 15 minutes, has launched its service in Chicago with plans for further expansion across various US geographies in 2022.
The company was founded by Slava Bocharov and Rodion Shishkov. The pair also co-founded Samokat, Russia’s largest grocery delivery company, in 2018 before selling their stake to fund Buyk.
Following its launch in New York City three months ago, Buyk will begin operations in Chicago with six dark stores, bringing the total to 35 stores across both cities.
M&S bolstered its Digital & Data team with the appointment of Krista Nordlund as Chief Digital Product Officer.
The newly created role will see Nordlund driving further improvements to the retailer’s customer experience for all digital touchpoints across the business, including the M&S app and M&S.com.
Nordlund is currently Chief Product Officer at US digital rental marketplace RentPath. She will take on her new role in January and report into Chief Digital & Data Officer Jeremy Pee.
Canadian e-commerce platform giant Shopify added Fidji Simo to its board of directors.
Simo is the CEO and member of the board of directors at Instacart.
Prior to joining Instacart, she was the Vice President and Head of the Facebook app. Before that, she helped build out eBay’s local commerce and classified advertising initiatives.
Hudson, which has more than 1,000 stores in airports, commuter hubs, landmarks and tourist destinations across North America, became the first retailer in the travel industry to offer Amazon’s palm recognition service, Amazon One.
This is now available at Hudson Nonstop – powered by Just Walk Out technology – at Dallas Love Field Airport.
7-Eleven teamed with Nuro to pilot a commercial delivery service using autonomous vehicles in Mountain View, California.
Customers can access this through the convenience store giant’s 7NOW delivery app.
The pilot will initially use Nuro’s self-driving Priuses before moving on to its R2 delivery vehicles.
