Including EE, Packfleet, Kezzler, and Migros: RTIH’s most read retail technology articles from last week
Check out the articles on this here website that caught your fancy this past week, including Polytag, Matalan, Kin + Carta, Autonomo, Global Fashion Agenda, PDS Ventures, Primark, Sainsbury’s, and the launch of the 2024 RTIH Innovation Awards.
Recycling technology firm Polytag builds on Ocado Retail, Aldi, Co-op tie-ups with Series A funding round
Polytag has secured Series A seed funding for its mission to transform the recycling industry across the UK and Europe.
The undisclosed investment builds on partnerships with major UK retailers, including Ocado Retail, Aldi, and Co-op.
Polytag's technology offers real-time visibility and insights into single-use packaging throughout its lifecycle. Using its QR codes and Invisible UV Tags, the solutions enable FMCG brands to track and incentivise plastic packaging recycling.
The funding is led by Collateral Good, a climate first venture capital firm based in Switzerland, and co-led by Knop Ventures, an early-stage venture capital fund that invests in startups that are building a better world.
The combined investment will fund the wider installation of Polytag’s Invisible UV Tag readers in material recovery facilities across the continent, offering a larger range of brands real-time insights on where, when, and how much of its packaging is being recycled.
2024 RTIH Innovation Awards opens for submissions, with winners to be announced in November
The sixth edition of the RTIH Innovation Awards is now open for entries.
The awards celebrate global tech innovation in a fast moving omnichannel world, with winners being announced during a glittering ceremony at RIBA’s 66 Portland Place HQ in Central London on Thursday, 21st November.
This year, we’re bringing you two new categories: AI Innovation and Sustainable Retail Innovation.
AI Innovation
After a barrage of hype, the retail space is now seeing many examples of artificial intelligence creating value and efficiency.
This award will highlight AI projects across the omnichannel retail landscape that have gone beyond the proof-of-concept stage, scaling and delivering results.
Sustainable Retail Innovation
Traditionally, the biggest problem with sustainable technology solutions has been in the relatively high cost of implementation, often meaning that scaling them was not viable.
Things change, however, with incentives, targets and climate pledges as well as the rapid iteration of innovative technologies driving down costs in various areas.
This award will go to a retailer or brand that has worked with technology suppliers to put sustainability at the core of its values. The winning entry will show how a company has boosted its green credentials whilst also demonstrating the tangible business benefits of sustainable practices.
Kezzler and Migros partner on supply chain transparency initiative with new data marketplace launch
Swiss retailer, Migros, has partnered with Kezzler to launch a new supply chain data marketplace powered by EPCIS 2.0 technology.
According to a press release, the solution will provide “a secure and centralised platform for businesses of all sizes to share and access valuable product and supply chain data.”
“This data will be captured using EPCIS 2.0, the latest GS1 standard for electronic product information capture, which connects physical products to their digital representations.”
Migros and partners will gain real-time insights into product provenance, movement, and condition throughout the supply chain.
Green delivery startup Packfleet bags $10 million in Series A funding, co-led by General Catalyst and Voyager Ventures
Carbon-neutral courier Packfleet has raised $10 million in Series A funding.
This was co-led by General Catalyst, an early investor and Voyager Ventures, an early-stage climate fund.
All of Packfleet’s existing investors participated in the funding round, a roster that includes Creandum, Entree Capital and Founder Collective. The cash will bolster its presence in the London delivery market and also support the development of the firm’s proprietary routing software, Pathfinder.
Since launch in 2021, the B Corp certified courier has grown to more than 35 HQ employees, and now its 100+ drivers deliver for hundreds of businesses, including Who Gives A Crap, Pizza Pilgrims and HURR.
Matalan teams with Kin + Carta to launch new GenAI and Large Language Model online tool
Matalan, a fashion and homeware omnichannel value retailer, has announced the launch of a new Generative AI (GenAI) tool.
Matalan has partnered with Kin + Carta on the GenAI and Large Language Model (LLM) offering, which creates detailed product descriptions for items listed on its website.
The move is pitched as the first time a UK retailer has used AI in this way and forms an important part of Matalan’s digital transformation journey.
The tool will be implemented across all departments, including clothing and homeware. According to a press release: “As well as making shopping online with Matalan even easier, it is expected to deliver a 4x increase in productivity.”
Autonomo secures £2 million funding round and preps expansion into the UK and across Europe
Checkout-free software startup Autonomo has closed a £2 million seed funding round.
This was led by London-based Potter Ventures, the team behind the inamo restaurant group, and Liverpool-based UK investors River Capital through its EIS growth fund, fund:AI.
It brings Germany born Autonomo’s total funds raised to ca. £3.8 million, with previous investment coming from a number of parties, including members of The Edeka Group, Germany’s largest supermarket corporation and angel investment from current and former directors at Aldi, Delivery Hero, Metro, Carrefour, Apple and Brookstreet Equity Partners of Mayfair.
The cash will be used to bring Autonomo’s computer vision powered checkout solutions to the UK, after going live in Germany in petrol stations, convenience and grab-and-go stores.
EE: future of retail on the high street involves getting personal and offering mix of real life and digital experiences
Blending in real life with digital, giving customers unforgettable experiences and being personal – that's the future of retail on the high street. So says Asif Aziz, Retail Director, EE/BT Group.
In a LinkedIn post, he observed: “Great to have had the opportunity to talk about all this and more alongside Joanne Hayward (Vice President Convenience Europe at bp) on the 'Stores of Tomorrow' panel at LIVE 2024: Retail Week x The Grocer.”
He added: “The investment we're making in our bricks and mortar stores with EE is part of our drive to reinvent retail in telco, putting customer experience, community focus and innovation at the heart of our strategy to be the most personal, customer focused brand in the UK.”
“A real pleasure to have shared ideas and been inspired by other leaders in our industry, too – as well as catch up with a few familiar faces!”
Global Fashion Agenda and PDS Ventures seek early-stage green innovators for new Trailblazer Programme
The initiative seeks to identify fashion’s most promising early-stage innovators and support them on their journey to scale.
As part of this, PDS Ventures will award one participant an investment of up to $200,000.
The winner will also receive commercial and operational support from PDS Group’s Positive Materials - a textile company and strategic research partner supporting the development and acceleration of low impact textile innovation through collaboration between early-stage startups, supply chain partners and brands.
Further scaling opportunities will be gained through access to PDS Limited’s global supply chain.
Grocery giant Sainsbury's battles payments and online delivery issues as IT meltdown hits hard
Sainsbury's was hit by an IT meltdown on Saturday following an 'error with an overnight software update' that has prevented the grocery retailer from being able to fulfil online orders and accept contactless payments in stores.
“We're experiencing technical issues affecting some stores, our Groceries Online service and our ability to contact customers. Unfortunately, we will not be able to fulfil the vast majority of today's Groceries Online deliveries,” it said on X (formerly known as Twitter).
“We are working hard to fix the issue and apologise to our customers for the inconvenience. We will contact customers proactively to rebook orders as soon as we can.”
It added: “Unfortunately no orders will be going out today. Please book a new delivery from Monday onward. We’re very sorry for the inconvenience. Please bear with us whilst our IT team work tirelessly to resolve this.”
Scotmid Co-op leverages Retail Insight AI solution to drive down food waste in stores
Scotmid Co-op, Scotland's largest independent cooperative, has extended its partnership with Retail Insight, a provider of store operations execution software, to reduce food waste and enhance operational efficiencies in-store.
Launched 165 years ago, Scotmid Co-op now operates around 300 retail outlets across Scotland, Northern Ireland and the north of England across its businesses, including Scotmid Food, Semichem and its Funeral Directors and Post Office branches.
Founded with corporate social responsibility (CSR) at the core of its values, Scotmid Food is focused on reducing its carbon footprint and the amount of waste that goes to landfill, identifying this as a ‘key priority’ in its 2023 Annual Report.
Working towards its target of achieving zero waste going to landfill, in 2021 it partnered with Retail Insight, leveraging its cloud-based software solution WasteInsight to increase its volume of sell-through while reducing its waste footprint.
The Very Group hosts artificial intelligence immersion day as online retailer shows off new GenAI chatbot
Multi-brand online retailer, The Very Group, this week brought the entire company together for an event entitled, Very Con: AI in Action.
In a LinkedIn post, Matt Grest, CIO at The Very Group, said: “It’s always going to be a big call to bring the whole company together for an AI immersion day, but as a business we have made huge strides over the last 12 months in powering the business using genuine AI and I really wanted to keep up the momentum and bring more colleagues into the fold.”
He added: “We had a fantastic day where we were able to outline our strategic ambitions, we had colleagues demonstrating how we’re already leveraging genuine AI across the business and saw many great demonstrations from our valued partners in Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft, Samsung Electronics, Meta and Multiverse - great energy in the office all day from everyone.”
The big reveal of the day was the launch of VeryGPT, a generative AI chatBot that will be available to all employees.
Grest said: “This gives everyone access to a new tool that they can use to support their daily activities, in a safe and secure environment with appropriate guardrails.”
“We’ve already been able to demonstrate some amazing productivity gains from colleagues using VeryGPT during our internal trial, and I can’t wait to see what colleagues are going to do with this now that it’s rolled out to all.”
‘Welcome to our future’: Primark continues self-service checkouts roll-out amidst big UK stores investment
Primark is introducing self-service checkouts across more of its stores after starting the roll-out in 2022.
Initially, they were deployed at stores in Sheffield, Northampton, West Bromwich and Kingston as part of a trial. Milton Keynes and Basingstoke then followed.
And most recently, the technology went live at Stockport.
In a LinkedIn post, Holly Eaton, Manager at Primark, said: “Welcome to our future! As well as served tills we now have new self-serve. We are super excited to allow our customers to flow through store quicker and conveniently. We are proud to also say this means more amazing smiley faces will be on our store floor.”
Referring to Eaton’s post, Richard Feest, Senior Product Manager - In-store Experience (Retail) at Primark, commented: “This is what makes our job incredible! Often you will see people sharing posts of what they have done.”
“But when it’s someone from a store that is sooo excited and bringing something to their customers. Well, it just blows your mind!”
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