Artificial Intelligence

The shopping habits of today’s consumers have changed; retailers must be able to provide the product information they want through one or more of the marketing channels they may frequent — and all of those communications must be consistent with the physical in-store experience. That means new merchandising tactics are being embraced by industry leaders who are turning to digital signage to enhance the shopper experience and achieve competitive differentiation.

San Mateo, Calif. - Feedzai, a data science company that uses real-time, machine-based learning to analyze Big Data to prevent fraud, has developed e-commerce apps for the Shopify and Big Commerce platforms. The Feedzai apps on Shopify and Big Commerce provide online retailers with real-time information to determine the legitimacy of an order.

Once again a move by our innovative friends at Amazon.com has prompted me to write a Tech Bytes column. Amazon’s latest interesting venture is the launch of an online marketplace for items created by 3D printer. Currently, the online 3D printed products store includes more than 200 items in categories such as jewelry, toys, home décor and fashion accessories. The new store will feature design templates for product individualization and 3D preview capability.

Groupon has named Parker Barrile as its SVP of product. He will lead Groupon’s global product teams focused on Web, mobile and design.

“Parker brings tremendous value to Groupon both as an entrepreneur and an established, effective product leader in global tech organizations,” said Groupon CEO Eric Lefkofsky. “He will help us evolve our local commerce platform to further engage our customers and help make Groupon a premier online shopping destination.”

New York -- Epson, a leading supplier of value-added point-of-sale (POS) solutions, and Mobivity Holdings Corp., a provider of retail customer engagement and marketing technologies, have entered into a partnership to transform receipts from transactional to actionable.
 

Dallas – The global Electronic Shelf Labels (ESL) market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18.03% during the period 2013-2018. According to a new report from Sandler Research, one of the key factors contributing to this market growth is the reduction in labor costs.

The global Electronic Shelf Labels market has also been witnessing the increasing demand for ESL by retail stores. However, Sandler Research advises the increasing competition among vendors could pose a challenge to the growth of this market.

Seattle – Consumers like the Firefly feature that lets users of the Amazon Fire phone scan objects to obtain information and perform instant purchase on Amazon.com, but not enough to switch from their current phones to Amazon Fire. According to a survey of 53 consumers from UserTesting, 84% chose Firefly as their number one or two favorite feature of Amazon Fire.

New York - Ugam, a provider of managed analytics technology, has released Assortment Intelligence, a solution that generates insights for retailers about what products to keep, carry and drop, based on real-time data collection and analysis. The solution delivers rich, accurate, up-to-the-minute data that helps merchandisers identify assortment gaps and opportunities to differentiate their offerings.

Grapevine, Texas – The GameStop Technology Institute (GTI) business unit of GameStop has entered into strategic partnerships with iBeacon solution providers Shelfbucks and BestFit Mobile, as well as social media hub provider Dynamic Signal. The partnership with Shelfbucks and BestFit will bring Shelfbucks’ iBeacon platform and BestFit Mobile’s ProxDK solution into to its brick-and-mortar retail locations.