DIpil Das
The Coresight Research team participated in Groceryshop 2019, which was held September 15-18. The conference brought together over 3,000 attendees and more than 200 speakers to talk about the transformation of the retail industry, shifts in consumer behavior and innovations that are helping retailers to keep up with fast-changing consumer expectations.
On September 15, Weinswig kicked off the event by emceeing the Emerging Technology Spotlight session, in which 19 innovative companies had four minutes each to present to a panel and the live audience. Over 130 companies applied to present at the event. Groceryshop selected the participating startups based on their solutions, looking for companies that solve some of the most pressing challenges in grocery, e-commerce, food and CPG. All participating startups offer business-to-business (B2B) solutions.
Coresight Research categorizes the 19 startups into four types of solution:
Data and Insights: Digital technology is creating new metrics and capabilities to glean insights and understand the best way to meet and exceed customer expectations.
Improved Shopping Experiences: Shoppers demand intuitive and more seamless grocery experiences, both online and in-store. Grocery retailers face challenges in keeping their assortment up to date and in sync with fast-changing consumer demand.
Next-Generation Marketing: With so many different touchpoints and channels to reach consumers, engagement has become more complex than ever. In addition, there are rapid shifts in how consumers discover, shop and buy. New marketing technologies help grocery retailers and CPGs to engage and acquire customers.
Operations and Supply Chain: Over the next few years, new omnichannel grocery offerings will likely go mainstream, giving consumers new experiences as well as more convenient delivery and pickup options. Simultaneously, technologies such as robotics, artificial intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things (IOT) are changing how grocery items move from producer to store to consumer.
After the presentation, each company had a brief Q&A with Deborah Weinswig, during which the audience voted for the companies they liked using the Groceryshop app or website.
Left to right: Hannah de Boer (Cofounder and CEO, Meisterdish), Olga Yurovski (Founder and CEO, Shopperations), Joe Laszlo (VP Content, Groceryshop), Evan Silver (Founder and CEO, Simplista ), Micky Balter (Cofounder and CEO, Oriient), and Deborah Weinswig (Founder and CEO, Coresight Research).
Source: Coresight Research [/caption] The table below gives a brief description of each participant, followed by a more detailed profile. [caption id="attachment_98192" align="aligncenter" width="700"]
Source: Company reports/Coresight Research[/caption]
Source: Adrich [/caption]
What Problem Does Adrich Solve?
Post-purchase behavior is notoriously difficult to track – but can be a goldmine of information. How often does the consumer use the product and at what time? How long does it take the consumer to finish the product after purchasing? These important insights can inform design and creation of new products and management of existing ones. Adrich’s technology enables manufacturers to increase sales, automate reordering, predict order lead times more accurately, and identify opportunities for product improvements and targeted communications.
Headquarters
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Adhithi Aji has more than six years of related industry experience, including product management and technical research and development experience. She has a master’s degree in engineering and technology management from Carnegie Mellon University.
Joe Belechak, VP of Sales and Operations, has four years’ experience in CPG sales. After graduating with honors from Carnegie Mellon's Tepper School of Business, Belechak began his career at General Mills, with responsibilities including account management, sales strategy, consumer insights, financial management and budget planning, and people management.
Market potential
According to IDC, global big data and business analytics will grow from $130.1 billion in 2016 to over $203 billion in 2020, at a CAGR of 11.7%.
Company Outlook
Adrich received undisclosed seed funding from Plug and Play Ventures, IDEA Fund Partners, Innovation Works and Sony Innovation Fund. The company launched in North America, Latin America and Europe in a short span of six months and is now working with seven Fortune 500 brands.
Source: AGTools[/caption]
What Problem Does AGTools Solve?
Farmers, agricultural buyers and distributors face the uncertainty of agricultural, logistical and political developments, which impacts on the yield of produce: AGTools’ data insights help growers and buyers make more accurate decisions on production, distribution and future capabilities, thus reduce food waste.
Headquarters
Orange County, Los Angeles.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Martha Montoya has over 25 years of worldwide agricultural and supply chain experience. She is a board member of the California State Board of Agriculture and Food.
Market Potential
Worldwide, around $350 billion in food waste is generated per year between farms and distribution centers. AGTools aims to reduce part of it.
Source: Brandchat[/caption]
What Problem Does Brandchat Solve?
Retailers want to acquire as many as shoppers as they can, and one way to achieve that is to create a two-way conversation with consumers in order to listen to their needs. However, the continuously expanding landscape of social media is making it harder to hear the message through all the noise. Brandchat helps retailers to generate voice, chat and visual communication that is tailored to each customer.
Headquarters
New York.
Funding Stage
n/a
Management Team
Cofounder Adam Stave has over 15 years of experience in marketing, sales, consumer lifecycle and emerging technology. He also serves as VP of Strategy and Innovation at Brandshare, a shopper activation company with deep roots in sampling and brand experience.
Cofounder and CEO Magnus Erhardt has extensive experience in digital marketing. He is also the founder of Edge Cognitive Marketing, a company that uses augmented reality, virtual reality, AI and Amazon Alexa to power digital marketing.
Market Potential
According to BI Intelligence, about 80% of businesses will use chatbots—applications that engage in interactive conversation using natural voice or text—by 2020. Moreover, it is estimated that such technology will save businesses about $8 billion annually by 2022.
Company Outlook
Brandchat was founded in December 2018. The startup aims to offer brands a new and smarter approach to shopper engagement, relationship building and activation, as well as ways to discover new audiences more effectively than other digital prospecting tools.
Source: CoupDog[/caption]
What Problem Does CoupDog Solve?
Retailers and brands want to make sure their customers can receive and use coupons conveniently. However, some transaction-based programs are unsecure, leading to a substantial increase in loyalty fraud in recent years. CoupDog delivers a more secure, dynamic and targeted way for retailers and brands to issue digital offers and create loyalty programs.
Headquarters
Toronto.
Funding Stage
n/a
Management Team
Cofounder and Director Rob Balfour served as President and CEO at Trapeze Media for 12 years. He also cofounded eAdvocate prior to CoupDog.
Cofounder and Director Greg Bandler has direct experience in grocery retail and CPG marketing and technology. He has also been involved in a number of startups, bringing vision and strategy to drive growth and market success.
Market Potential
According to Deloitte, blockchain technology is transforming the retail industry by creating a giant database that is open and decentralized, yet has strict controls over privacy so that customers must authorize access to this data.
Company Outlook
CoupDog launched commercially in April 2019. The company is now working with Rouses Market, one of the largest independent grocers in US. CoupDog has been working with more than 50 CPGs since its launch.
Source: Datasembly [/caption]
What Problem Does Datasembly Solve?
Brands and retailers want to set the price right at the right time and place, but the data to help inform these decisions comes in piles of disparate public sources of raw numbers. What retailers really need is high-quality, organized, structured data that is easier to understand. Datasembly solves this problem by collecting and collating pricing data and delivering it in an organized, easily accessible format.
Headquarters
Washington, DC.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Cofounder and CTO Daniel Gallagher was a lead engineer at Applied Predictive Technologies prior to setting up Datasembly. He worked as a research assistant at Cornell University after obtaining his bachelor’s degree in computer science there.
Cofounder and CEO Ben Reich was a lead software engineer at Applied Predictive Technologies prior to setting up Datasembly. He worked as a research assistant at Cornell University after obtaining his bachelor’s degree in mathematics and linguistics there.
Market Potential
According to market research firm IDC, global big data and business analytics will grow from $130.1 billion in 2016 to over $203 billion in 2020, at a compound annual growth rate of 11.7%.
Company Outlook
The company raised $1.5 million in a seed round in August 2018.
Source: Gather AI[/caption]
What Problem Does Gather AI Solve?
Manual inventory is costly and time consuming. The good news is, in the modern warehouse there is no need for it: Automated solutions such as that offered by Gather AI enable companies to use drones to perform this task—even noting if items are in the wrong place or cannot be recognized. Gather AI’s flatform enables drones to monitor inventory without the need for additional infrastructure.
Headquarters
Pittsburgh.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Cofounder Sankalp Arora has 10 years’ experience developing unmanned aerial systems and robotics technology. He is a recipient of the Qualcomm Innovation fellowship and Swartz Innovation fellowship. Arora holds a PhD in robotics from Carnegie Mellon University.
Cofounder Daniel Maturana has over 12 years’ experience in computer vision, machine learning and robotics. He is a recipient of the Qualcomm Innovation Fellowship and a doctoral candidate at Carnegie Mellon University.
Cofounder Geetesh Dubey led the development of India’s first autonomous tank and developed one of the world’s fastest, fully autonomous camera-only drones. He holds a master’s degree in robotics from Carnegie Mellon University.
Market Potential
According to Global Market Insights, the inventory management software market share is set to surpass $3 billion by 2024.
Company Outlook
In July 2019, Gather AI received $135,000 in pre-seed funding.
Source: Leaf Logistics[/caption]
What Problem Does Leaf Logistics Solve?
Leaf Logistics enables shippers, carriers, brokers and logistics service providers to quickly identify the best contracting opportunities for their logistics network, cutting cost and improving operations.
Headquarters
New York.
Funding Stage
n/a.
Management Team
Cofounder and CTO Stefan Friederichs has over 15 years’ technology and software development experience. He was chief product officer at Park Jockey prior to founding Leaf Logistics. Stefan holds a PhD in operations research and analytics.
Cofounder and CEO Anshu Prasad led A.T. Kearney's global analytics practice for 13 years prior to founding Leaf Logistics. He graduated from Cornell University with a degree in biochemistry, and from Oxford University with an MBA.
Market Potential
According to IDC, the market for big data and business analytics will grow from $130.1 billion in 2016 to over $203 billion in 2020 globally, at a compound annual growth rate of 11.7%.
Company Outlook
Leaf Logistics was formerly known as the Logistics Exchange. The company has been in beta mode for the past 18 months.
Source: Macondo Ventures[/caption]
What Problem Does Macondo Ventures Solve?
Retailers and manufacturers want to ensure warehouse and distribution center staff perform at their best, but accurately evaluating productivity is quite challenging. Macondo Ventures’ solution uses camera-based activity tracking to optimize workflow at distribution centers.
Headquarters
Atlanta.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Frank Layo has over 20 years’ experience in various industries and was a Partner Kurt Salmon prior to founding Macondo Ventures.
Market Potential
According to Macondo, US companies lose over $150 billion from their bottom lines every year due to rising operating costs. Employee theft costs US businesses $50 billion annually. The company believes the increased visibility delivered by camera-based activity tracking will help mitigate these rising costs.
Company Outlook/News
The company recently launched a solution dedicated to hospitality businesses.
Source: Meisterdish[/caption]
What Problem Does Meisterdish Solve?
Grocery retailers want to provide more value-added services to consumers. At the same time, sales of meal kits in grocery stores are increasing, as consumers opt for convenience but with better quality than a premade meal. Meisterdish helps grocers offer customers on-demand meal kits and delivery service using a standardized approach.
Headquarters
New York.
Funding Stage
n/a
Management Team
Cofounder and CEO Hannah de Boer has over 12 years’ experience in lifestyle marketing. Prior to setting up Meisterdish, she was a senior account associate at Firmenich.
Cofounder and Executive Chef Johannes Hennche spent years working in Michelin-starred kitchens.
Market Potential
Coresight Research estimates that the US meal kits market was worth around $2.9 billion in 2018, up from around $2.5 billion in 2017.
Company Outlook
Meisterdish is actively looking for partnerships with grocery retailers. It currently provides over 16 dishes each day and offers more than 200 dishes on a rotating menu.
Source: Oriient [/caption]
What Problem Does Oriient Solve?
Retailers want to guide consumers to products and want this to be as straightforward as possible. However, most indoor positioning systems require companies to buy and install additional devices and systems into their stores – and as is the case for most products, low-cost solutions are not as effective as very expensive ones. Oriient’s solution is easy to deploy, does not require additional hardware installation or maintenance.
Headquarters
Tel-Aviv.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
CEO and Cofounder Mickey Balter has over 20 years’ experience using technology to solve business challenges. He cofounded Veloquity Systems and Scientra before setting up Oriient. Balter holds a master’s degree in business administration from Tel-Aviv University.
CTO and Cofounder Amiram Frish worked as an algorithms and architecture leader at Motorola Solutions for seven years before cofounding Oriient.
Market Potential
Stratistics MRC estimates the global indoor location market was worth $3.43 billion in 2015 and is expected to reach $29.4 billion by 2022, growing at a CAGR of 35.9% from 2015 to 2022.
Company Outlook/News
In April 2019, Oriient received $4 million funding from F2 Capital and Innogy Innovation Hub.
Source: Pick ‘n’ Watch[/caption]
What Problem Does Pick ‘n’ Watch Solve?
Retailers want to educate customers about products, but having enough staff on hand to constantly attend to every customer would be impractical. Pick ‘n’ Watch shows the right product video and promotional deal when customers interact with products and helps brick-and-mortar stores close the innovation gap between offline and online shopping experiences.
Headquarters
San Jose, California.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Erhan Ark has 19 years of technology market experience in product development, sales and business development. He is also the CEO of Federal Smart Solution.
Market Potential
Forrester forecasts digital marketing spend in the US will reach $120 billion by 2021.
Company Outlook
Pick ‘n’ Watch’s is currently working with several notable customers which include Microsoft, Constellation Brands, McKesson and Ace Hardware and will look to expand its reach further to other brands looking to close the gap between the online and offline shopping experience.
Source: Retail Aware[/caption]
What Problem Does Retail Aware Solve?
Retailers want to understand how customers interact with products: who is picking up the product, who visits certain parts of the store, and most importantly, which behaviors point to the consumer converting to a buying customer. Retail Aware says its micro sensor system can estimate consumers’ age, gender, ethnicity and income to provide valuable shopper data to help retailers refine their omnichannel strategies and digitally target shoppers.
Headquarters
Omaha, Nebraska.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Keith Fix has experience in marketing and sales. He founded DailyMav and Blabfeed prior to founding Retail Aware.
Market Potential
According to Global Market Insights, the global retail analytics market is set to grow from $3 billion in 2018 to over $8 billion by 2024.
Company Outlook
In March 2019, Retail Aware received $450,000 in seed funding.
Source: Shopperations[/caption]
What Problem Does Shopperations Solve?
Brands and retailers want to manage marketing campaigns and events in a more systemic way. However, when several parties are involved, planning and execution marketing projects can be highly complex and messy. Shopperations helps automate connections with multiple teams, facilitates information sharing and improves workflow.
Headquarters
Cincinnati, Ohio.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Olga Yurovski has more than 15 years’ experience in the consumer packaged goods (CPG) and consumer electronics industries. She was shopper marketing director at Canagra Brands prior to setting up Shopperations. Sharki King-Thomas serves as VP of Operations and Customer Success.
Market Potential
According to Information Resources, online CPG sales in the US totaled $58.6 billion in 2018—some 11% of the total. However, online is only half the story—leading retailers need to engage their customers through multiple channels, and omnichannel marketing introduces a new level of complexity to what is already a complex process. Consumer expectations around omnichannel are continually rising.
Company Outlook
Shopperations’ clients include Heineken, Conagra, Pinnacle and Smithfield. The company also received The Imagining Grant from Ohio's Third Frontier, administered by CincyTech USA.
Source: Shoppermotion [/caption]
What Problem Does Shoppermotion Solve?
The in-store flow of information can improve decisions on product placement as managers can see correlations between different areas, blind spots and popular areas. This can also help ensure staff is deployed to the best locations. Shoppermotion helps retailers track consumers’ complete shopping journey anonymously and transforms the data into actionable insights.
Headquarters
San Francisco, California.
Funding Stage
Venture.
Management Team
Cofounder and CEO Jorge Bueno cofounded BeMee Technology and ShOOSoft prior to setting up Shoppermotion. He has a PhD in robotics lab, 3D model recognition and artificial intelligence.
Cofounder and CSO Alejandro Martín Clemente cofounded BeMee Technology after obtaining his PhD in robotics and control engineering.
Cofounder and CTO Marco Doncel Gabaldón cofounded LiveClubs and Startapps prior to Shoppermotion.
Market potential
According to IDC, global big data and business analytics will grow from $130.1 billion in 2016 to over $203 billion in 2020, at a compound annual growth rate of 11.7%.
Company Outlook
According to Shoppermotion’s CEO, its solution is “changing the way in-store offline marketing is done, the way online marketing did when Google Analytics for websites appeared back in 2005.”
Source: Simplista[/caption]
What Problem Does Simplista Solve?
Retailers are losing tens of millions of dollars annually in missed market opportunities because it can take four to eight weeks to get each item onboarded (the process of listing a new item so that it is available for sale). Antiquated processes, especially in the digital space, can inhibit product assortment growth, extended product attribution and omnichannel scalability. Retailers are also experiencing supply chain bottlenecks due to incorrect data/item attribution errors. Simplista’s solution looks to minimize the pain points of this process for retailers and increase onboarding efficiency.
Headquarters
Toronto.
Funding Stage
Bootstrapped.
Management Team
Evan Silver is the founder and CEO of Simplista. Originally from South Africa, his career began in Canada as a computer science graduate who was recruited into Oracle as a consultant. Silver then founded a consulting firm, helping Fortune 100 clients drive operational effectiveness through advanced analytics and business process automation. Silver has worked with Canadian retail giant Loblaw, major telecommunications companies (Rogers, TELUS, Bell) and financial services firms (CIBC and BMO). He has over 20 years of technology delivery experience. He developed Simplista to fix a fundamental flaw in every retailer’s supply chain, and grow revenue and profit for retailers and their suppliers.
Market Potential
According to research from Mordor Intelligence, the business process management market was valued at $3.18 billion in 2018 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 6.26% until 2024, to $4.5 billion.
Company Outlook
Simplista is targeting its solution at large and medium US and Canadian retailers. The company plans to go into Series A funding and enter the US market in 2019.
Source: SuperUp[/caption]
What Problem Does SuperUp Solve?
Retailers want to provide a seamless omnichannel experience and deliver a cohesive experience for shoppers at every touchpoint. Retailers also need to know what consumers are looking for and shopping preferences to recommend products: SuperUp helps brands and retailers build apps that combine personalized shopping, video content and marketing.
Headquarters
Tel Aviv.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Cofounder and CEO Roy Ittah was head of production at Amdocs, a software and services provider to communications and media companies, for 11 years.
Cofounder and CSO Adam Ittah comes from a sales and strategy background. Prior to founding SuperUp, he worked at Caliber Associates in New York.
Market Potential
Online shopping is driving retail growth and online sales are growing exponentially, but most actual purchases still take place in the store – and this is especially true of fast-moving consumer goods (FMCGs). According to Nielsen, online and offline FMCG sales totaled more than $1.01 trillion at the end of August 2018, up 2.6% year over year. Although online accounted for 5% of total omnichannel sales, it drove 40% of sales growth, according to Nielsen.
Company Outlook
In November 2018, SuperUp received $15 million in seed funding. The company is helping blue-chip retailers such A.S Watsons to improve customer conversion and basket size. It recently launched with Natura, one of the world’s largest cosmetics manufactories.
Source: Tastry[/caption]
What Problem Does Tastry Solve?
While the typical wine aisle offers hundreds, and sometimes thousands, of choices, the average consumer lacks the experience to choose a bottle of wine that matches his or her palate preference. Retailers have traditionally assisted shoppers by providing expert ratings and descriptions of wines. More modern attempts involve using software-based recommendation engines. However, these sometimes fail to provide accurate matches because they cannot always account for shoppers’ individual taste preferences.
Retailers want to customers to pick a wine they will enjoy in order to improve the chance of repeat purchase and therefore support future sales, and the pairing feature also cross-promotes food items. Tastry’s solution combines analytical chemistry, flavor preferences and machine learning to track consumer preferences and provide more accurate recommendations. Suggestions are filterable by price, wine type, food pairing and other criteria. Tastry’s solution further enhances the shopper experience through food and recipe pairings and retailer-optional coupons.
Headquarters
San Luis Obispo, California.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Katerina Axelsson is a graduate of California Polytechnic State University with a degree in chemistry. She noticed that a single batch of wine, sent to two different labels, received drastically different industry scores. It was then that she knew there had to be a more objective way to buy wine for the individual. Axelsson saw an opportunity to create an objective scoring system powered by AI but using chemistry to better understand consumer preferences.
Market Potential
The wine market is typically divided into distribution channels that include supermarkets and hypermarkets, specialty stores, convenience stores and e-commerce. According to Zion Market Research, the global wine market was valued at approximately $302.02 billion in 2017 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of around 5.8% to 2023, to reach approximately $423.59 billion. Supermarkets and hypermarkets are expected to dominate the global wine market in the near term.
Company Outlook
Tastry plans to launch an automated food pairing solution which not only pairs wines with types of foods but even specific recipes – and to food inventory in the store. The new solution can even filter for dietary preferences and restrictions. In October 2018, Tastry announced a strategic partnership with Aila Technologies, a leading enterprise retail technology platform, to work on in-aisle touchpoints.
Source: Tiliter Technology [/caption]
What Problem Does Tiliter Technology Solve?
The company believes its solution addresses problems such as long lines (by speeding the checkout process by cutting the number of items that need manual product entry), self-checkout frustration and plastic pollution.
Research by environmental consultancy Euonomia estimates that top supermarkets in Europe are creating a plastic waste problem in excess of 800,000 tonnes per year. Because Tiliter’s solution can identify fresh produce such as red apples and avocadoes with automatic detection, it may reduce the use of many plastic bags for fruits and vegetables.
Retailers have thousands of vendors from which to choose when selecting a barcode scanning system, many of which are not plug-and-play solutions and may require substantial time and effort to integrate into current business processes. Tiliter’s solution can be included in existing systems and upgraded easily.
Headquarters
Sydney.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Cofounder and CEO Marcel Herz has a background in mechanical, bio-medical and design engineering.
Cofounder and CTO Christopher Sampson was test systems engineer at Cochlear prior to cofounding Tiliter Technology. He has a master’s degree in engineering science, systems and control from the University of New South Wales in Australia.
Cofounder and CTO Martin Karafilis cofounded Karra’s Lures, an environmentally friendly fishing lure company. He has a background in business, human resource management and marketing.
Market Potential
According to Global Market Insights, the global self-checkout system market is set to exceed $4 billion by 2024.
Company Outlook
In August 2019, Tiliter received its first orders and is currently working in partnerships with several start-up programs, including the Autodesk Entrepreneur Impact Group and Microsoft for Startups Program. The company is actively expanding its team and focussing on US and Europe launches. Tiliter may expand its offering into a business-to-business, business-to-consumer platform so that anyone in any industry can use the software to build their own recognition solution. This means that it can be integrated into existing computer systems or used as a standalone software.
See our previous coverage of Groceryshop 2019 here:
Groceryshop 2019: Day 1 Insights – Emerging Technology Spotlight
Groceryshop 2019: Day 2 Insights – Artificial Intelligence, Personalization and Growth Channels
Groceryshop 2019: Day 3 Insights – Algorithms and Data Steal the Show
Groceryshop 2019: Day 4 Insights – CBD Continues to Grow
Insights from Groceryshop 2019
After the presentation, each company had a brief Q&A with Deborah Weinswig, during which the audience voted for the companies they liked using the Groceryshop app or website.
Who came out on top?
After the votes were tallied, the innovators (as selected by the audience) were:- Gather AI
- Meisterdish
- Oriient
- Simplista
- Shopperations
Left to right: Hannah de Boer (Cofounder and CEO, Meisterdish), Olga Yurovski (Founder and CEO, Shopperations), Joe Laszlo (VP Content, Groceryshop), Evan Silver (Founder and CEO, Simplista ), Micky Balter (Cofounder and CEO, Oriient), and Deborah Weinswig (Founder and CEO, Coresight Research). Source: Coresight Research [/caption] The table below gives a brief description of each participant, followed by a more detailed profile. [caption id="attachment_98192" align="aligncenter" width="700"]
Source: Company reports/Coresight Research[/caption]
Adrich at a Glance
Founded in 2016, Adrich provides a connected consumer platform that uses a smart product tracker and software. The company’s labels track product usage after the customer has purchased it and taken it home. With consumer consent, Adrich’s labels and custom software create a stream of real-time product usage data that enables manufacturers to offer features such as automatic reordering, predicting order lead times more accurately and identifying opportunities for product improvement and targeted communications. The company leverages machine learning and draws information from a tracker placed on products inside the label. Data is aggregated and presented visually on Adrich’s Dashboard. [caption id="attachment_98130" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Adrich [/caption]
What Problem Does Adrich Solve?
Post-purchase behavior is notoriously difficult to track – but can be a goldmine of information. How often does the consumer use the product and at what time? How long does it take the consumer to finish the product after purchasing? These important insights can inform design and creation of new products and management of existing ones. Adrich’s technology enables manufacturers to increase sales, automate reordering, predict order lead times more accurately, and identify opportunities for product improvements and targeted communications.
Headquarters
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Adhithi Aji has more than six years of related industry experience, including product management and technical research and development experience. She has a master’s degree in engineering and technology management from Carnegie Mellon University.
Joe Belechak, VP of Sales and Operations, has four years’ experience in CPG sales. After graduating with honors from Carnegie Mellon's Tepper School of Business, Belechak began his career at General Mills, with responsibilities including account management, sales strategy, consumer insights, financial management and budget planning, and people management.
Market potential
According to IDC, global big data and business analytics will grow from $130.1 billion in 2016 to over $203 billion in 2020, at a CAGR of 11.7%.
Company Outlook
Adrich received undisclosed seed funding from Plug and Play Ventures, IDEA Fund Partners, Innovation Works and Sony Innovation Fund. The company launched in North America, Latin America and Europe in a short span of six months and is now working with seven Fortune 500 brands.
AGTools at a Glance
Founded in 2015, AGTools uses machine learning to collect, normalize and analyses a wide array of data related to agriculture produce. The company provides real time algorithm data services to farmers and corporate buyers covering over 500 fruits, vegetables, herbs, nuts and ornamentals. It has over 71 million records of market data plus 25 years’ experience operating on a national and global scale. The company’s solution generates actionable insights to famers, buyers and shippers in agriculture supply chain. [caption id="attachment_98131" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: AGTools[/caption]
What Problem Does AGTools Solve?
Farmers, agricultural buyers and distributors face the uncertainty of agricultural, logistical and political developments, which impacts on the yield of produce: AGTools’ data insights help growers and buyers make more accurate decisions on production, distribution and future capabilities, thus reduce food waste.
Headquarters
Orange County, Los Angeles.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Martha Montoya has over 25 years of worldwide agricultural and supply chain experience. She is a board member of the California State Board of Agriculture and Food.
Market Potential
Worldwide, around $350 billion in food waste is generated per year between farms and distribution centers. AGTools aims to reduce part of it.
Babylon Micro-Farms at a Glance
Founded in 2017, Babylon Micro-Farms developed an indoor agriculture technology for grocery stores and restaurants. The company’s on-demand farming service supports a distributed network of micro-farms that allow businesses to vertically integrate their supply chains and grow fresh produce on site. Babylon Micro-Farms leverages a patented IoT platform to remotely manage indoor farms: Its hydroponic system can grow a variety of leafy greens, herbs, flowers and fruits more quickly than traditional planting methods and using 90% less water. What Problem Does Babylon Micro-Farms Solve? Food retailers and restaurant owners would love to be able to offer locally grown fresh produce—growing on site would be a particular selling point for consumers looking for a true farm-to-table experience. However, the infrastructure is complex and adding that to the already daunting task of running a grocery store or restaurant would be impractical. Babylon Micro-Farms offers modules with fixed dimensions; food retailers and restaurant owners can choose the number of modules based on the size of their operations and the produce variety they want. The Babylon app provides live data and harvest scheduling on the farm; farm owners can also re-order the growing supplies from the app. Headquarters Charlottesville, Virginia. Funding Stage Seed. Management Team Founder Alexander Olesen graduated with a degree in foreign affairs and social entrepreneurship prior to founding Babylon Micro-Farms. Market Potential According to Organic Produce Network and Nielsen, sales of organic fresh produce increased 8.6% to $5.6 billion in 2018 in the US. Company Outlook In August 2019, Babylon Micro-Farms received an undisclosed amount in seed funding from CIT GAP Funds.Brandchat at a Glance
Founded in 2018, Brandchat is an AI-powered conversational management platform. Brandchat offers a conversation management platform to interact with customers through multiple messaging platforms (Facebook, WeChat, Kik) and across voice and AR applications. After developing a deeper understanding of product choices, pricing sensitivity and sales history across every transaction, Brandchat creates a conversation tailored to each consumer and his or her needs. The solution can help retailers and brand owners deepen customer relationships, driving incremental sales with each interaction. [caption id="attachment_98132" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Brandchat[/caption]
What Problem Does Brandchat Solve?
Retailers want to acquire as many as shoppers as they can, and one way to achieve that is to create a two-way conversation with consumers in order to listen to their needs. However, the continuously expanding landscape of social media is making it harder to hear the message through all the noise. Brandchat helps retailers to generate voice, chat and visual communication that is tailored to each customer.
Headquarters
New York.
Funding Stage
n/a
Management Team
Cofounder Adam Stave has over 15 years of experience in marketing, sales, consumer lifecycle and emerging technology. He also serves as VP of Strategy and Innovation at Brandshare, a shopper activation company with deep roots in sampling and brand experience.
Cofounder and CEO Magnus Erhardt has extensive experience in digital marketing. He is also the founder of Edge Cognitive Marketing, a company that uses augmented reality, virtual reality, AI and Amazon Alexa to power digital marketing.
Market Potential
According to BI Intelligence, about 80% of businesses will use chatbots—applications that engage in interactive conversation using natural voice or text—by 2020. Moreover, it is estimated that such technology will save businesses about $8 billion annually by 2022.
Company Outlook
Brandchat was founded in December 2018. The startup aims to offer brands a new and smarter approach to shopper engagement, relationship building and activation, as well as ways to discover new audiences more effectively than other digital prospecting tools.
CoupDog at a Glance
Founded in 2016, CoupDog offers retailers and brands a digital coupon platform powered by blockchain to manage coupon’s entire lifecycle. CoupDog technology integrates digital coupons with the latest mobile wallet platforms from Apple and Google, as well as retailer Load2Card’s platforms. The company’s technology provides a format to create and distribute offers, so consumers can save coupons or retailer loyalty cards in their mobile wallets. With bank-grade encrypted security, CoupDog reduces the risk of fraud and redemption issues that have plagued the industry for many years. The platform delivers value to three primary stakeholders:- Retailers: At store level, CoupDog delivers operational efficiencies at checkout and back-office due to electronic validation of purchase rules and automated coupon clearing, using Blockchain’s distributed ledger as the absolute record of truth.
- CPGs: Brands are able to better leverage online media expenditure with a direct response purchase incentive. Brands can monitor online attribution to in-store conversion and adjust media buys in real-time.
- Consumers: Users benefit from the convenience of receiving offers on their mobile phones for portable, all-time access instead of carrying around paper coupons. Consumers can also create a MyOffers account to store all their digital coupons and redeem validated purchases at retail checkout with a single swipe.
Source: CoupDog[/caption]
What Problem Does CoupDog Solve?
Retailers and brands want to make sure their customers can receive and use coupons conveniently. However, some transaction-based programs are unsecure, leading to a substantial increase in loyalty fraud in recent years. CoupDog delivers a more secure, dynamic and targeted way for retailers and brands to issue digital offers and create loyalty programs.
Headquarters
Toronto.
Funding Stage
n/a
Management Team
Cofounder and Director Rob Balfour served as President and CEO at Trapeze Media for 12 years. He also cofounded eAdvocate prior to CoupDog.
Cofounder and Director Greg Bandler has direct experience in grocery retail and CPG marketing and technology. He has also been involved in a number of startups, bringing vision and strategy to drive growth and market success.
Market Potential
According to Deloitte, blockchain technology is transforming the retail industry by creating a giant database that is open and decentralized, yet has strict controls over privacy so that customers must authorize access to this data.
Company Outlook
CoupDog launched commercially in April 2019. The company is now working with Rouses Market, one of the largest independent grocers in US. CoupDog has been working with more than 50 CPGs since its launch.
Datasembly at a Glance
Founded in 2014, Datasembly provides pricing and product intelligence to CPGs and retailers by collecting pricing data from across the web. The company aggregates millions of grocery and retail pricing records from hundreds of grocery delivery and online shopping websites. The information includes store-level detailed price intelligence fed by a comprehensive database of real-time SKU-level pricing data from tens of thousands of individual stores and zip codes across the US. This information can be turned into usable insights and analyses. [caption id="attachment_98134" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Datasembly [/caption]
What Problem Does Datasembly Solve?
Brands and retailers want to set the price right at the right time and place, but the data to help inform these decisions comes in piles of disparate public sources of raw numbers. What retailers really need is high-quality, organized, structured data that is easier to understand. Datasembly solves this problem by collecting and collating pricing data and delivering it in an organized, easily accessible format.
Headquarters
Washington, DC.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Cofounder and CTO Daniel Gallagher was a lead engineer at Applied Predictive Technologies prior to setting up Datasembly. He worked as a research assistant at Cornell University after obtaining his bachelor’s degree in computer science there.
Cofounder and CEO Ben Reich was a lead software engineer at Applied Predictive Technologies prior to setting up Datasembly. He worked as a research assistant at Cornell University after obtaining his bachelor’s degree in mathematics and linguistics there.
Market Potential
According to market research firm IDC, global big data and business analytics will grow from $130.1 billion in 2016 to over $203 billion in 2020, at a compound annual growth rate of 11.7%.
Company Outlook
The company raised $1.5 million in a seed round in August 2018.
Gather AI at a Glance
Founded in 2019, Gather AI has developed a software-only inventory monitoring fleet of drones. The software plugin enables enterprises to use standard drones (or off-the-shelf drones) for warehouse inventory tracking. Clients map out the warehouse and the drones circulate the spaces autonomously. The drones can count boxes and packages, scan bar codes and locate unidentified items while continually updating inventory records. The drones also capture thermal imagery to collect temperature data. According to the company, Gather’s robotics-as-a-service (RaaS) solution drones achieve 10 times faster inventory checks compared to manual inventory checks, while also collecting data that enables metrics such as space utilization, SKU mismatches and asset path optimization. [caption id="attachment_98135" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Gather AI[/caption]
What Problem Does Gather AI Solve?
Manual inventory is costly and time consuming. The good news is, in the modern warehouse there is no need for it: Automated solutions such as that offered by Gather AI enable companies to use drones to perform this task—even noting if items are in the wrong place or cannot be recognized. Gather AI’s flatform enables drones to monitor inventory without the need for additional infrastructure.
Headquarters
Pittsburgh.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Cofounder Sankalp Arora has 10 years’ experience developing unmanned aerial systems and robotics technology. He is a recipient of the Qualcomm Innovation fellowship and Swartz Innovation fellowship. Arora holds a PhD in robotics from Carnegie Mellon University.
Cofounder Daniel Maturana has over 12 years’ experience in computer vision, machine learning and robotics. He is a recipient of the Qualcomm Innovation Fellowship and a doctoral candidate at Carnegie Mellon University.
Cofounder Geetesh Dubey led the development of India’s first autonomous tank and developed one of the world’s fastest, fully autonomous camera-only drones. He holds a master’s degree in robotics from Carnegie Mellon University.
Market Potential
According to Global Market Insights, the inventory management software market share is set to surpass $3 billion by 2024.
Company Outlook
In July 2019, Gather AI received $135,000 in pre-seed funding.
Leaf Logistics at a Glance
Founded in 2017, Leaf Logistics provides a data and analytics platform to increase cost and service predictability in the transportation industry. The company used predictive analytics and artificial intelligence to create a freight contracting platform. The platform provides an end-to-end service for carriers, shippers, and logistics service providers and helps them secure future transportation capacity, rates and service through the company’s forward contracts. Pricing data from these contracts, combined with additional analytics and contracting, establish the foundation for a futures market for logistics, allowing participants hedge transportation costs. [caption id="attachment_98136" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Leaf Logistics[/caption]
What Problem Does Leaf Logistics Solve?
Leaf Logistics enables shippers, carriers, brokers and logistics service providers to quickly identify the best contracting opportunities for their logistics network, cutting cost and improving operations.
Headquarters
New York.
Funding Stage
n/a.
Management Team
Cofounder and CTO Stefan Friederichs has over 15 years’ technology and software development experience. He was chief product officer at Park Jockey prior to founding Leaf Logistics. Stefan holds a PhD in operations research and analytics.
Cofounder and CEO Anshu Prasad led A.T. Kearney's global analytics practice for 13 years prior to founding Leaf Logistics. He graduated from Cornell University with a degree in biochemistry, and from Oxford University with an MBA.
Market Potential
According to IDC, the market for big data and business analytics will grow from $130.1 billion in 2016 to over $203 billion in 2020 globally, at a compound annual growth rate of 11.7%.
Company Outlook
Leaf Logistics was formerly known as the Logistics Exchange. The company has been in beta mode for the past 18 months.
Macondo Ventures at a Glance
Founded in 2019, Macondo Ventures’ proprietary software leverages machine learning to track employee performance in distribution and warehouse centers. The company uses off-the-shelf camera-based technology to passively track staff activity and evaluate overall performance by converting these activities into data insights. Management can use this intelligence to evaluate associate and supervisor activities against defined standards. The videos are converted directly to data to protect individual privacy. Macondo Ventures also provides benchmark data from similar operations and recommends specific areas for improvement. The company’s camera-based activity tracking allows businesses to collect data to improve processes, for example:- Cutting warehouse labor cost through productivity improvements.
- Automating tedious engineering tasks.
- Providing insights through data analytics.
- Providing peer benchmark reporting.
Source: Macondo Ventures[/caption]
What Problem Does Macondo Ventures Solve?
Retailers and manufacturers want to ensure warehouse and distribution center staff perform at their best, but accurately evaluating productivity is quite challenging. Macondo Ventures’ solution uses camera-based activity tracking to optimize workflow at distribution centers.
Headquarters
Atlanta.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Frank Layo has over 20 years’ experience in various industries and was a Partner Kurt Salmon prior to founding Macondo Ventures.
Market Potential
According to Macondo, US companies lose over $150 billion from their bottom lines every year due to rising operating costs. Employee theft costs US businesses $50 billion annually. The company believes the increased visibility delivered by camera-based activity tracking will help mitigate these rising costs.
Company Outlook/News
The company recently launched a solution dedicated to hospitality businesses.
Meisterdish at a Glance
Founded in 2017, Meisterdish is an SaaS company that enables groceries to create new in-store experiences by offering in-store made-to-order meal kits. According to the company, it is “digitalizing the deli counter” by providing customer experiences such as online ordering and scheduling while using grocers existing deli counters. The solution provides the following: Customer facing tools:- Store finder and digital menus.
- Automatic order scheduling.
- Online ordering and payment.
- Visual work instructions.
- Digital performance monitoring.
- Customer and order management.
- Inventory management and quality control.
Source: Meisterdish[/caption]
What Problem Does Meisterdish Solve?
Grocery retailers want to provide more value-added services to consumers. At the same time, sales of meal kits in grocery stores are increasing, as consumers opt for convenience but with better quality than a premade meal. Meisterdish helps grocers offer customers on-demand meal kits and delivery service using a standardized approach.
Headquarters
New York.
Funding Stage
n/a
Management Team
Cofounder and CEO Hannah de Boer has over 12 years’ experience in lifestyle marketing. Prior to setting up Meisterdish, she was a senior account associate at Firmenich.
Cofounder and Executive Chef Johannes Hennche spent years working in Michelin-starred kitchens.
Market Potential
Coresight Research estimates that the US meal kits market was worth around $2.9 billion in 2018, up from around $2.5 billion in 2017.
Company Outlook
Meisterdish is actively looking for partnerships with grocery retailers. It currently provides over 16 dishes each day and offers more than 200 dishes on a rotating menu.
Oriient at a Glance
Founded in 2016, Oriient uses magnetic fields and smartphone sensors to provide indoor positioning services. With the objective to make the physical world searchable, Oriient provides businesses like retailers, airports, office buildings, megastores, malls and wholesalers with the ability to allow their customers to navigate larger areas and identify items—all with a mobile device. The solution does not require hardware installation: instead of using beacons or Wi-Fi, it is based on Earth’s magnetic field and users’ smartphones. Many malls, for example, already offer visitors free dedicated apps that enable them to do a store or product search. Adding Oriient to that app can provide an indoor positioning service to guide the shoppers directly to the store and the shelf. Its enterprise customers use the GPS technology by integrating into their existing mobile app. The solution helps companies improve service, space utilization, staff performance and operations. [caption id="attachment_98139" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Oriient [/caption]
What Problem Does Oriient Solve?
Retailers want to guide consumers to products and want this to be as straightforward as possible. However, most indoor positioning systems require companies to buy and install additional devices and systems into their stores – and as is the case for most products, low-cost solutions are not as effective as very expensive ones. Oriient’s solution is easy to deploy, does not require additional hardware installation or maintenance.
Headquarters
Tel-Aviv.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
CEO and Cofounder Mickey Balter has over 20 years’ experience using technology to solve business challenges. He cofounded Veloquity Systems and Scientra before setting up Oriient. Balter holds a master’s degree in business administration from Tel-Aviv University.
CTO and Cofounder Amiram Frish worked as an algorithms and architecture leader at Motorola Solutions for seven years before cofounding Oriient.
Market Potential
Stratistics MRC estimates the global indoor location market was worth $3.43 billion in 2015 and is expected to reach $29.4 billion by 2022, growing at a CAGR of 35.9% from 2015 to 2022.
Company Outlook/News
In April 2019, Oriient received $4 million funding from F2 Capital and Innogy Innovation Hub.
Pick ‘n’ Watch at a Glance
Founded in 2017, Pick ‘n’ Watch offers a subscription-based smart-shelf solution that is compact, modular and easy to deploy. The smart shelves use motion sensors to detect consumer interaction with products, then automatically display relevant promotional or informational videos in response. The system doesn’t require a specific shelf fixture or camera to provide a seamless experience. Moreover, the solution also provides real-time analysis on customer activity. Pick 'n' Watch’s solution can boost in-store customer engagement up to 60%, according to the company. [caption id="attachment_98140" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Pick ‘n’ Watch[/caption]
What Problem Does Pick ‘n’ Watch Solve?
Retailers want to educate customers about products, but having enough staff on hand to constantly attend to every customer would be impractical. Pick ‘n’ Watch shows the right product video and promotional deal when customers interact with products and helps brick-and-mortar stores close the innovation gap between offline and online shopping experiences.
Headquarters
San Jose, California.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Erhan Ark has 19 years of technology market experience in product development, sales and business development. He is also the CEO of Federal Smart Solution.
Market Potential
Forrester forecasts digital marketing spend in the US will reach $120 billion by 2021.
Company Outlook
Pick ‘n’ Watch’s is currently working with several notable customers which include Microsoft, Constellation Brands, McKesson and Ace Hardware and will look to expand its reach further to other brands looking to close the gap between the online and offline shopping experience.
Retail Aware at a Glance
Founded in 2018, Retail Aware makes a micro, wireless smart sensor system deployed on retail shelves. The company collects data through its micro sensors. These sensors can be attached to product displays to track how many people walk by (footfall), how long they dwell, engagement (how many times a product is picked up) and more. The solution is cameraless and does not collect any personal identifying information. Retail Aware then applies machine learning to the data to deliver actionable insights which help retail manufacturers and their supply chain operation teams optimize merchandising and increase sales. [caption id="attachment_98141" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Retail Aware[/caption]
What Problem Does Retail Aware Solve?
Retailers want to understand how customers interact with products: who is picking up the product, who visits certain parts of the store, and most importantly, which behaviors point to the consumer converting to a buying customer. Retail Aware says its micro sensor system can estimate consumers’ age, gender, ethnicity and income to provide valuable shopper data to help retailers refine their omnichannel strategies and digitally target shoppers.
Headquarters
Omaha, Nebraska.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Keith Fix has experience in marketing and sales. He founded DailyMav and Blabfeed prior to founding Retail Aware.
Market Potential
According to Global Market Insights, the global retail analytics market is set to grow from $3 billion in 2018 to over $8 billion by 2024.
Company Outlook
In March 2019, Retail Aware received $450,000 in seed funding.
Shopperations at a Glance
Founded in 2014, Shopperations offers a cloud-based service platform helps CPGs and retail marketers to streamline budgeting processes and standardize omnichannel tactical planning. Its solution facilitates more efficient and transparent information sharing and workflows among brands/retailers, sales teams and marketing agencies. Clients range from large companies such as General Mills to startups such as Vital Farms. [caption id="attachment_98142" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Shopperations[/caption]
What Problem Does Shopperations Solve?
Brands and retailers want to manage marketing campaigns and events in a more systemic way. However, when several parties are involved, planning and execution marketing projects can be highly complex and messy. Shopperations helps automate connections with multiple teams, facilitates information sharing and improves workflow.
Headquarters
Cincinnati, Ohio.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Olga Yurovski has more than 15 years’ experience in the consumer packaged goods (CPG) and consumer electronics industries. She was shopper marketing director at Canagra Brands prior to setting up Shopperations. Sharki King-Thomas serves as VP of Operations and Customer Success.
Market Potential
According to Information Resources, online CPG sales in the US totaled $58.6 billion in 2018—some 11% of the total. However, online is only half the story—leading retailers need to engage their customers through multiple channels, and omnichannel marketing introduces a new level of complexity to what is already a complex process. Consumer expectations around omnichannel are continually rising.
Company Outlook
Shopperations’ clients include Heineken, Conagra, Pinnacle and Smithfield. The company also received The Imagining Grant from Ohio's Third Frontier, administered by CincyTech USA.
Shoppermotion at a Glance
Founded in 2013, Shoppermotion provides proprietary indoor mapping technology that tracks shopper location and in-store path. The company attaches small sensors to shopping carts and baskets, invisible to shoppers, that transmit signals to Bluetooth sensors in the ceiling. It then leverages a proprietary indoor geo-positioning algorithm, big data processing and machine learning analysis to model consumer behavior patterns. This information can help retailers to identify opportunities to improve customer flow through stores as well as determine optimal locations for in-store ads and activations. [caption id="attachment_98143" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Shoppermotion [/caption]
What Problem Does Shoppermotion Solve?
The in-store flow of information can improve decisions on product placement as managers can see correlations between different areas, blind spots and popular areas. This can also help ensure staff is deployed to the best locations. Shoppermotion helps retailers track consumers’ complete shopping journey anonymously and transforms the data into actionable insights.
Headquarters
San Francisco, California.
Funding Stage
Venture.
Management Team
Cofounder and CEO Jorge Bueno cofounded BeMee Technology and ShOOSoft prior to setting up Shoppermotion. He has a PhD in robotics lab, 3D model recognition and artificial intelligence.
Cofounder and CSO Alejandro Martín Clemente cofounded BeMee Technology after obtaining his PhD in robotics and control engineering.
Cofounder and CTO Marco Doncel Gabaldón cofounded LiveClubs and Startapps prior to Shoppermotion.
Market potential
According to IDC, global big data and business analytics will grow from $130.1 billion in 2016 to over $203 billion in 2020, at a compound annual growth rate of 11.7%.
Company Outlook
According to Shoppermotion’s CEO, its solution is “changing the way in-store offline marketing is done, the way online marketing did when Google Analytics for websites appeared back in 2005.”
Simplista at a Glance
Founded in 2016, Simplista is a cloud-based item-onboarding platform that leverages real-time data exchange between retailers and suppliers. It offers automated ingestion and attribute enrichment that cuts down listing time from weeks or months to a matter of days. Simplista’s solution provides increased efficiency, which generates incremental annual revenue, increases profit margins and translates into cost savings for retailers and their brand partners. [caption id="attachment_98144" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Simplista[/caption]
What Problem Does Simplista Solve?
Retailers are losing tens of millions of dollars annually in missed market opportunities because it can take four to eight weeks to get each item onboarded (the process of listing a new item so that it is available for sale). Antiquated processes, especially in the digital space, can inhibit product assortment growth, extended product attribution and omnichannel scalability. Retailers are also experiencing supply chain bottlenecks due to incorrect data/item attribution errors. Simplista’s solution looks to minimize the pain points of this process for retailers and increase onboarding efficiency.
Headquarters
Toronto.
Funding Stage
Bootstrapped.
Management Team
Evan Silver is the founder and CEO of Simplista. Originally from South Africa, his career began in Canada as a computer science graduate who was recruited into Oracle as a consultant. Silver then founded a consulting firm, helping Fortune 100 clients drive operational effectiveness through advanced analytics and business process automation. Silver has worked with Canadian retail giant Loblaw, major telecommunications companies (Rogers, TELUS, Bell) and financial services firms (CIBC and BMO). He has over 20 years of technology delivery experience. He developed Simplista to fix a fundamental flaw in every retailer’s supply chain, and grow revenue and profit for retailers and their suppliers.
Market Potential
According to research from Mordor Intelligence, the business process management market was valued at $3.18 billion in 2018 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 6.26% until 2024, to $4.5 billion.
Company Outlook
Simplista is targeting its solution at large and medium US and Canadian retailers. The company plans to go into Series A funding and enter the US market in 2019.
SuperUp at a Glance
Founded in 2015, SuperUp provides e-commerce marketing solutions focused on mobile shopping to enable grocers, beauty, fashion and mass retailers that have discovery and advertising tools to better engage consumers, capture data and monetize traffic. Powered by AI, voice and shoppable content technologies, the company’s platform offers an omnichannel shopping experience with real-time personalized recommendations. SuperUp’s big data solution can be deployed on-premise or in any cloud with little disruption to existing infrastructure. SuperUp’s platform also provides real-time targeting capabilities to leverage retailers’ mobile traffic via search and personalized product suggestions. [caption id="attachment_98145" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: SuperUp[/caption]
What Problem Does SuperUp Solve?
Retailers want to provide a seamless omnichannel experience and deliver a cohesive experience for shoppers at every touchpoint. Retailers also need to know what consumers are looking for and shopping preferences to recommend products: SuperUp helps brands and retailers build apps that combine personalized shopping, video content and marketing.
Headquarters
Tel Aviv.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Cofounder and CEO Roy Ittah was head of production at Amdocs, a software and services provider to communications and media companies, for 11 years.
Cofounder and CSO Adam Ittah comes from a sales and strategy background. Prior to founding SuperUp, he worked at Caliber Associates in New York.
Market Potential
Online shopping is driving retail growth and online sales are growing exponentially, but most actual purchases still take place in the store – and this is especially true of fast-moving consumer goods (FMCGs). According to Nielsen, online and offline FMCG sales totaled more than $1.01 trillion at the end of August 2018, up 2.6% year over year. Although online accounted for 5% of total omnichannel sales, it drove 40% of sales growth, according to Nielsen.
Company Outlook
In November 2018, SuperUp received $15 million in seed funding. The company is helping blue-chip retailers such A.S Watsons to improve customer conversion and basket size. It recently launched with Natura, one of the world’s largest cosmetics manufactories.
Tastry at a Glance
Founded in 2016, Tastry is an automated, machine learning-based platform for wine sellers. The company’s solution analyses the chemistry of wine, then use AI and machine learning to identify and define consumer’s preference for alcoholic beverages. It recommends personalized and sensory-based beer, wine and spirits selections and pairings to consumers. The technology serves manufacturers, retailers and consumers by providing science-based guidance for product development, demand forecasting and direct-to-consumer recommendations. [caption id="attachment_98146" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Tastry[/caption]
What Problem Does Tastry Solve?
While the typical wine aisle offers hundreds, and sometimes thousands, of choices, the average consumer lacks the experience to choose a bottle of wine that matches his or her palate preference. Retailers have traditionally assisted shoppers by providing expert ratings and descriptions of wines. More modern attempts involve using software-based recommendation engines. However, these sometimes fail to provide accurate matches because they cannot always account for shoppers’ individual taste preferences.
Retailers want to customers to pick a wine they will enjoy in order to improve the chance of repeat purchase and therefore support future sales, and the pairing feature also cross-promotes food items. Tastry’s solution combines analytical chemistry, flavor preferences and machine learning to track consumer preferences and provide more accurate recommendations. Suggestions are filterable by price, wine type, food pairing and other criteria. Tastry’s solution further enhances the shopper experience through food and recipe pairings and retailer-optional coupons.
Headquarters
San Luis Obispo, California.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Founder and CEO Katerina Axelsson is a graduate of California Polytechnic State University with a degree in chemistry. She noticed that a single batch of wine, sent to two different labels, received drastically different industry scores. It was then that she knew there had to be a more objective way to buy wine for the individual. Axelsson saw an opportunity to create an objective scoring system powered by AI but using chemistry to better understand consumer preferences.
Market Potential
The wine market is typically divided into distribution channels that include supermarkets and hypermarkets, specialty stores, convenience stores and e-commerce. According to Zion Market Research, the global wine market was valued at approximately $302.02 billion in 2017 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of around 5.8% to 2023, to reach approximately $423.59 billion. Supermarkets and hypermarkets are expected to dominate the global wine market in the near term.
Company Outlook
Tastry plans to launch an automated food pairing solution which not only pairs wines with types of foods but even specific recipes – and to food inventory in the store. The new solution can even filter for dietary preferences and restrictions. In October 2018, Tastry announced a strategic partnership with Aila Technologies, a leading enterprise retail technology platform, to work on in-aisle touchpoints.
Tiliter Technology at a Glance
Founded in 2017, Tiliter Technology uses AI and computer vision to provide an object identification tool for fresh produce at retail checkouts (point-of-sale and self-checkout). The solutions use plugin cameras to recognize fruits and vegetables so cashiers and shoppers using self-checkout do not need to manually input price look-up numbers from a long menu of fruits and vegetables. The solution can speed the checkout process, prevent theft and could reduce plastic waste by reducing need to use separate plastic bags for fruits and vegetable. The plugin camera can be applied to existing point-of-sale and self-checkout systems. Tiliter specifically designed its hardware to identify products locally, meaning no internet connection is required. The information is then fed to either a standalone interface or the point-of-sale interface. [caption id="attachment_98147" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Source: Tiliter Technology [/caption]
What Problem Does Tiliter Technology Solve?
The company believes its solution addresses problems such as long lines (by speeding the checkout process by cutting the number of items that need manual product entry), self-checkout frustration and plastic pollution.
Research by environmental consultancy Euonomia estimates that top supermarkets in Europe are creating a plastic waste problem in excess of 800,000 tonnes per year. Because Tiliter’s solution can identify fresh produce such as red apples and avocadoes with automatic detection, it may reduce the use of many plastic bags for fruits and vegetables.
Retailers have thousands of vendors from which to choose when selecting a barcode scanning system, many of which are not plug-and-play solutions and may require substantial time and effort to integrate into current business processes. Tiliter’s solution can be included in existing systems and upgraded easily.
Headquarters
Sydney.
Funding Stage
Seed.
Management Team
Cofounder and CEO Marcel Herz has a background in mechanical, bio-medical and design engineering.
Cofounder and CTO Christopher Sampson was test systems engineer at Cochlear prior to cofounding Tiliter Technology. He has a master’s degree in engineering science, systems and control from the University of New South Wales in Australia.
Cofounder and CTO Martin Karafilis cofounded Karra’s Lures, an environmentally friendly fishing lure company. He has a background in business, human resource management and marketing.
Market Potential
According to Global Market Insights, the global self-checkout system market is set to exceed $4 billion by 2024.
Company Outlook
In August 2019, Tiliter received its first orders and is currently working in partnerships with several start-up programs, including the Autodesk Entrepreneur Impact Group and Microsoft for Startups Program. The company is actively expanding its team and focussing on US and Europe launches. Tiliter may expand its offering into a business-to-business, business-to-consumer platform so that anyone in any industry can use the software to build their own recognition solution. This means that it can be integrated into existing computer systems or used as a standalone software.
See our previous coverage of Groceryshop 2019 here:
Groceryshop 2019: Day 1 Insights – Emerging Technology Spotlight
Groceryshop 2019: Day 2 Insights – Artificial Intelligence, Personalization and Growth Channels
Groceryshop 2019: Day 3 Insights – Algorithms and Data Steal the Show
Groceryshop 2019: Day 4 Insights – CBD Continues to Grow
Insights from Groceryshop 2019