Whether it is opening the drink and taking two sips and putting it back in its original place, or leaving the store empty-handed after " eliminating " the ice cream in the store, or taking the high-priced drinks on the low-priced shelf out of the store, and throwing the bread out of the gate, The results were billed correctly.

On May 17 , the intelligent robot at the site of Shanghai Information Consumption Yunfenghui

In 2019 , comedians Shen Teng and Jia Ling staged a helpless " fancy bad debt " .

The two downloaded the Suning Store App on the spot and bound it to Suning Finance, scanned their membership codes to enter the store, but found that there were no staff and no cash register equipment in the store. " This is fine ! Then if I hide things on my body and take them out, or if I take them out after eating, can I be found ?" Shen Teng and Jia Ling began to launch a big challenge of " buy things without spending money " to the smart unmanned store.

As a result, whether it is opening the drink and taking two sips and putting it back in its original place, or leaving the store empty-handed after " eliminating " the ice cream in the store, or taking the high-priced drinks on the low-priced shelf out of the store, and throwing the bread out of the gate machine, the results are correctly settled and deducted.

Observing this sample, it is not difficult to find that in the all-scenario smart retail system, digital " black technology " is everywhere to empower production and supply chains.

Unmanned shop, can't rely on it

It is reported that the products in Suning Smart Unmanned Store do not have the RFID tags ( electronic tags ) on the products in conventional unmanned stores , and there is nothing special in appearance.

The " black technology " is hidden in the camera on the top and the rows of shelves: the " visual recognition + weight sensing " system can be used to accurately obtain product information, and the products that consumers take off from the shelves are automatically added to the virtual shopping cart. It is automatically cleared, very accurate and fast.

Millisecond-level payment settlement allows consumers to take it away. According to statistics, the average shopping time will save 45 seconds, and the fastest time to buy a bottle of mineral water is 1 second, and 24- hour shopping can be realized. For managers, compared with ordinary stores, the overall operation and management efficiency of smart unmanned stores can be increased by more than 70% .

" The first-generation unmanned store uses RFID tags to physically record the process of goods entering and exiting the gates by scanning the tags. In 2019 , Suning's fourth-generation unmanned store will be put into operation. It is a concentrated presentation of digital technology and It is not limited to unmanned store application scenarios. " Jing Wei, executive vice president of Suning Technology Group, told "Oriental Outlook Weekly".

Store digital technology does have the ability to help unmanned store scenarios reach more levels of consumers. For example, the private category model can meet the needs of consumers who do not want to be disturbed while shopping - but this is not the most important. The key point is that the capabilities demonstrated by each module of the fourth-generation unmanned store can bring real value to the retail industry.

When consumers shop online, big data can fully record consumers' preferences. In the past, offline, due to weak digital capabilities, consumption behavior can only be presented through consumption results.

Jing Wei believes that it is precisely offline that people's behavior is more abundant. To really serve consumers well, it is necessary to be able to accurately describe offline and online holographic user portraits, so as to achieve true digital retailing.

Suning fully digital visual unmanned store

" Demand crowdfunding " to meet special needs

How to better identify consumer needs and respond to such needs is the most important logic for retail companies when selecting products, and it is also an important starting point for discovering and cultivating new types of consumption.

Customer-to-manufacturing (C2M) has become an optimized solution to satisfy this logic. Take Suning Xiaobiu water purifier as an example, its " origin " is inseparable from digital empowerment.

Since 2018 , cities across the country have implemented garbage sorting, and many families have to install not only water purifiers, but also garbage processors. Therefore, many consumers have reported that the space in the new kitchen cabinets is tight, and a slimmer water purifier is needed.

After the feedback was collected, Suning specially customized the deluxe version of the small Biu water purifier according to the market demand. While the body is more miniaturized, it adopts a strengthened composite quick filter element and a front-fill design, which not only facilitates the user to change the element easily, but also reduces the number of later stages. use cost.

In addition, Suning Xiao Biu 's smart car also has a " special needs " market. This car was jointly built by Suning and Xinbaojun. Aiming at the pain point that many people are inconvenient to receive express delivery, it can remotely open the tailgate of the car and let the courier brother put the package in the car.

Today, leading retail companies operate across regions and categories with a large number of chain stores. Any one person or team has been unable to accurately select products. Without the support of AI algorithms, it may mean a decline in store sales, waste of inventory, and bring a lot of leftovers to brand owners.

Li Peixin, Fanruan Data Application Research Institute, interpreted consumption forecasts and said: Based on the historical situation of the previous one to two years, we can analyze trends and reasons for changes, and at the same time combine macroeconomic conditions, seasonal changes, new product launches and promotion activities, promotional activities, and regional markets. The industry's competition situation, advertising investment, etc. comprehensively judge the formulation of monthly sales targets.

Through sales forecasting, realize centralized sales and quickly break through ; strong channels, make famous brands ; market-oriented, quick response. All analysis is based on data. Without data sources, sales forecasting is almost impossible.

The battle for logistics is in the cloud

The ultimate showdown of modern logistics efficiency lies in technology, in the digital cloud.

Jiang Zhijin is a " post -95 " who graduated from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore with a major in logistics supply chain. After graduating with a master's degree in 2018 , he joined Suning Logistics and became a group management trainee. In October 2019 , he officially participated in the research and development of the Suning logistics digital twin project as the person in charge of the logistics side.

In science fiction movies, the digital twin system has long been presented.

In the movie "Iron Man", when Tony Stark designs and repairs the suit, he does not operate on drawings or objects, but through virtual image mapping. This kind of virtual mapping has long been invested in research and development by enterprises and applied in business, and Suning Logistics is one of them.

Jiang Zhijin said: " The digital twin system born out of the physical world has the functions of fast calculation and operation optimization that can only be realized in the digital world. "

In June 2020 , the digital twin system of Suning Logistics was tested in the large-scale logistics warehouse in Nanjing, achieving an overall increase of 30% in the efficiency of warehouse import and export .

The system can automatically generate a digital twin system of a real large-ware warehouse according to the actual spatial layout of the warehouse. By setting condition parameters in the system, the optimal warehouse operation plan can be automatically output, improving human efficiency and reducing costs.

Under the trend of smart retail transformation, Suning Logistics focuses on the three scenarios of " arriving warehouses, arriving stores, and arriving home " , and vigorously develops full-link unmanned intelligent equipment technologies such as unmanned warehouses, unmanned vehicles, and drones. Distribute massive intelligent processing capabilities to wireless edge terminals so that they can understand, reason and act independently; integrate business units, weave composite neural networks, and promote the transformation from " information data chain " to "AI data chain " .

It is precisely because of the wider and deeper implementation of smart applications in the logistics field that on the day of " Double 11" in 2020 , the delivery volume of more than ten super cloud warehouses of Suning Logistics at 12:00 across the country has exceeded the whole day of last year, and the delivery completion rate has reached 99.8%; the volume of tripartite business orders undertaken increased by 107% year-on-year , and nearly one-third of the products were delivered from the live broadcast warehouse.

" Black technology " sharing

Two years ago, Suning Science and Technology Smart Retail Technology Research Institute conducted a market survey. The research objects were nearly 200 small-scale or large-scale retail enterprises in China ; the purpose of the research was to understand the proportion of these enterprises’ annual investment in digital Internet construction. .

" The results are surprising. Almost every company will invest nearly 30% of its annual revenue to build its own independent underlying technology platform. " Jing Wei said.

At that time, Suning Technology also made suggestions to the relevant national departments: In the retail circulation industry, whether it is possible to issue guidelines for the construction of the underlying platform, and turn the achievements of individual enterprises into public capabilities of the industry in some form. This can reduce the repeated investment of individual enterprises and realize the joint efforts to make increments on the public technology framework platform.

"30% doesn't seem like a huge number, but every business investing 30% is actually a waste. "

Lu Jianzhong, an engineering expert and manager of engineering enterprises, also proposed to effectively promote the sharing of R&D resources, which can not only reduce the repeated investment in R&D equipment, but more importantly, guide cross-field innovation resources to collide with new ideas.

On July 27 , 2020 , Zhang Jindong proposed at the Suning 818 press conference that Suning would be upgraded from a " retailer " to a " retail service provider " .

" The transformation to a smart retail service provider is to provide users with high-quality services while also including partners in the ' good service ' . Using digital technology to improve their ability to physically reach users, and partners include not only retailers It also covers upstream manufacturers and brand owners. " Jing Wei said.

Gong Zhenyu, vice president of Suning.com Group, told Oriental Outlook Weekly: " In fact, Suning has already started planning to open our SaaS (Software-as-a-Service , that is, providing software services through the Internet ) platform. This platform contains Suning logistics capabilities, financial capabilities, and product promotion capabilities. Suning supports the development of small and medium-sized brands and helps them provide product supply chain support services and network development. ”

The retail industry is a diverse and inclusive industry. When the underlying technology platform, business platform, and industrial capabilities are shared among the industry, new growth in the industry will be immeasurable.

Reprinted from RFID World Network