Artificial Intelligence

Amazon.com’s sales growth in the first quarter continued to outpace the overall e-commerce growth rate, especially Web services, but expenses related to interest and currency exchange caused the online leader to report a $57 million net loss.

Total sales for the quarter ended March 31 increased 15% to $22.72 billion but a strengthening of the U.S. Dollar caused a $1.3 billion currency exchange headwind. On a constant currency basis, which is how global retailers like to analyze their business, sales increased 22%.

Dallas – Waiting in line is probably the least appetizing part of the dining out experience. That is why Chili’s Grill &Bar has selected the NoWait mobile network to power its new mobile waitlisting app.

Rolling out nationwide in summer 2015, NoWait enables guests to search local Chili's restaurants, understand the wait time to be seated and add their names remotely to a restaurant's real-time seating list. Customers will also be able to track their place in line and show up when their table is scheduled to be ready.

Charlotte, N.C. -- Shoppers in the United States are in no hurry to buy a wearable device, according to a survey by Carlisle & Gallagher Consulting Group, a business and technology consulting firm exclusively focused on the financial services industry. The findings suggest that future adoption of the technology will be driven by attractiveness, alerts and payments functionality.

For those shoppers who are sick of lugging phone chargers from room to room, Ikea has a solution: The Swedish retailer is launching a new line of home furnishings with wireless chargers.

As smartphones have become an essential part of consumers’ lives, Ikea decided to make the charging function a natural part of the home.

EBay painted a mixed financial picture for the first quarter, with lower revenue from its marketplaces division and higher revenue from its Paypal division, which the company said it plans to spin off later this year.

By Mark Kirstein, Zebra Technologies

Every brand wants to meet the needs, desires and expectations of today’s consumers. With the explosion of new technologies in the retail space, shoppers have instant access to vast amounts of information dictating every purchasing decision. For retailers to adapt, it’s important for them to first identify the behavioral trends that are gaining momentum in the industry.

Consumer expectations are never-ending

Those who failed to grasp the significance of the iPhone when it launched in 2007 are not going to make the same mistake twice with the introduction of the Apple Watch –- a wearable technology device that hit the market April 24 with some well-deserved hype and considerable transformative potential.

Mountain View, Calif. – It’s not just media hype – retailers’ exposure to data breaches really is getting worse. According to the 2015 Internet Threat Report from security technology provider Symantec, 11% of all data breaches Symantec recorded in 2014 hit retailers.

Only the healthcare industry represented a larger share of breaches. In addition, retailers provided a leading 59% of all identities revealed in breaches during 2014. Total breach incidents during the year rose 23% compared to 2013.

San Jose, Calif. – Nothing is more personal than the inside of your body, and that is where PayPal reportedly envisions the next frontier of biometric user authentication. According to the Wall Street Journal, PayPal is investigating the feasibility of embeddable, injectable, and ingestible devices to identify users for mobile and online transactions.