Retail Innovation Tech Alliance summed up the first selection of startups

Retail Innovation Tech Alliance (RITA), consisting of X5 Retail Group, Beeline, M.Video-Eldorado Group, and Hoff summed up the results of the first stage of the scouting program. As part of the selection of startups, 395 applications were received from 17 countries (Russia, Belarus, Great Britain, Germany, Spain, Israel, Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Latvia, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Romania, USA, Serbia, Ukraine, Finland, Estonia). The volume of applications received 4 times exceeded the program plan. 15 startups reached the finals and participated in the online Deal Flow Session with the RITA experts. GoTech Innovation was the scouting operator in Russia and the CIS.

The majority of the proposed innovative solutions relate to the following areas: improving customer relations, remote support for online sales, increasing the efficiency of online trading. (in the delivery and assembly of orders, during transportation of goods), as well as solutions in the field of advertising, marketing, and financial technologies, home mobile entertainment, and automatic interior design. In their solutions startups-participants of the contest use the following technologies: AI/Machine Learning (20%), IoT/Robotics (11%), Big Data (7%), Computer vision (6%), Cloud Tech (6%), AR/VR (5%).

Companies with solutions of different maturity took part in the RITA program: 25% are at the pre-seed stage, 11% are at the seed stage, 27% of the teams assigned themselves to the startup stage, 24% came from companies at the growth stage and 7% at the stage of expansion to international markets. 43% of participants indicated that they are residents or graduates of accelerators, and 47% already had their first sales.

15 teams reached the finals, and they will have the opportunity to finalize the MVP, test the working capacity of the technology, launch a pilot with partners of the RITA alliance, and implement their project for millions of customers and in thousands of outlets. Startup SWiP, a technological platform for clients’ payment using their face biometry, received the highest number of points from the RITA partners, it gained the opportunity to participate in the acceleration program of the Parisian retail hub Lafayette Plug & Play.

RITA is a fundamentally new approach to finding innovation. This association is unprecedented for Russian retail: the efforts of the four largest companies are joining together for effective scouting around the world. On this site, partners freely exchange their experience, solutions evaluation, and implementation results.

The list of participants of the RITA Deal Flow Session on May 14th (listed in alphabetical order):

Adnetic - native advertising platform
AXDraft - document designer
BenefittY - service for creating and delivering personal promotions and targeted loyalty programs
Fans Teams Brands - service for creating shows in stadiums using spectators' mobile phones
Figureit AI - behavioral analytics of customers in retail based on data collected from security cameras
Michelle Robotics - autonomous robot for in-store inventory
Nyris - platform for visual online search of the product
Picsell - AI detection system for merchandising
Sequence Enforcement - neural networks for detecting and preventing theft in hypermarkets
Smart Driving Element - telematics and security functions for a car park
SweetCard - interbank platform of personal cashback offers from offline retailers
SWiP - technological platform for clients’ payment using their face biometry
VR Concept - application for virtual prototyping and collective work with digital twins
WayBot Cleanbotics - cleaning of premises with deep automation and robots
Yoloco - service for search and analysis of Instagram bloggers using AI