Artificial Intelligence

Digital retailer QVC is adding new in-app features that allow customers to make easy and quick purchases with just a touch of their finger. 

Using Apple’s fingerprint sensor technology, Touch ID, the QVC for iPhone app now gives customers the option to log in to their QVC accounts on all iOS 8-enabled iPhone 5S, 6 and 6+ mobile devices using only their fingertip for authentication.   

Wolverhampton, U.K. –- U.K.-based convenience chain One Stop has been using Galleria’s Customer Centric Merchandising solution for planogram automation and optimization for a number of years, and is now implementing the Galleria Behavioral Cluster Planning tool. The new solution will provide a better understanding of consumers, assisting One Stop to understand how their categories are being shopped.   

Ad targeting firm Cardlytics said its secured an additional $70 million in funding led by Discovery Capital.

Cardlytics, an advertising and technology company regarded as a leader in card-linked marketing, said the new $70 million funding round brings its total venture capital funding to more than $170 million. Cardlytics intends to use the funds to continue to extend and expand the breadth of the company’s capabilities to make all marketing more relevant and measurable. Morgan Stanley acted as adviser on the deal.

Menlo Park, Calif. –- Net income soared 90% to $806 million in the third quarter of fiscal 2014 from $425 million in the same quarter a year earlier, as part of strong overall performance by Facebook Inc. A sharp increase in operating income helped drive the net income growth.  

Mooresville, N.C. -- Lowe's Innovation Labs will introduce two autonomous retail service robots in an Orchard Supply Hardware store in midtown San Jose, Calif. during the upcoming holiday season to study how robotics technology can benefit customers and employees. Called OSHbot, the robots will assist customers to navigate stores by directing them to specific products and providing real-time information about product promotions and inventory.   

Englewood Cliffs, N.J. -- LG Electronics USA has selected Ugam's Brand Intelligence solution to help manage its brand reputation and channel relationships in the U.S. consumer electronics industry. Ugam's technology and services will support LG's commitment to deliver a superior customer experience by enforcing compliance with its pricing policy.  

Sears and Amazon.com both recently came under fire for allowing rings decorated with the Nazi swastika symbol to be posted for sale on their third-party seller sites. While both retailers quickly pulled the items down and issued public apologies, they received a large amount of negative publicity and surely damaged their brand image with many offended customers, perhaps to the point of permanently losing some of them.

Armonk, N.Y. –- IBM has released new high-speed analysis and criminal investigation software that is designed to uncover hidden criminal threats buried inside massive volumes of disparate corporate data. IBM i2 Enterprise Insight Analysis (EIA) can find non-obvious relationships within hundreds of terabytes of data and trillions of objects in just seconds.