Starring EE, RTS 2025, Attensi, and Attain: our biggest retail technology articles on LinkedIn this week

We’re big fans of LinkedIn and are busy building an amazing community of retail tech enthusiasts on the social media platform. As we head towards the 20,000 followers mark, these are the articles that are currently on their radars, including River Island, inPost UK, ImagineCreate AI, Order Editing, Attensi, Rithum, Pret A Manger, YOOBIC, and the 2024 RTIH Innovation Awards.

Retail Technology Show 2025 website goes live as leading event makes move from London Olympia to ExCel

The new Retail Technology Show website has gone live, ahead of the 2025 event, set to take place at London ExCel on 2nd-3rd April.

Retail Technology Show 2024, which took place at London Olympia in April, welcomed over 12,500 retail professionals to its two-day event, an increase of attendee numbers by +28% year-on-year.

Described by Charles Tyrwhitt’s Nick Wheeler as “eye opening”, the organisers (Nineteen) delivered their biggest innovation showcase to date, with 400+ technology providers and innovators exhibiting across two exhibition halls. 

Nourished’s CEO, Melissa Snover, pointed to the sheer breadth and depth of the technologies being showcased this year, commenting: “there’s a huge amount of different people from all elements of retail, and some incredible technologies coming out.” 

Welcome to Wembley: EE opens tenth Experience Local store covering likes of Brixton, Coventry and Bradford

EE opened its latest Experience Local store in Wembley last Friday. This was the tenth such store to open in the past month and is just around the corner from Wembley Stadium where, as lead partner, EE helps fans remain connected during gigs and games.

In a LinkedIn post, Asif Aziz, Retail Director at EE, said: “Our Experience and Experience Local stores are far more than just “phone shops”. They are a testament to EE’s commitment to deliver the best experience on the high street, giving shoppers the opportunity to try the latest tech in an immersive environment.”

He added: “With each new opening, we transform the way customers interact with technology. Every store has been carefully designed to match the needs and interests of its local community, with expert EE Guides on hand to provide personalised recommendations and tech advice.”

“A big thank you to our incredible teams, whose dedication and hard work have made the ten new Experience Local store openings possible.”

“We look forward to welcoming everyone living in and around Sheffield, Taunton, Bradford, Ealing, Huddersfield, Brixton, Wolverhampton, Hounslow, Coventry and Wembley into our stores and showing them how technology can enhance their connected lives.”

Bringing customers a delivery game-changer: Fashion retailer River Island offers InPost at online checkout

River Island has announced a partnership with parcel locker specialist InPost UK.

In a LinkedIn post, the latter said: “By offering InPost at checkout, River Island customers can now enjoy the convenience of collecting their parcels from a nearby locker at a time that suits them. It’s a win-win for shoppers – no more missed deliveries or waiting around – just a smooth, reliable delivery solution.”

“We're really excited to team up with River Island to bring their customers a delivery game-changer.”

Attain announces acquisition of Zooey Deschanel co-founded rewards and loyalty specialist Merryfield

Attain, whose platform powers real-time purchase measurement and outcome signals for brands, has acquired Merryfield, an app that rewards shoppers for buying better for you products.

Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Attain says that the acquisition of the company, originally launched and funded by actress and musician Zooey Deschanel with David Mayer and Joe Dickson, signals the start of a broader strategy for it to grow its scale and depth of data while adding more affluent customers to its purchase panel.

ImagineCreate AI targets e-commerce brands with new AI image generation and try-on technology

ImagineCreate AI has announced a new suite of AI image generation tools, supporting its mission to fuel brands with more efficient and high quality methods of photo creation.

“No matter the size, every brand depends on product photography for their website, ads, and channels, yet producing professional-quality images has traditionally been a costly and time-consuming process, involving studio rentals, photographer bookings, photo editing, and reshoots,” says former Shopify Director Fatima Yusuf, Founder and CEO at ImagineCreate AI.

“It's why I’m thrilled to share this best-in-class AI image generation technology, delivering ultra-realistic images at a fraction of the cost. We’re on a mission to enable personalised, high quality image creation and unforgettable experiences for brands of every size with the power of AI.” 

Shopify veteran Paul Goldston joins self-service technology startup Order Editing as Head of ANZ

Paul Goldston has joined Order Editing, a startup whose tech lets customers make changes to their orders without emailing support, as Head of ANZ.

He was previously at Shopify where he held such roles as Engagement/Delivery/Partner Manager - Shopify Professional Services APAC.

In a LinkedIn post, Order Editing Co-founder, Hamish McKay, said: “You couldn't comprehend how happy I am to be announcing that Paul Goldston has officially joined our founding team.”

“When I announced that we were hiring our first full time employee, I asked my network - Who could we hire that would make you think "How the hell did you manage to land them?!" Paul was brought up every single time. And within ten minutes of our initial meeting, I had texted my Co-founder saying "I have to have him."

Food and coffee chain Pret A Manger taps YOOBIC tech to support frontline teams and global expansion

Pret A Manger is partnering with digital workplace specialist YOOBIC.

By deploying the company’s suite of tools across 525 shops in 15 international markets, Pret says it is enabling its team to deliver consistently excellent brand experiences while prioritising customer and employee safety at every step of the way.

Over the next three to five years, it plans to double its total footprint to more than 1,000 shops through a growing global network of franchise partnerships.

That's where YOOBIC comes in. By bringing to life some of Pret's extensively documented standard operating procedures into a unified virtual hub, it gives frontline teams immediate access to the digital tools and information they need to succeed, while enabling senior leaders to maintain full visibility into and control over its global operations.

Pret's team members are currently using the tech to monitor and manage over 65,000 monthly tasks across the company's network of shops, with full tracking of task completion, follow up action items, and compliance rates.

Retail technology innovation of the week: Attensi shows why AI is an ally rather than a threat to employees

Retail Technology Innovation of the Week is a series brought to you by RTIH, and sponsored by 3D Cloud, highlighting stand out deployments, launches, and initiatives by retailers and tech suppliers.

And this week we’re focusing on Attensi, which has unveiled Attensi RealTalk, pitched as the first roleplay training solution to incorporate Agentic AI1 and AI free-form dialogue with realistic, virtual humans.

Rithum appoints former Fiserv, Electronic Data Systems and Conduent executive Lou Keyes as new CEO

E-commerce specialist Rithum, formerly CommerceHub and ChannelAdvisor, has announced the appointment of Lou Keyes as its new Chief Executive Officer (CEO).

Keyes, who joined the company as Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) in June, will succeed Bryan Dove, who has served as CEO since 2021.

He has an extensive background in scaling private companies and large corporations, including Fiserv, Electronic Data Systems (EDS) and Conduent. Notably, under Keyes’ leadership, Conduent reversed a three-year sales decline and doubled annual bookings.

Time is running out to enter the 2024 RTIH Innovation Awards, deadline for submissions Friday, 25th October

There are only four weeks left to submit your entries for the 2024 RTIH Innovation Awards. 

Deadline for submissions is Friday, 25th October.

The awards, sponsored by CADS, 3D Cloud, Retail Technology Show 2025, and Business France celebrate global tech innovation in a fast moving omnichannel world.

It's free to enter and you can do so across multiple categories.

Download our handy guide to entering the 2024 RTIH Innovation Awards.

Key 2024 dates:

Friday, 25th October: Award entry deadline 

Tuesday, 29th October: 2024 shortlist revealed

30th October-6th November: Judging days

Thursday, 21st November: Winners announced at the 2024 RTIH Innovation Awards ceremony, to be held at RIBA’s 66 Portland Place HQ in Central London.

For all entry related queries, please email our Editor and Founder, Scott Thompson: scott.thompson@retailtechinnovationhub.com