Retail in Asia

In Trends

Intelligent systems: the cure for Big Data overload in retail

How fast is technology changing in the retail industry? A year ago the shop assistants were using clunky cash registers, now they can roam the stores with mobile handheld devices so customers can avoid the checkout queues and pay on the spot. A year ago, when you were buying drinks from a "smart" vending machine, it would be able to suggest flavor to you. Now the vender is not only able to suggest drinks but also display videos and even interact with you in the video.

What’s the technology behind the change? It’s called, embedded technology. With the technology powered retail device, retailers have the opportunity to capture, analyse and act on data throughout their organisations with intelligent systems. The valuable data makes it possible for retailers to forecast sales more accurately, develop dynamic pricing models and better understand customers.

John Boladian, Business Group lead for Windows Embedded in Asia-Pacific, Greater China and Japan, told Retail in Asia about the use of their new platform – Windows 8-powered Embedded Systems in the retail industry and how to harness the power of Big Data to generate growth and create a better shopping experience for customers.

RIA: You released Windows 7 for Embedded Systems last year and now it’s Windows 8. What are the differences? What are the new features about Windows 8-powered Embedded Systems?

John Boladian (JB): After we released Windows 7 for Embedded Systems last year, we started thinking about how to bring Windows 8 technologies to specialised devices in retail, healthcare and manufacturing industries and provide the technology’s platform, security, manageability and application framework to our OEM customers in a way they can build devices that are purpose-built for these industries. So this year, we have released Windows 8 for different kinds of general-purpose platforms such as tablets, laptops and desktops.

The primary new features about this new platform are the modern application and enhanced touch screen interface. Normal Windows applications have a menu, with little boxes to open and close. However, the old feature is gone in the new platform as Windows 8 has been built primarily as a touch interface. If you launch an application in full screen now, it goes border to border. Once this is used in the retail industry, say a kiosk, it’s easier to work with.

RIA: How will Windows 8-powered Embedded Systems benefit retailers?

JB: First of all, it’s easy to manage. The old generation retail systems are quite complicated and retailers have to spend a lot of time to train their new hires.

However, with the new platform, retailers can train the staff faster. Because today in everyday life we are using touch screens – on our smart phones and tablets. If retailers can adopt the same type of interface in their stores, it’s easy for staff to learn as they are already used to the feature.

Secondly, Windows 8-powered Embedded Systems are more secure. The nice thing about Windows 8 for consumers is we can install new applications. However, in a retail environment, that’s the last thing you want your staff to do when they are only supposed to be processing transactions. So, we restrict the way the retail device is used and make sure it is only used for certain types of function.

Thirdly, it’s easier to solve the issue whenever a device stops working. Downtime costs money for retailers. If you have 10 lanes in the store and 2 of them are not working because your barcode scanner is not functioning, that’s not a good situation to be in as that loses income.

Previously you would have to shut down the whole lane and call a service technician then wait for the technician to diagnose the issue. However, with the new Windows 8-powered Embedded Systems, you don’t have to do so.

We put technology in the product that enables you to solve the problem by yourself. If a scanner doesn’t work all of a sudden, you can unplug it and take a spare one out from underneath. Click a button, ask for help and keep processing transactions. There’s no downtime.

What’s more, we make it easy for our OEM customers to configure the devices and provide more flexibility to retailers.

RIA: What challenges are retailers facing today? How to cope with the challenges brought with new technology?

JB: Retailers today are facing critical challenges on many fronts and one of the biggest challenges is how to increase the share of wallet with current customers. How do you sell more to existing customers? How do you attract them online and bring them into a store where you can have a more meaningful dialogue with them, understand their buying patterns and potentially sell more.

The "omni-channel" is one of the key trends for the retail industry this year. When people shop online, what they care about more is – what do I need? But if you can bring the customers into the store, analyse their buying patterns and recommend products to them, it creates a great up-sell opportunity.

The embedded technology can gather as much information as possible, analyse the data and present relevant products and services. For example, if the customers buys product A and you know they are 80 percent likely to buy product B when they come to store, you can build a promotion that says "Buy A and get B at 10 percent discount". Potentially, that will drive more revenue by enticing customers to purchase more.

Another big challenge for retailers is how to harness the power of Big Data and create highly personalised customer experiences to uplift revenue and loyalty.

Loyalty cards enable retailers to track customer data and use the data to build strong, lasting relationships. If you have the records of a customer’s buying pattern in the store from POS terminals when they use loyalty cards, you will be able to extend an offer online that drives them into the store.

There are millions and millions of transactions a day, sometimes retailers don’t know what to do with so much information. So what we do is to build intelligence into all the different devices and drive business intelligence. As a retailer, once you get all of the information, you will be able to make decision on what you want to change.

We are trying to empower our retail customers with technologies from our partners that will help them make decisions to drive additional revenue.

RIA: Can you give an example about how intelligent systems drive business intelligence and decision making for retailers?

JB: If you manage a convenience store with limited retail space, you need to get the right amount of products to the store so that it will never run out of stock but there shouldn’t be too much to overcrowd the shelves. Now you have a certain number of trucks delivering goods to the store which raises the question: how do you make sure you have exactly the right amount of goods in the delivery vehicle to satisfy all of the stock of each store without overstocking them and show the truck driver what is the best route to take from store to store?

You can get the information from different feeds that you can put into your intelligent system. Some of the feeds come from the sales data, some come from social feeds or weather reports.

If the weather looks rainy, you’d better deliver umbrellas. If it rains but you didn’t deliver umbrellas, then you will miss your opportunity.

This is the competitive advantage many retailers are employing today. They may not be talking about it, but this is how they increase profitability. What we are working on is to take all the Big Data and consolidate that into one screen or three screens so that retailers can look at the report every morning for half an hour to figure out how their business is doing or how to improve sales.

 

John Boladian is the business group lead for Windows Embedded in Asia Pacific, Greater China and Japan. He is responsible for regional partner engagement and communications representing all Windows Embedded platforms.

Taking Stock is Retail in Asia’s fortnightly column dedicated to showcasing opinions from experts in the retail industry.