PMC and Deliverect among 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards Tech Implementation of the Year (UK) finalists
We’re pleased to announce the shortlist for the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards Technology Implementation of the Year (UK) category. We received a record number of entries this year and many fantastic examples of technology excellence driving transformative change across the global retail sector.
Check out a rundown of our 2026 shortlists and finalists here.
Congratulations to all those who made it through the initial submission process! It’s now over to our star studded judging panel who will decide the winners to be announced at the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards Ceremony, taking place at The HAC in Central London.
The event will be held on Wednesday, 4th November and consist of a drinks reception, three course meal, awards ceremony presided over by award winning stand-up comedian, presenter, actor and broadcaster, Aurie Styla, and after party until 1am.
Click here to book your place at the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards Ceremony on Wednesday, 4th November.
Our 2026 Technology Implementation of the Year (UK) finalists as follows:
Ann Summers and PMC
Ann Summers partnered with PMC to modernise its core IT infrastructure after years of legacy development had left its tech stack complicated, expensive to maintain and difficult to manage, slowing innovation and creating operational friction.
Asda and Deliverect
Deliverect has partnered with Asda Express to simplify on-demand retail operations across its estate, consolidating separate Uber Eats, Deliveroo and Just Eat picking workflows into one unified application.
Rolled out across the Asda Express estate, the technology gives store teams a single process for managing and picking marketplace orders, reducing operational complexity while significantly improving product availability and picking accuracy. The simpler experience has also driven improved staff NPS. Beyond operational efficiency, the initiative provides the technology infrastructure underpinning Asda Express's q-commerce success, creating a scalable ecosystem where additional digital channels and capabilities can be introduced easily as and when required.
cardfactory and Retail Response
In autumn 2025 and spring 2026, cardfactory entrusted Retail Response with two ambitious, estate wide technology roll-outs. The first upgraded legacy PoS software across the estate, creating the foundation for a complete payment’s technology refresh delivered the following spring.
Across both programmes, Retail Response completed two store visits per location over 16 weeks, with roll-out activity peaking at approximately 40 stores per day. Delivered at exceptional pace and scale, the programmes modernised cardfactory’s retail technology infrastructure while minimising disruption to trading. Together, they demonstrate how careful planning, technical expertise and outstanding execution can deliver complex transformation.
Castore and Patchworks
Castore, the multi-brand fashion and apparel retailer, runs 35 Shopify stores across multiple regions. At peak, its pricing process was manual and fragile: two people spent 6–7 hours a night importing CSVs into NetSuite, success rates were only 60–70%, and the ERP was pushed past safe concurrency limits.
Castore redesigned the flow so approved pricing moves from SharePoint into Snowflake, is validated and signed off, then delivered straight to Shopify by Patchworks. Pricing updates fell from around five hours to 2–3 minutes, error rates dropped from 30–35% to 1–2%, and peak ran with zero error days.
East of England Co-op and Transaction Network Services (TNS)
Transaction Network Services (TNS) delivered a fully managed TNS Secure SD-WAN implementation across East of England Co-op's estate of more than 200 grocery, travel and funeral sites in Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex.
The project consolidated fragmented, multi-vendor connectivity into a single, resilient network with built-in redundancy, reducing failover from up to 90 seconds to instantaneous. Centralised dashboards now provide real-time, estate wide visibility, strengthening compliance and security oversight. Delivered by a dedicated TNS account team with clear project leadership and ownership, the implementation has produced estimated operational savings of 10-15% and zero visible downtime during failover events.
Great Northern Market, Manchester Airport T2
Vita Mojo powers every order at Airport Retail Enterprises' Great Northern Market, the first street food market of its kind in a UK airport, at Manchester Airport Terminal 2.
The three-floor market brings together six kitchens, a bakery, two bars and four kiosks as one unified operation. An Order & Pay at Table model lets passengers browse multiple vendors and pay in a single transaction, with orders routed dynamically across 13 operational flows and six menus. Vita Mojo worked consultatively with Airport Retail Enterprises from concept through launch, delivering a go-live with zero operational issues.
Iceland and SAI
Facing approximately £20 million in annual retail losses from theft and shoplifting, Iceland sought a scalable way to reduce shrink without increasing labour costs or introducing additional hardware to its estate, as well as ensuring it didn’t add friction for honest customers.
Working with SAI, Iceland deployed an AI powered loss prevention platform across its existing store cameras, providing real-time detection of theft events across checkouts, store aisles and exits. The solution enabled colleagues to intervene quickly and safely through highly accurate alerts, delivered directly to handheld devices.
John Lewis and FoundIt!
FoundIt! is an AI driven, intent led commerce platform helping major retailers transform how customers discover, navigate and buy products. Its technology turns millions of behavioural, search and product signals into scalable customer journeys, visual navigation, richer product data and SEO structures aligned to genuine shopper intent.
Working with retailers including John Lewis, B&Q and M&S, FoundIt! has moved AI beyond experimentation and into live enterprise commerce environments. The platform delivers measurable customer and commercial outcomes, including eight-figure benefits, while helping retailers prepare for search and shopping increasingly shaped by AI agents.
LeMieux
LeMieux Insiders was launched in November 2025 to transform a high growth equestrian brand into a community led, loyalty powered ecosystem that builds meaningful, long-term customer relationships beyond transactional commerce.
WHSmith and SOLUM
Waitrose and SOLUM are delivering a nationwide digital shelf transformation using Newton Pro electronic shelf labels. Following pilots, the programme has expanded to more than 200 stores and over three million labels.
Centrally managed digital displays enable faster, more consistent updates across fresh, ambient and specialist categories. By reducing repetitive ticket changes, the programme helps Partners focus more on products and customers while maintaining the premium store experience expected from the Home of Food Lovers.
