What’s the Story?

This report forms part of our Innovator Profile series, which focuses on emerging technologies that are disrupting traditional retail and fueling innovation across the retail value chain. Coresight Research collaborated with each covered company to offer insights into their business models and offerings. In this report, we profile Nexite, provider of the Connected Merchandise Platform that enables retailers to track the customer journey, boost revenues based on real-time insights and optimize the retail experience.

Why It Matters

Nexite aims to provide solutions for the apparel retail market, which will account for more than $1.7 trillion in sales globally in 2021, according to Statista market forecasts. With the majority of apparel sales still expected to be made in stores despite the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, retailers must look to get the same sort of detailed visibility into the offline customer journey as they do into the online one. Nexite aims to provide connected data to retailers about their omnichannel businesses, enabling them to optimize customer experiences based on real-time, actionable insights.

Nexite: In Detail

What Problem Is the Company Solving? In a landscape defined by omnichannel shopping, many retailers still struggle to integrate and manage their inventory across channels. Nexite focuses on helping retailers better manage their inventory and customer experience in two key areas: 1. Contactless, frictionless experiences Consumers now shop across a variety of offline and online channels, making it increasingly important for retailers to provide seamless shopping experiences to consumers wherever they are. Nexite’s solutions ensure consumers have full transparency on what is available in each store and even the shelf locations of desired items. Consumers shopping at retailers that utilize Nexite’s solutions can then complete any transaction by themselves with no friction—and with minimal risk of theft for the retailer. 2. Visibility into the customer journey Nexite can provide in-store data to retailers with the level of detail that they can collect online. Whereas many stores still struggle to understand the offline consumer journey, retailers that use Nexite are better equipped to understand which of their products generate the most engagement and have the highest conversion rates. Furthermore, Nexite can help retailers better arrange their stores using data rather than instinct by indicating which locations in the store tend to see the highest sales. Nexite leverages this data to provide actionable real-time insights that can alert retailers to changes they need to implement based on their specific customers and merchandise. [caption id="attachment_123140" align="aligncenter" width="725"] Source: Nexite[/caption]   How the Covid-19 Pandemic Has Impacted Business Nexite believes that its business is poised to capitalize on the shift toward online shopping during the Covid-19 pandemic, which has accelerated the growth of omnichannel shopping habits. Since retailers now need to sell their goods via different platforms, it has become increasingly important for them to have real-time data connectivity. To accelerate the omnichannel revolution, Nexite is focused on contactless features and real-time data insights, to enable retailers to eliminate friction for their customers and make the most of every visit, online or offline. Competitive Advantages Nexite’s Connected Merchandise Platform automatically collects real-time data from every product in stores through fixed readers and processes the collected data in the cloud. In addition to providing insights into the customer journey, the data enables digital solutions that reduce transactional friction—by enabling self-checkout options and helping consumers access real-time information on stock availability. Nexite’s NanoBT technology, a battery-free Bluetooth low-energy tag, can automatically transmit Bluetooth signals at long range, with no internal power source, for a relatively low price. The tag also has an anti-theft mechanism, providing security and replacing existing security buzzers. The company believes this solution to be more useful and cost effective than RFID or Bluetooth tags—RFID tags must be read manually, making it more difficult for retailers to get real-time data, while Bluetooth tags require a battery and are more costly. Upcoming Developments Nexite is focused on scaling its existing business in 2021. Beyond this year, the company is also working to develop smart closets for consumers in the home, which can be scanned with their phone using the same tags and technology as Nexite uses with its retail partners. Looking further into the future, Nexite believes its solution could pair well with the Amazon Alexa and Google voice assistants, as the technology could leverage smart closet data alongside personalized calendars, weather forecasts and more to advise consumers on what to wear. The solution could also help give consumers recommendations for new products to purchase or provide resale options of clothes that they have worn infrequently. Nexite’s goal is to become an end-to-end solution that enables connected retail all the way from the factory floor to the closets of consumers.

What We Think

Many retailers already leverage detailed, automatically updated, real-time data on their online businesses. Fewer have been able to effectively replicate this 360-degree view of inventory and the customer journey on items sold in-store. Nexite’s ability to collect in-store data in real time should prove valuable to helping retailers manage their omnichannel business effectively. Perhaps most exciting about Nexite’s solution is its potential future application: the ability to create in-home smart closets that can recommend outfits, new purchases and resale options. Consumers increasingly value personalization, making a solution that not only maintains contact with the consumer post-purchase but also provides them with useful personal recommendations potentially of great value.