digimag-may-2021.dealerscope.comDealerscope DigiMag May 2021

× Content x DigiMag May 2021 Nationwide Marketing Group Pulse Voices Robots In Retail Retail Rumblings International Perspectives Video Unboxed Audio Digital Diva Distributor Roundup Retail On The Run Spring Accessories Wireless What’s Cookin’? What’s up? Stat Shot CT Events Podcast Subscribe To Our Publications Get In Touch Masthead Menu Inside the Dealerscope May 2021 issue: Robots in Retail” looks at all the ways that our industry is implementing automation to increase productivity, safety, and customer service. Plus, distributors share lessons from the pandemic, health experts break down the nutrition angle on kitchen appliances, and PC makers brace for the global chip shortage. Happy reading! A WORD FROM OUR PUBLISHER 2021: The Year of the Robots Shortly after the 2020 CES, I read that 2021 would be the year of the robots. Fast forward to this year, and I am fascinated by how many have been accepted in our homes – and more are coming. So, I am thrilled to have this very subject as the main feature of Dealerscope’s May issue. Our Editor in Chief, Tom Samiljan, takes us on a journey as to what lies ahead in the robotics world. In our Distributor Roundup this month, we look at how our distributors are coming out of the pandemic and how their dealer programs are changing. And speaking of distributors, Fred Towns, president of New Age Electronics’ division of SYNNEX and member of the CTA Board, will address the topic of Spring Accessories, with a look forward to and a focus on the Oculus 2. From the founder of PTZOptics, there is also coverage of the ideal setups for a home/office studio. That leads me into telling you about a great story on what to expect in the wireless industry in 2021. I am also pleased to welcome John Quain to our team of Contributing Editors. John will cover the chip shortage and how it is affecting the PC market in the U.S. and Europe. Jessica Guyon, our Digital Diva, also looks at the changes at Twitter, in this issue, and how they affect our business. Every month, make sure to look for our great content in Unboxed, Retail Rumblings, Stat Shot and other terrific features. In our Retail on the Run,” department, we also had the pleasure of visiting California’s Video and Audio Center, where we spent time with President Joseph Akhtarzad. This was a great visit, with Joseph providing amazing insights from his business perspective. We have been launching something new every month this year in our pages. In May, we are introducing What’s Up?,” where we ask industry leaders to share their views on business, what their priorities are, and why Dealerscope is important to them. For this first chapter, I had the pleasure of having lunch with Dawn Pratt, CEO and founder of TechUp for Women, Toni Sabatino, president of Toni Sabatino Style, and the legendary Robin Raskin, founder of VEG (Virtual Events Group). What a wonderful event, and a meeting of great minds. Please make sure you see this new section. I want to hear from you – what is important for your business, what helps you sell, what you want to learn. Please always feel free to get in touch with me at tmonteleone@ctlab.media. Tony Monteleone, Publisher A WORD FROM OUR EDITOR IN CHIEF When Your Job is Replaced by a Robot, Lean Into the Opportunity One of the things I love most about my job is getting to interview so many fascinating innovators, technologists, entrepreneurs, and businesspeople about what they think or work on. The Robots in Retail” story in this month’s issue was no exception. I only wish I could have included every last quote from every person I talked with, though I also managed to get some other quotes from press conferences and panels on robotics that I attended at the virtual iteration of the 2021 Collision Conference, an annual North American offshoot of Europe’s much bigger Web Summit. While attending a conference that focuses on all the ways that business, culture, and society intersect with technology, I found it hard not to think of all the ways that the pandemic accelerated many disruptive trends across all industries and technologies. Robotics in the retail space is no exception. The surge in online orders over the past 14 months aside, there is a lot of interest and investment in warehouse robotics at the moment, which raises an obvious question: What happens to human workers when robots start doing their jobs faster and more precisely? With movies like Nomadland winning a Best Picture Oscar this year, the subject is as top-of-mind as robotics technology itself among businesses and consumers alike. On one level, the rise of robots means that workers no longer have to walk 14 or 15 miles per day shuttling products across a warehouse; on the flip side, it also means they have to keep up with the ever-faster robots. But while some jobs that humans do now may indeed go the way of the dodo, new roles will emerge, which requires commitment and collaboration on the part of business and government sectors, as well as among workers themselves, who increasingly must be open to retraining and changing jobs on a regular basis. Last October, Amazon announced that it was investing more than $700 million in training programs to upskill” workers into, whether those are jobs managing and maintaining robots or other jobs in areas such as data science or programming. There’s going to be this virtuous cycle,” said Melanee Wise, CEO of Fetch Robotics, at one of those Collision panels. Fetch Robotics makes cloud-based on-demand autonomous mobile robotics (AMR) solutions for warehouses. We need to create incentives for companies to train these large groups of people for new jobs, and also support people who struggle to be re-educated or re-tasked. It’s a problem that we are struggling with societally, and we need to focus more on changing jobs on a regular basis. and re-education for job switching. The answer is not to stop developing technology; the answer is to fix our problems in society.” There’s no denying that robots are cool. Dr. Eugene Izhikevich, CEO and co-founder of BrainCorp, which makes software for in-store robots that clean, among other services, doesn’t think it’ll be too hard to get people interested in job switching. Many of our robots are deployed by janitors, many of whom didn’t graduate from high school,” said Izhikevich at that same Collision panel in April. I asked one of them if he was afraid for his job and his reply was, ‘Are you kidding? I’m the robot guy!’ So think of this as robots elevating professions to the next level, where people feel good about what they’re doing.” Tom Samiljan COVER STORY Robots In Retail Everywhere from warehouses to in-store, the race to automate shopping infrastructure is heating up. BY TOM SAMILJAN Quick, what’s the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word robot? It’s likely anything from a walking, talking C-3PO-like bipod to a wheeled cylinder-like R2D2 to an unstable computer like HAL 9000. The truth is, just about anything mechanized that can pull off human actions can be considered a robot. It doesn’t need to look like a human, either. Because robots don’t necessarily have to walk and talk or even think much, they can be deployed in many different ways, both consumer-facing and behind the scenes. The retail space is no exception. Social distancing and sanitization requirements over the past 14 months led to a surge in online ordering and a dearth of shoppers heading to the malls, which accelerated the use of certain types of robots in warehouses and brick-and-mortar stores. Some of those trends are here to stay, others not so much. Here’s a rundown of significant technologies and trends in the robotics in retail space. AutoStore’s robot known as The Router” maximizes storage space of products in big cubes, creating 25 percent more space in warehouses. What’s In Store The general trend is that we’re seeing more robots in retail stores,” says John Harmon, senior analyst at Coresight Research. That’s...