Israeli-based technology company Trigo raised $22M in a Series A funding round for its automated grocery checkout technology, according to a report by TechCrunch.
The company wants to use cameras and artificial intelligence (AI)-powered software to track what a customer gets without them ever having to go through a checkout process. Amazon Go has also been developing this technology, but at a smaller scale.
Trigo is marketing to large supermarkets with its technology. Red Dot Capital led the funding round, and Vertex Ventures and Hetz Ventures participated. Combined with previous funding, Trigo has raised $29 million in total so far, but is not disclosing its valuation.
Trigo said it had numerous deals in place to install its technology, including Tesco, the U.K.’s largest grocery chain, and Shufersal, the largest grocery store in Israel. The tech will go up in 280 Shufersal stores in the next five years.
A series of cameras in the store will monitor shoppers and keep track of what they put in their baskets, but the camera system uses triangulation, not just recording, as it has to be able to tell when people take things out of their carts, as well.
“I don’t actually think people really want grocery eCommerce,” Ran Peled, VP of marketing, said. “They do that because the supermarket experience has become worse with the years. We are very much committed to helping brick and mortar stores return to the time of a few decades ago, when it was fun to go to the supermarket. What would happen if a store could have an entirely new OS that is based on computer vision?”
Trigo, unlike Amazon Go, isn’t tethered to any of the products being sold and can work with or without loyalty cards.
“We believe that Trigo’s world-leading computer-vision team will be the first to scale this technology globally and unlock the full potential of a true grocery-wide revolution,” said Barak Salomon, managing partner of Red Dot Capital. “The process of manually scanning barcodes for each separate item at checkout is outdated and time consuming. Trigo’s technology is going to save brick and mortar, revitalizing the in-store experience while keeping the best part of shopping alive.”
Transportation management system provider BeyondTrucks teamed with electronic data interchange (EDI) platform Orderful.
The collaboration will see BeyondTrucks embed Orderful’s EDI platform into its multi-tenant software-as-a-service (SaaS) transportation management system, according to a Monday (Dec. 23) press release.
“EDI of the past is opaque, time-consuming, expensive and just simply outdated,” BeyondTrucks CEO Hans Galland said in the release. “Now with Orderful as our partner, our customers can elect to use the Orderful portal to manage EDI transactions in a rapid intuitive manner for all transactions and all trading partners. We are eliminating the need for a custom integration into BeyondTrucks with each and every partner.”
By embedding the EDI platform into BeyondTrucks’ system, the company builds EDI connections between shippers and carriers by converting EDI data via an API, the release said. The integration gives users real-time data synchronization, instant visibility, automated compliance checks and intuitive error handling.
In addition, BeyondTrucks fleet customers can access the Orderful portal for visibility into EDI data from shippers. Fleets can view when shippers make changes to load information but don’t communicate them or that information is not passed through to the BeyondTrucks system.
“By embedding our platform, BeyondTrucks customers gain real-time visibility and faster connections, eliminating the headaches of traditional EDI and enabling them to operate more efficiently,” Orderful Chief Revenue Officer Jonathan Kish said in the release.
The trucking industry is critical to the U.S. economy, moving more than 72% of freight by weight. However, outdated payment methods hurt efficiency, leading companies to search for faster, digital solutions.
The PYMNTS Intelligence report “Fast-Lane Finance: Accelerating Payments in the Trucking Industry” found that nearly two-thirds of trucking companies manage at least seven different types of freight shipping, each needing separate payment processes. These include trucking, rail and shipping containers, all involving distinct payment methods, creating extra work for accounting teams.
“The reliance on manual payment methods is problematic as it increases the risk of errors such as duplicate payments or miscalculated charges,” PYMNTS wrote this month.