The latest from Żabka Polska, Coles, and Amazon: Last week’s biggest retail technology plays at a glance
RTIH rounds up the stand out retail systems deals, launches, deployments and pilots from the past seven days. Featuring Casper, Bolt, AiFi, Żabka Polska, River Island, Mercaux, and Amazon.
AiFi and Żabka Polska
Autonomous retail firm, AiFi, has hit an active stores milestone.
In a LinkedIn post, the company said: “The launch of our store with Żabka Polska in Poland marks our 100th active store worldwide, a testament that autonomous retail isn’t just a trend; it’s here to stay”
“In cooperation with AiFi, we have created an innovative concept of Żabka Nano, which on a global scale, makes a revolutionary change in the perception of consumer experience,” says Tomasz Blicharski, Managing Director at Żabka Future.
“The idea of an autonomous store makes shopping the most convenient experience ever, since it only requires taking a product from the shelf and paying for it at the checkout without scanning.”
Coles Group
Australian retailer, Coles Group, has partnered with Bringg with the aim of improving its home delivery offering.
With Bringg’s platform, Coles says it will will be able to more efficiently allocate deliveries to its network of carriers and track those deliveries in real-time, which will increase cost efficiency throughout the supply chain.
SES-imagotag and Kavanagh Group
SES-imagotag has announced the opening of the UK’s first VUSION 360 powered store.
Leveraging the firm’s VUSION Retail IoT Cloud platform, Kavanagh’s location in Belsize Park, London taps various retail applications to improve its daily operations, providing a 360° view on all store activities and delivering data and feedback on actions in-store.
The store features automated price and promotion execution with real-time shelf visibility, helping to both drive sales and prioritise replenishment of high value and margin products.
Amazon
Amazon is to integrate its logistics network (from pickup to delivery) and SmartCommerce services with Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC), a private non-profit company established by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade of Government of India.
SmartCommerce is an AWS powered suite of SaaS products that enables MSMEs in India to build and scale their business across digital mediums and will have enablers for onboarding to the ONDC network.
This will be Amazon’s initial collaboration with ONDC, with the two set to explore other potential opportunities for stronger integration.
Hobbs and Phase Eight
Retail Assist has welcomed two new brands, Hobbs and Phase Eight, part of TFG Brands (London), to its client roster.
The womenswear specialists will be supported with its 1st Line Help Desk service, acting as a single point of contact for 266 stores across the UK.
Having supported Whistles since 2010, Retail Assist says it was well positioned to roll-out its support model to two more TFG brands.
Previously, Hobbs and Phase Eight received IT support from their internal shared IT services team.
After extensive growth, they needed a partner who could deliver a focused help desk to manage all incidents from initial identification through to resolution.
They required an experienced team who could implement the solution swiftly, in order to minimise impact through peak trade.
The solution is usually delivered in ten weeks, however Retail Assist were up and running just under five weeks, to make sure that Hobbs and Phase Eight stores had support through the Christmas shopping period.
Outform
Outform has launched what is pitched as a first of its kind interactive digital mannequin at retail trade fair EuroShop.
This serves as a visual merchandising platform that lets the shopper control which products they see and how they’re represented in-store through their smartphones.
Shoppers who scan a QR code on the digital mannequin display can take control of what content is displayed.
They can choose which products they see from different perspectives, and which model wears them.
From there, they have the option to purchase the product directly through their mobile device on a microsite.
River Island
Mercaux is delivering RFID self-checkout into stores of River Island, the British high street retailer, alongside key strategic partners.
Shoppers will be encouraged to use self-service devices to speed up the last step in their path to purchase.
After dropping the items into the “RFID Bucket”, said items appear instantly in a digital basket on Mercaux’s self-service kiosk where the customer completes the transaction.
This is made possible, in part, with Mercaux’s composable platform, allowing retailers to surface the checkout process on any device in-store (store associate or customer), eliminating the need for customers to join a line to be served by a store associate at the traditional cash register.
Mercaux’s technology was deployed and integrated with River Island’s existing omnichannel commerce platform with the support of system integrator, Cabiri.
JYSK
JYSK has chosen SES-imagotag to roll-out its VUSION solution in two additional countries, Netherlands and Belgium, for a total of 152 new stores.
With more than 1,500 stores in Europe equipped with the technology, the Scandinavian retailer will now have the opportunity to further digitise its locations by the adoption of the VUSION IoT Cloud platform.
It says that it will be able to save time spent by store employees on error prone and tedious tasks, enabling them to focus on higher value added assignments and customer service.
Casper
Checkout technology company, Bolt, has announced a partnership with Casper, a company that sells sleep products online and in retail locations.
Casper is leveraging Bolt's API-based, modular checkout experience without replacing its existing user interface, which is currently hosted on Salesforce Commerce Cloud.
"Casper is customer obsessed and always looking to turn its shoppers into loyal, repeat customers," says Jason Sauser, VP of Technology at Casper. "We're excited to take our customers on a seamless journey, from checkout to snooze."
Amazon (again!)
Amazon’s Just Walk Out technology and Amazon One solutions have touched down at Kansas City International Airport in the US.
Two &GO stores deploying these offerings can be found in the new Terminal B and baggage claim area.
The new terminal officially opened for business yesterday. It replaces a 50 year old facility and cost $1.5 billion.
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