Israel latest to automate stores

Startup joins supermarkets to offer cashier-free checkout

Amazon.com set off a global race to automate grocery shopping. The latest entrant comes from a nation not known for state-of-the-art retail experiences: Israel.

Shufersal, Israel’s largest supermarket chain, is partnering with local startup Trigo Vision to eliminate the need for cashiers in its 272 stores, the companies said in a statement last week. Trigo’s platform uses a feed from ceiling cameras to identify items in a customer’s shopping cart, which are tallied to produce the bill.

It’s surprising Israel would be among the first countries to say farewell to the supermarket checkout line, as its startups traditionally pay little attention to the domestic market. Israeli tech entrepreneurs generally aim for clients in bigger markets, and many consumer-facing industries here lag behind technologies used in other developed economies.

“In providing pure commerce technology, I’m not sure Israel has a lot to offer,” said Danny Peled, managing partner at Israeli venture capital firm KDC Media Fund. “The local industry is not really developed, and you need a size and a magnitude to create the kinds of products that are world-beaters.”

Shufersal is trying to make supermarket shopping one of the few exceptions. According to the company, online sales account for 14 percent of its roughly $3.3 billion of annual revenue, which it says is one of the highest levels for major chains worldwide. E-commerce will account for about 2.5 percent of the $1 trillion U.S. food and beverage market this year, according to Coresight Research.

Technology plays “a big role” in customer satisfaction, Shufersal Chief Executive Officer Itzik Abercohen said in the statement. Working with Trigo “will also drive efficiency and minimize costs across our operation.”

The company didn’t specify how many jobs it would cut as a result of the new partnership.

Trigo says its technology has a 99.5 percent accuracy rate. Founded in 2016, the startup offers grocers two models: One replicates the AmazonGo experience, where customers self identify with their smartphones and leave with their items, and the chain bills their credit cards. The other allows anyone to enter the store, grab their goods and check out at giant screens that have already catalogued the contents of their shopping carts.

Trigo, which has raised $7 million from investors, is working with two other “large international supermarket chains” and plans to add more clients by the end of the year, CEO Michael Gabay said. The cost — between $20,000 and $30,000 per store — is significantly lower than what Morgan Stanley estimates Amazon will spend on each cashierless shop, as much as $1 million.

“Every supermarket that adopts this technology will have a leg up on the competition,” Gabay said in an interview at the company’s Tel Aviv office, where the firm tests it technology in a mock supermarket.

“If you’re in the neighborhood and there’s two supermarkets — one with a line and the other not — which one are you going to go to?”

About 80 percent of the checkout process is spent waiting in line and then watching cashiers scan products, according to Ilan Leiferman, the founder of retail innovation advisory firm The Shelf.

“The problem for retailers is immense here,” Leiferman said. “New artificial intelligence techniques are helping retailers not only close the gap between offline and online shopping, but they’re also changing the thinking about the role of stores as ways to collect and analyze data that can improve the customer experience and operational efficiency.”

AmazonGo first opened in Seattle in 2016 and the company plans to open 3,000 more stores by 2021, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg in September. Competitors aren’t standing pat: Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is experimenting with similar technology in China, and rival enterprises have begun sprouting in Japan.

Global retailers are increasingly coming to Israel, Leiferman added, with companies such as Nike Inc., Alibaba and India’s Flipkart Online Services buying local startups in the past year.

“Amazon sets the benchmark for the industry,” said Peled, whose fund also invested in Syte.ai, an Israeli startup that uses machine-learning technology to help consumers search more effectively for items. “Now everyone is running like crazy to match it or beat it.”