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The retail sector is experiencing dramatic changes under pressure from on-line commerce. New technologies can be leveraged to complement on-site experience with the online features shoppers have become accustomed to. 

Bridging the electronic / physical commerve divide is the main driver for the High Impact Initiative (HII) in Smart Retail carried out by EIT Digital. 

This HII will bring to retailers the tools to create a seamless shopping experience for their customers whether in-store or online. Its innovations in cloud based services, in-store analytics and customer interfacing are packed into a Digital Retail Suite for shopping centres, showrooms and pop-up stores.

The HII is working to deliver a product called Digital Retail Suite (DRS) that includes tools and applications to / for: 

  • A modular platform for the most pressing retailer needs
  • Assist retailers in understanding consumer behavior in-store
  • Assist retailers in tailoring digital messages right: content, place and moment)
  • Enhance customer experience in order to increase sales and conversion rates Enable interaction between customers and physical sales assitants 
  • Allow physical stores to remain competitive compared to purely online retailers
  • Allow the transfer of personalized information from smartphones to large screens

The Smart Retail DRS will allow retailers to run their operations from the cloud services which will increase the loyalty and engagement of consumers both online and in-store. 

The DRS will support retailers to increase on-line conversion rates by 10 %. Thus, the HII team believes that the short term impact of the activity can be measured from the business perspective via the application of the ROI index, whilst the long term goals can be measured from the societal perspective by applying the Social ROI index. 

The Smart Retail HII guarantees continuous innovations throughout the whole retail value chain until 2017. Beyond that date, innovation will be fostered by off-spring companies that are incubated in the activity. 

EIT Digital partners in HII Smart RetailAalto, British Telecom, CNR, DFKI, Deutsche Telekom, Engineering, FBK, Forum Virum Helsinki, Nokia Technologies, Philips, Politecnico di Milano, Reply, TU Berlin, Telecom Italia,  Trento Rise, University of Helsinki, VTT and several SME’s. 

Read more in the article of EIT Digital Activity Leader  HII Smart Retail, Sandro Battisti, Media Duemille, special edition Expo 2015: 

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