EVENTS


UPCOMING EVENTS


Retail Fraud – Dublin Conference 17 July 2014 The Shelbourne, Dublin dublin.retail-knowledge.com


Online Retail Conference - Case Futures 16 September 2014 Royal Garden Hotel, Kensington, London orevents.com/orc-casefutures


Smart Insights: Digital Impact 2014 17 September 2014 Cavendish Conference Centre, London smartinsights.com/digital-impact-2014


World Retail Congress 29 September - 1 October 2014 cnit, La Défense, Paris worldretailcongress.com


Customer Contact Expo 1-2 October 2014 National Hall Olympia, London live.callcentre.co.uk/expo


eCommerce Expo 2014 1-2 October 2014 West Hall Olympia, London ecommerceexpo.co.uk


IP EXPO 8-9 October 2014 ExCeL, London ipexpo.co.uk/


Payments Conference 6 November 2014 IoD Hub, London fstech.co.uk/payments


National Retail Federation 2015 11-13 January 2015 Jacob K. Javits Convention Centre, New York bigshow15.nrf.com


EuroCIS 2015 24-26 February 2015 Messe Düsseldorf, Germany eurocis-tradefair.com


Technology for Marketing & Advertising 2015 25-26 February 2015 National Hall Olympia, London t-f-m.co.uk


Retail Business Technology Expo 10-11 March 2015 Olympia Grand Hall, London retailbusinesstechnologyexpo.com


held across Europe at the beginning of each year,Retail T


which trends identified back then are becoming a retail reality now. EuroShop, which takes place every


four years in Düsseldorf, Germany played host to over 100,00 visitors this February. It was also home to EuroCIS, the retail IT trade event held at the same venue every year.


While Retail T echnology covered


some of the key EuroCIS 2014 trends online at the time, David Concordel, senior vice president and head of the retail business group at Fujitsu, hinted at technology developments to help boost the management of retail infrastructures and hardware that built on the emerging concept of an ‘Internet of Things’ (IoT). “It’s about providing not just the


right software and hardware, but also services that can target the most common operational errors and identify incidents before they lead to having to close a checkout lane completely,” he said. “Remote management and self healing will be key here, as will building sensor inside the machines themselves that can reboot a cash dispenser remotely and so lower the total cost of ownership, for instance.” Fast forward a few months and


The Kroger Co., a US general retailer known for its investment in in-house IT development, announced the results of work with IT partner Wincor Nixdorf and engineering company eInfochips to integrate long battery life sensors, handheld and point-of-sale (PoS) devices and video management software into a next-generation retail applications platform for loss prevention, store automation and analytics using ZigBee wireless mesh networks. Run on a new enterprise IT


architecture called Retail Site Intelligence (RSI), new wireless devices (cameras,


08 Spring/Summer 2014


STAYING AHEAD OF A


lmost six months on from the round of industry technology trade shows


echnology rounds up


scanners and scales, with more to come) featuring ZigBee wireless technology, and Vigil360, a new video management software kernel designed specifically for RSI, are perhaps one of the first steps towards an IoT-enabled store environment. “We are leveraging technology to help customers have the best possible shopping experience in retail stores, whether by more easily finding the products they want or saving time at checkout,” stated Chris Hjelm, Kroger senior vice president and chief information officer. “We expect Retail Site Intelligence to be the cornerstone of the technology infrastructure for Kroger stores in the future.” More connected store systems may be


an emerging trend, but another growing in terms of retail adoption is the IT enabling item-level tracking and visibility, like radio frequency identification (RFID). Bill Toney, Avery Dennison global head of RFID market development was at EuroShop to highlight how work, with the likes of Marks & Spencer (M&S), to tag products and facilitate more efficient supply chain and distribution management was also gaining traction among retailers with stores (Accurate inventory tracking benefits M&S, RetailTechnology.co.uk, 18 February 2014). “Once an item gets to the store, there’s lots of SKU [stock-keeping unit] level distortion,” he said. “When a retailer may only be able


to carry out a full stock count once a year, this makes inventory visibility even more distorted. But source tagging means they can read 1,000s of products in a hour, compared to scanning a few barcode tags every minute.” One such retailer embracing the benefits of greater item-level stock visibility is Asda, which announced earlier this year that it was working with Tyco Retail Solutions on an RFID inventory visibility and accuracy store project for its George apparel business (Asda reveals item-level RFID


www.retailtechnology.co.uk


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