Retail technology startup AssetFloow secures €1.5 million investment from GED Ventures
AssetFloow has closed a €1.5 million investment round.
The startup has developed artificial intelligence technology capable of describing consumer behaviour inside a store without the need for cameras or sensors.
With the aforementioned investment from GED Ventures, it aims to triple its R&D team in Portugal, accelerate expansion in Europe and South America, and consolidate its position in the behavioural analytics market.
This is its first equity round (in 2021, it received a €100K SAFE note).
AssetFloow, founded in 2021 by Katya Ivanova and Ricardo Santos, combines AI with behavioural analysis, directly from anonymous retailer sales data.
Its platform generates the paths used by consumers in stores and their interactions with products, allowing an understanding of purchase patterns and behaviours.
AssetFloow provides a tool to create a digital twin of a store, providing information such as heatmaps, paths most used by different consumer segments, suggestions of where to place products/categories to increase sales, promotional campaign strategies, sales anomalies, new products to add to the store etc.
The firm currently operates in Europe (Portugal, Spain, UK, Italy) and Brazil.
Ikea claims an industry first as it says it is now using 100 drones for stock inventory
One hundred autonomous drones are now operational in Ikea stores – the latest in Ikea Zaventem, Belgium – with owner Ingka Group saying it is the first retailer to use such a solution for stock inventory.
Two years ago, Ingka Group and the Supply Chain Development Team at Inter Ikea Group, together with Verity, a provider of indoor drone systems, started developing a fully autonomous drone solution.
As a result, 100 drones are now at work during non-operational hours, with the aim of improving stock accuracy and securing availability of products for online or physical retailing. This means that co-workers no longer need to manually confirm each pallet.
“We are investing in technology across the board so that our stores can better support customer fulfilment and become true centres for omnichannel retailing,” says Tolga Öncu, Head of Retail at Ingka Group.
“Introducing drones and other advanced tools – such as, for example, robots for picking up goods – is a genuine win-win for everybody. It improves our co-workers’ wellbeing, lowers operational costs, and allows us to become more affordable and convenient for our customers.”
Retail technology startup stories interview: Adib Zaher, CEO and Co-founder at Vree AI
RTIH gets the lowdown on VRee AI, a startup working in the areas of computer vision and AI, allowing users to generate 3D models from 2D images, with links integrated for virtual try on capabilities.
Ethnic grocery delivery startup Oja bags footballer Raheem Sterling as angel investor
Oja, pitched as the UK’s first ethnic digital supermarket focused on African and Caribbean goods, has raised a pre-seed extension led by LocalGlobe, with participation from Premier League and England football player Raheem Sterling.
Founded in 2020, Oja, which is Yoruba, a Nigerian language, for market, ships orders from its own warehouses and dark stores to homes across London, and has also recently launched its service in Birmingham.
The funding will be used to further its expansion into new cultures and regions, as well as its B2B offering.
In addition to becoming an angel investor, Sterling will be the firm’s first brand ambassador.
