SandStar CMO Speaks at an Online Workshop of SCMP About the Future of Retail Digitization in China

CHARLOTTE, N.C., April 26, 2021 (Newswire.com) - This month, SandStar CMO Andrea Wang attended an online workshop sponsored by the South China Morning Post (SCMP). At the event, she talked with the head of the newspaper's technology pages about the resurgence of unmanned retail with the help of AI as well as the future of retail digitization in China. 

Founded in 1903, SCMP is the most influential English-language newspaper in Southeast Asia focusing on providing international news as well as authoritative business and financial analyses. Based on the Computer Vision Report published by it earlier, SCMP invited people from multiple companies empowering the retail industry with AI to discuss the future of the technology and the industry as panelists.   

Computer vision (CV) has become the most remarkable area in the field of artificial intelligence (AI), and has formed a huge application market in China. Members of SandStar's funding team have 10 years of retail experience on average. They have a profound understanding of how technology can empower the retail industry. Since the company was founded, they have developed a series of AI+retail solutions with CV as the core technology, including the AI vending machines adopted by the world's top 3 beverage brands, the pure vision unmanned store costing far less than Amazon Go, and the smart store analytics solution that can help merchants increase sales. With this, the company is offering efficient shopping and operational experiences enabled by new technologies to physical retailers on an ongoing basis.   

Based on the powerful digital DNA of CV, SandStar believes that this technology can provide the biggest help for merchants to break the ceiling of sales growth today and take physical retailers to achieve detail-oriented operations. Take the smart store analytics solution as an example. For SandStar, the use of CV is not just limited to helping a merchant convert the people, goods, and facility of its store into data and save them; more importantly, it's about repeatedly analyzing the data to obtain actionable advice for operations, to be adopted by the merchant to improve the operational decision making specifically, so as to achieve better sales.

After deploying SandStar's smart store analytics solution, the stores of a renowned retail chain in northern China had been adopting SandStar's advice for optimizing restocking, displaying, and ordering during the three-month pilot period. Data about the outcomes shows that each optimization advice resulted in significant sales growth for the company. Statistics of the average performance of each brand's case studies shows that SandStar's digital store solution can increase sales by over 20% for convenience stores.   

All the products of SandStar are designed to help retailers reduce costs and increase efficiencies. In addition to the smart store analytics solution that can be used by physical retailers, SandStar's AI vending machines also have an exceptional performance. Compared to RFID, weight sensor, and static vision technology, SandStar's dynamic vision technology has a clear advantage: restocking frequency can be more flexibly controlled, there are fewer restrictions on product display, and the costs of personal training and supervision are also substantially lowered. The real data from customers shows that SandStar's AI vending machines can help to reduce the cost of restocking by 40% during operations.  

SandStar is thankful to SCMP for brainstorming with it at the workshop. By leveraging the influence of SCMP, SandStar will catch the attention of more retailers who are eager to boost their growth with AI. Meanwhile, SandStar strongly believes that AI is a major driver for the next round of technological revolution and industrial transformation in the world. The company will continue to invest in R&D, to promote the ongoing iteration of its products and technologies, and to embrace a new era for retail. 

About SandStar 

SandStar is an artificial intelligence company that provides leading computer vision technology for the retail industry. The advanced retail solutions engage shoppers like never before with grab-and-go convenience, autonomous checkout and big data analytics, serving businesses worldwide. Founded in 2016, SandStar now has over 220 engineers. The company provides Smart Kiosks, Pure Computer Vision Smart Shops, and Smart Store Analytics. Headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., SandStar serves 20+ Fortune 500 companies and strives to build an AI retail ecosystem. SandStar is a qualified Intel® IoT Market Ready Solution (Intel® IMRS) partner and Microsoft Co-Sell partner, supported by a number of leading venture capital investors after four rounds of funding, including CP Group, one of the world's largest conglomerates. Check out more on http://www.sandstar.com

Source: www.sandstar.com