Oriola

Camilla Renz

How do you think the retail tech landscape has evolved over the last few years?

For the last few years, the retail tech space has been undergoing a dramatic evolution. The term—store—has somehow changed. Today, the industry is adopting a combination of concepts to meet customers where they are or through any channel they want—be it traditional physical stores, pop-up stores, unmanned stores, or eCommerce. However, the rapid transition into eCommerce (that has further been accelerated by the pandemic) is the most significant change. It requires the industry to leverage cutting-edge novel tools and technologies to automate its processes. 

Today, there are many POS systems, net channels, and several other digital tools for our customers to use. The rising consumer demand is weighing down on the supply chain industry, driving them to automate their whole processes. But the logistics companies are reluctant to spend a significant amount of resources on automation, which impels us to reduce our operational costs to a great extent. 

To this end, we are now required to go in and understand the orders and deliver them to customers seamlessly and without breaking a sweat.

What are some of the challenges persisting in the space, and how do you see them mitigated?

Previously, there were primarily two different ways of buying: either a customer had to go to a store and buy something, or they had to buy something and wait for it to get delivered to them. But now, the scenario is changing. What we're looking at is that customers have developed a new expectation where they can visit a store and order the same things they can order online, and also sort of access the things they have saved in their basket online. They want to complete a purchase in the physical store while also letting everybody in the store know what they have bought online. As a result, now we have an omnichannel setting that needs to be delivered to the customer to ease their purchase experience. Prior to omnichannel, we had two different platforms for that. Either it was the store-first or the eCommerce. But now, we look at the eCommerce site first and then go and look at the products at stores.

"The current most significant difference for us millennials is that we want to buy everything online. But the newer generation is leaning more towards having the best of both worlds"

The current most significant difference for us millennials is that we want to buy everything online. But the newer generation is leaning more towards having the best of both worlds. They want to go to a store while still having access to the eCommerce site at the same time. Accordingly, retail companies need to rebuild their platforms and entire POS infrastructure anew to cater to this latest consumer demand.

According to you, what kind of business practices and retail technologies should companies adopt to steer ahead of the competition?

Retail companies need to think about sustainable architecture. They need to have technologies that are open and flexible no matter where those are implemented. So, we need to make sure that the tools we choose are compatible with other existing technologies that are there in our company landscape.

Companies can no longer buy an entirely new POS system because now they must first think about different aspects that may get affected by that piece of additional technology. For example, they need to think through how the POS system would be used online and in the store, how it would evolve, how to leverage it in a pop-up store, and so on.

I'd say, previously, we used to have a clear idea of using a particular POS system for maybe five to 10 years. But today, we have a much shorter span than we had before.

What would your advice be for the industry veterans and the budding entrepreneurs of the retail space?

I'd advise them to invest more in their competencies. First of all, enterprise architecture is becoming more central. So, they should invest more in internal competencies, including artificial intelligence, robotics, and other critical integrations.

Also, retail businesses need to understand and identify their partners and be in good agreement with them. They need to sit down together and collaborate on the ideas they conceive. This would translate into moving forward hand-in-hand and being successful together in this highly competitive arena.

Businesses would also be required to adapt to the constantly changing market. Before, we had a few years to react to certain things. But now, the scenario has completely changed.

As a result, my advice to them is to see and go through the competencies they have in-house, make sure to build new competencies wherever they need them for the future, and sit down and undertake a target architecture spree to align with the change in the market. They should also be clear about every aspect, from the business side to IT, and identify the capabilities they might need to sustain themselves in the upcoming years.

For Oriola as well, it is crucial to find that target architecture that will help us further evolve and run aligned with the market. We need to be much more agile and bridge the gap between the business and the IT competencies in order to be able to deliver the best experience to customers and have a bright future for the organization.