Concept: American startup Veeve has introduced an AI-powered smart cart, the Veeve smart cart that aims to offer customers a frictionless and contactless in-store shopping experience. This shopping cart includes a touchscreen display, cameras, and scale for capturing the item weight and calculating the price automatically. This can enable customers to scan items while shopping, get personalized recommendations and pay for their purchase easily.
Nature of Disruption: Shoppers can check-in by entering their phone number, place their bags in the cart, and add the required items to the cart. At checkout, they can either tap to pay or insert a card without visiting a kiosk. For instant recognition, the startup leverages computer vision algorithms to extract visual features. While shopping, customers can search for, locate, and compare products. To improve basket size, the system offers real-time recommendations depending on cart content or location. Customers can also ask for help with a single tap. Its embedded GPS chip can help track cart location in real-time. Moreover, it can assist store staff by sending grocery lists to the Veeve cart, allowing them to select and assemble orders for curbside pickup or delivery.
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Outlook: Smart carts can speed up the shopping process for customers while also providing vital business intelligence to retailers, which are being scrutinized by supermarkets. Veeve smart cart aims to enhance the in-store experiences and merge online and offline experiences. Large traditional grocery stores, such as Albertsons and Kroger have collaborated with the startup to adapt and modify how people shop goods. Albertsons is testing Veeve smart carts at an Albertsons store in Eagle, Idaho, and a Safeway store in Pleasanton, California. Also, it is testing carts with Kroger in multiple Midwestern markets. Additionally, it is recording the whole shopping process from four different cameras aimed to build a 3D model of every product in the store to eliminate the barcode scanning process. Veeve has raised $2.1M in a seed funding round in October 2019.
This article was originally published in Verdict.co.uk
