This latest issue - The 10 Most Innovative Retail Solution Providers, 2020 explores the importance of retail with technology & companies that are striking to implement the best in serving the needs of the customers.

1. www.thebusinessberg.com
2021
VOL. - 01
ISSUE - 01
The Most
Innovative
RETAIL SOLUTION
Providers

4. ED
xpanding in an
Eunorganized retail sector
is surely a challenge. So, to
take the game to the next level it
is beneficial, to leverage corporate
partnerships to organize and
expand domestically and globally.
This is one of the challenges in the
retail sector. But owing to the
digital transformation initiatives
and rising customer awareness,
these challenges can be
overcome in time.
The covid-19 pandemic has
already severely impacted
businesses globally. Although the
situation is under control now
companies are getting used to the
new normal and are pivoting their
strategies for the future. Similarly,
to develop the strategy according
to the needs - ecommerce is the
future of the retail businesses.
Through ecommerce, retail
businesses can have their own
store, their own products listed,
and receive payment online.
There is a promising future ahead
for the companies in the retail
industry. With initiatives like digital
and online platforms, small and
large retailers both are now
interested in these digital
platforms. Advanced digital
payment methods like UPI and
net-banking have also made the
process easier with the digital
payment companies.
For adapting to the need of the
hour, the retail industry needs to
come up with new practices
regarding the online
transformation of the retail sector.
Coping with the changing needs is
the only way that retail can
dominate in all the industries. This
is the sector which is completely
customer-driven, if the choices of
the customers are neglected retail
owners and businesses will suffer
Make Retail Great
Again!

5. DITOR’sNOTE
a serious loss and will be out of
the competition.
To meet the demands of the
world, retail will have to
revolutionize the manufacturing
processes by keeping up with the
technological innovation and
disruption. If we have to make
retail great at a faster pace, then
companies will have to work as a
team and keep up with the
demand. However, that has not
been the case until now.
But hereon, it is in the hands of
the retail company owners to
make it possible and identify the
need for it. Both online, as well as
offline businesses have to create
personalized customer
experiences to the changing
choices and times. This is the only
way retail businesses can
transform quickly.
In our latest issue - The 10 Most
Innovative Retail Solution
Providers, 2020 we explored
the importance of retail with
technology and companies that
are striving to implement the best
in serving the needs of the
customers.
Also, do not forget to read the
CXO standpoints written by the
industrial experts and the articles
crafted by our in-house editorial
team respectively. Reading these
articles, and CXOs, will give you
deep understanding of the retail
sector and the leadership qualities
of different leaders as well.
Let’s begin!
Darshan Parmar
DarsHP

6. A r t i
C o n t
INTERACTIVE EDGE
Leveraging BI to Enhance Sales
Processes in a Dynamic Way
10
18
RETAIL INSIGHTS
Top Trending Innovations
in Retail Business
14
INTUITION SYSTEMS
A One-Stop-Shop
Retail Solutions Maestro

7. c l e s
e n t s
22
28
RETAIL DISRUPTION
Using Most Distinctive Ways to
Improve Retail Solutions 26
SOUNDPAYS
Designing the Digitized
Shopping Experience
TOMPKINS ROBOTICS
Taking Automation to
the Next Level

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EDITORS
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Sumita Sarkar
SENIOR EDITOR
Anish Miller
MANAGING EDITOR
Darshan Parmar
SEO &
DEVELOPERS
January, 2021
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TECHNICAL HEAD
Jacob Smile
ASSISTANT TECHNICAL
HEAD
Pratiksha Patil
TECHNICAL CONSULTANTS
Amar, David, Robert
DIGITAL MARKETING
MANAGER
Alina Sege
ASSISTANT DIGITAL
MARKETING MANAGER
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ART &
DESIGN
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ART & PICTURE EDITOR
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VISUALISER
David King
SALES
BUSINESS
DEVELOPMENT
MANAGER
Sharon Brooks
MARKETING MANAGER
Mary D’souza
BUSINESS
DEVELOPMENT
EXECUTIVES
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SME-SMO EXECUTIVES
Gemson, Nikita
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EXECUTIVE EDITORS
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The Business Berg

10. Brief
Company Name
Macro Integration
Service
Jabir Bachani
Retail Business Manager
Richline Group
Randall Swanson
CEO
Tinu Cherian Abraham
Group Manager
(Global PR and
Media Relations)
Tompkins Robotics
Care Innovations
Zel Bianco
CEO
Interactive Edge
Anand Asaithambi
CEO
Dave Meleski
CEO
Mike Futch
President and CEO
Bart Collins
President
Steve Doswell
CEO
UST GLOBAL
Total Solutions
Intuition Systems is built on the foundations of innovation,
integrity, customer service and community.
Richline Group, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Berkshire
Hathaway, is a foremost precious metals and materials
manufacturer and marketer.
Tompkins Robotics is offering and delivering virtual tours of its
autonomous robot (AMR) solutions in use at its facility in
Orlando, Florida.
Care Innovations is a trusted advisor in the rapidly evolving
landscape of consumerism in healthcare.
Soundpays
Richard Waryn is spearheading LDK Logistics which is a
‘velvet glove’ logistics solution provider situated in Colorado.
From end-to-end digital transformations to the development of
revolutionary new products and services, UST Global has
helped leaders across the world realize their vision and create
billions in value.
Interactive Edge is a leader in data analysis and presentation
software for streamlining the retail selling process, category
management, and related disciplines.
Intuition Systems
Management
The company prides itself on putting the needs of its
customers first.
Total Solutions Ltd (TSL) is a leading technology solutions
company in the East African region. Over the last 15 years, it
continues to partner and form strategic alliances to bring
quality and innovative solutions to its customers.
Jean M Stephens
CEO
RSM
RSM is a powerful network of audit, tax and consulting experts
with offices all over the world.
Retail
Solution Providers
Most
Innovative
The

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12. Leveraging BI to Enhance Sales Processes in a Dynamic Way
A
dvanced retail experience is changing the
outlook of the sales vertical. Digitization has
shown us how businesses can transform quickly
and swiftly. As the technological advancements take
new turns, the dynamics of serving customers right
from their first step through the door has become quite
complex, yet simple with the availability and deploy-
ment of the right tools.
Identifying these tools and implementing them at the
right time is the key to a successful retail solution
integration. Interactive Edge is one such company
focused on enabling optimum collaboration between
the manufacturer and retailer when it comes to
enhancing the sales process.
Interactive Edge is a leader in data analysis and
presentation software for streamlining the retail selling
process, Category Management, and related
disciplines. Interactive Edge solutions are used by some
of the world’s largest Consumer Goods Companies
including Ace Hardware, Church and Dwight, Danone,
Kellogg’s, Jack Links, and Pepsi Cola. Interactive Edge’s
headquarters are in New York City.
“We started with the idea that sales organizations were
starting to utilize laptops for customer presentations
using multimedia, slides, product animations, video, and
more,” says the team at Interactive Edge. The
company leveraged its talented staff of programmers,
client service staff and animators to help companies
like Colgate-Palmolive, J&J and Nestle introduce their
new products to the retail customer. Typically, the
presentations were heavily brand focused and
included small amounts of data. Interactive Edge’s
team is responsible for building the retail selling
presentation for Colgate Total Toothpaste which to
this day is their most successful new item launch to
date.
With current projects, Interactive Edge works with
the client’s team to determine what type of
implementation would be most appropriate to
accomplish the goals and objectives of the
organization. Interactive Edge’s team reviews the
specific requirements and expectations from an
XP3 implementation, specifically the expected
business benefits, the scope of the proposed
solution and the resources and skill sets required
for the project, as well as the customer’s IT
infrastructure, hardware, and software
requirements.
Then, the team requests some sample data and
content. With XP3, a set of business intelligence
tools, the company gives business users the ability
to leverage virtually effectively and efficiently any
data to create, distribute and apply best practice
analytics in data-driven PowerPoint presentations
and Microsoft Excel reports. XP3 Data Workshop
allows users to easily load their Nielsen, IRI, SPINS
and other data sets.
With XP3 Data Integrator, users can define mapping,
www.thebusinessberg.com
10 | January 2021

13. We believe our
brand facilitating
our message of
‘ease of use’ is
now being
recognized as
critical for greater
efficiency and
ways of working
remotely
integration, and roll ups of multiple data sources
into a single data source for displaying data at
various product hierarchy levels. “Our cloud service,
XP3 BI Cloud allows users to view finished
PowerPoint presentations and Excel reports online
and dynamically change the geography and time-
period to be retailer specific,” states Zel Bianco, CEO
of Interactive Edge.
XP3 reduces the time needed to prep, align, and
integrate virtually any data including Syndicated,
POS, Panel, Shopper, EDI, and Shipment data, then
automates the process of generating retailer-specific,
data-driven PowerPoint and Excel output. Clients can
take the best in thought leadership and easily share the
resulting best practices presentations with the field,
providing a thorough, cohesive presentation that
reflects the values and strategies of headquarters.
Interactive Edge is also recognized for providing stellar
service and support and best practice guidance in using
data sources to generate category and shopper insights
along with actionable recommendations for better
retailer collaboration between retailers and consumer
goods manufacturers.
“We have embraced the cloud, with XP3® BI Cloud™, best
in class category management presentations are accessed
by end users and customized to each retail customer and
ready to download or present via the web,” says Zel. The
team at Interactive Edge continues to develop
connections through API’s to be able to connect
directly to popular data warehouses and are always
adding new features to XP3 BI Cloud to make it even
more valuable to its client base.
In a recent webinar hosted by the Category
Management Association and Shopper Insights
Management Association in October, Interactive Edge
in collaboration with Kellogg’s discussed how to
deliver an agile and nimble approach to enhance retail
customer collaboration. The panel included Zel and
Zel Bianco, CEO
The 10 Most Innovative Retail Solution Providers
www.thebusinessberg.com January 2021 | 11

14. Tom Wozbut – Director, Category Management
Analytics from the Kellogg Company. The duo put some
points across regarding the consumers’ changing
behaviors which resulted in roadblocks to the supply
chain where the manufacturers were pushed to adopt
agile technological solutions.
Along with that, some discussion underwent
regarding Covid-19 and its impact on the store
operations, sudden and mass out of stock condition,
customers’ enhancing capabilities to grasp the power
of e-commerce, and pressure points like sanitation,
etc.
According to the statistics, 93% of the collaborators
believe that virtual communication with retailers is
going to prevail for a long time. “XP3 BI Cloud allows
us to take advantage of this trend,” says Tom Wozbut.
A Dynamic Leadership
The team at Interactive Edge along with Zel introduced
XP3 BI Cloud in 2019, which allows customers to have
one version of the truth so that a professional,
standardized, and consistent strategy and message can
be accessed quickly and easily by sales. XP3 BI Cloud is
being used very effectively by clients like Pepsi,
Kellogg’s, Church & Dwight, etc. As technology evolves,
the size, need and use of multiple data sources
increased and the need to keep it simple for business
users did as well.
“We have been actively working on partnerships which
includes being a Nielsen Connected Partner as well as
1010 Data to name just a few,” shares Zel. The company
is also building upon its existing capabilities to include
emerging technologies such as tabular data structures,
e-commerce data, etc. It is actively building out
standard templates so clients can better understand
how they are doing in both brick and mortar and e-
commerce.
Zel and his team have increased the use of web
conferencing tools like Microsoft Teams to meet and
collaborate with clients. Interactive Edge’s clients use
its XP3 BI Cloud solution to access and share data
driven reports and presentations that are developed to
help sales teams become more comfortable with data
analytics and streamline their preparation of data
driven presentations to their retail buyers.
Zel started his career in the advertising industry at
large ad agencies including Young & Rubicam where
he worked on both Consumer Package Goods
accounts as well as technology accounts such as IBM.
Zel handled portions of the IBM account at two
agencies over the course of six years. Wanting to be
an entrepreneur, he decided to start Interactive Edge
along with, Cynthia Carnesi, who also came from the
agency side, and another partner who led the
technology side of the business.
Zel and his team became one of the first corporate
members of the Category Management Association
where IE has sponsored their annual conferences and,
in most years, presented Intellectual Property
breakout sessions with clients including Acosta,
Nestle, Jack Links, Mars and Kellogg’s.
Zel and the IE team were also contributors to the
Category Management 2.0 White paper and other
Association of whitepapers. He is on the Category
Management Advisory Board at DePaul University
along with major CPG companies and retailers. He has
been a contributing Brain Trust member of RetailWire
since it started. Zel has given presentations at many
industry conferences including SAP and ECRM in
Paris.
He believes that working with partners who are much
larger and have hundreds of clients and have a need for
Interactive Edge’s solutions, will contribute significantly
to its ability to higher.
www.thebusinessberg.com
12 | January 2021

16. RETAIL
BUSINESS
TOP TRENDING IN
INNOVATIONS
www.thebusinessberg.com
14 | January 2021

17. T
he United States has always been the Mecca of
Selling ever since it came into being. Incidents
like the world wars and turmoil worldwide hardly
had any effect on continental America where life continued
akin to that on a prized and peaceful island far away in the
middle of nowhere. And for close to a century, it has been
the most powerful economy that the world has ever seen
giving others not just competition but also a reason for
growth by being the largest and most prolific of buyers.
Speaking of buying, if there is one reason which stands out
for the US in it being called the “spender’s heaven”, it is
the ability to bring about massive innovations in systems
and ideas which govern every aspect of production,
marketing, sales and logistics of products. Consumer
products or otherwise, the US has always been the one
place which loved (it still does!) to innovate with ideas to
sell in retail, be it by bringing about the idea of franchise or
chain retail stores, mail-order and more.
For the last five years with the world going digital and
online, newer changes and additions in this space has been
an almost daily occurrence. What previously took a few
years from ideation to final implementation is now a matter
of weeks courtesy the internet. The long comatose brick and
mortar is seeing a resurgence though in a very different
avatar, and more in the nature of an extension to things
online. Giving it company are concepts inclusion e-
commerce sales and drop-shipping.
Five years in the life of retail these days is way too much.
The world in the meantime has moved further in its aim of
providing client satisfaction and retention. In the year 2021,
the following would be the top trending innovation in retail
business:
Retail Trend # 01: Renewed and intense focus on
healthcare
Directly attributable to the Covid-19 pandemic, the focus
today is more on being and staying healthy for the longest
period of time. From hand-sanitizers to hand-wash soaps to
toilet paper, it is personal health and hygiene that has been
the focus of consumers. A report by Accenture shows that
the focus on personal hygiene items has gone up by an
estimated +30% over the past year and has clearly been at
the cost of more discretionary spending including recreation
and food.
In a way this could be expected with the increase of the Net
penetration but what really brought about the wholesale
shift can be attributable only to the pandemic which if it
lasts long enough may just solidify into a habit. Marketers
and retailers if they are sensitive may support this trend to
create new services which besides providing an income,
also endears to one’s clients, shopper and even employees.
It need not always be with respect to medicines and
healthcare per se but may be surrounding activities
including healthy living which may have multiple
implications, and by extension, income streams.
Retail Trend # 02: Rise of the ethical! Because values
matter more than money and growth!
Placed on an equal plane of product attributes, what are the
factors that bring about differentiation and make brands
stand out? Quite simply, the way marketers treat their
customers, including taking care of customers’ intense likes
and dislikes. And one of the things that go to form intense
likes and dislikes in worldwide sales is the way one deals
with values, be it pertaining to their own brand and what it
stands for, or their stand viz-a-viz others, the industry, and
the entire eco-system. For instance, sweatshops in rundown
economies may be good to shore up the bottom-lines but
would do precious little to shore up sales from those
quarters who find such actions grossly inhuman. Adding to
this fact of using shady deals to reduce costs is not
disclosing the same or disclosing something rosy while
continuing the dirty work. Being ethical, transparent, and
value-based is a need for brands today that stand far
removed from times when it was a fad! Research from
established quarters (Forrester) suggest that close to 70% of
consumers prefer being clients of brand that have sound
values and stand by them, and that over 40% of retail
consumers would want to associate with sellers with strong
and positive ideals be it related to society, the ecosystem, or
politics.
RETAIL INSIGHTS
www.thebusinessberg.com January 2021 | 15

18. Retail Trend # 03: Sales is about an experience! In fact,
sometimes it is ONLY about an experience!
If you thought brick-and-mortar was dead and done with,
think again! When it comes to giving the consumer the live
feeling of an experience, online experiences just do not add
up. And this is more evident when the seller/ marketer has
brick-and-mortar in plenty and is in the business of giving
out experiences. Entertainment for instance or even
products for that matter where the “experience”
matters. Examples abound like Nike’s flagship store on
Time Square that despite its location boasts of a camera-
laden basketball court and treadmills that give the feeling of
being right where the action is. Though not a sales driver by
itself, it nevertheless is a great tourist attraction and a
constant brand engagement and awareness tool.
The recent trend points toward valuable real-estate being
put to the right use in creating the brand engagement and
awareness tools which in time to come could be a great
draw for brands.
Retail Trend # 04: Social Commerce
Facebook overtakes Amazon in being the perfect site for
people to shop for their needs which could be practically
anything under the sun. The internet, and more so social
media sites were the first and possibly only place where
people met during the pandemic-induced lockdown which
possibly brought to facebook the understanding that this
could be the best place to let marketers advertise and sell
their products- actively as part of the site’s very existence!
Facebook and others like it have thus replaced in-store
experiences by making these online stores just as interactive
and incisive as B&M stores or one’s own website. Where
social commerce is different from facebook pages of the
recent past is that all buying can be done RIGHT THERE
instead of approaching e-commerce sites or the seller’s
website. There are others in the game besides facebook like
Shopify which has tied up with TikTok and Snapchat.
Retail Trend #5: Brick-and-mortar as an extension to
online
Amazon Fresh Grocery opened its first store in September
2020. Despite it being a store that gives a seamless
experience where you pick and go, and bill without a
human interface at checkout, it IS nevertheless a brick-and-
mortar- a far cry from the ‘ONLY’ online that the world
associated with Amazon and eCommerce. What has brought
about this understanding is the fact the consumers still
prefer going to a real brick and mortar store and do their
shopping despite all the jazz that e-commerce sites come up
with. The same trends continue even with direct-to-
consumer brands like Casper and Bonobos.
The start of this trend was with apparels given the need to
interact with in-shop persons to get the right size and fit.
Why, even real-estate in the New York area is said to be
looking at dozens of B&M offices in the next couple of
years to beat the online blues!
Retail Trend #6: Even More AR-Powered Shopping
Experiences
AR-VR, ML, AI, and more are not lab phenomenon
anymore. In fact, a Nielsen global survey of 2019 found
that consumers were quite aware of these and their
capabilities, and how they would change lives in days to
come. The best part is that nearly half the respondents said
this affirmatively that they were willing to use AR-led
technologies to assess products being put forth to them.
What it means is that AR & VR could well be necessities in
doing business in days to come. Here too the pandemic had
its hand in making people aware of the uses and utilities in
AR. With online shopping being the only option during the
worldwide lockdown AR was the one technology that
brought the real and physical very close to the digital. It is
in fact reported by IBM in the US that the pandemic has
accelerated marketers push towards digitization (by using
the likes of AR) by about five years due to the prevalence of
the pandemic!
Retail shall never die. Only its form shall change sometimes
with the old, dead, or comatose making a comeback. Till
then, enjoy shopping, online, offline, or somewhere in
between!
-Purushottam
www.thebusinessberg.com
16 | January 2021

20. A One-Stop-Shop Retail Solutions Maestro
T
he global retail landscape is experiencing a major
transformation and becoming intensely
competitive. With the landscape of the
everything-digital era evolving constantly, conventional
methods of customer service are being disrupted.
The retail industry has undergone substantial changes
in recent years to improve business operations and
become more customer oriented, to cope with the
aforementioned transformation. Both online and
offline markets are adapting to overcome any
limitations in their services by using various advanced
technologies and are creating personalised customer
experience pertaining to the changing demands and
preferences.
In these times of increasing uncertainty, one of the best
resources that retailers and restaurateurs can avail for
themselves are the services provided by Intuition
Systems, one of the most innovative retail solutions
providers.
Intuition Systems was built on the foundations of
innovation, integrity, customer service and community.
The company’s cloud-based restaurant point-of-sale
(POS) software or retail POS software has more than
100 features including omni-channel management,
billing, business management, dedicated APIs
(application programming interface), aggregator of
third-party apps, CRM, analytics in one single POS
system.
With a mission to empower entrepreneurs with a
powerful and easy to use software tool, Intuition
Systems aspires to build an all-in-one mobile business
management, payment, and automation ecosystem
making it easier for retailers to conduct business from
their store front.
Humble Beginnings
In 2012, the founders at Intuition Systems tried to set
up a POS system for their restaurants in Bengaluru, for
Dosai Asai foods. They could only find expensive,
outdated, difficult to use, humongous legacy systems
that were hard to use. This prompted them to put
together their own mobile POS system.
After exiting the restaurant business, the founders
formed Intuition Systems to further develop, build and
commercialize this android-based mPOS billing,
payments and business management system called
Intuition’s Version of Point-of-sales (IVEPOS) which
became India’s first android POS platform.
Intuition has grown exponentially from a small ops
selling software for door to door and local restaurants,
to now providing for large payment processors and
smaller retailers in more than 15 locations in India and
abroad. They hope to continue their momentum and
growth.
2020 – ‘Top Entrepreneurs that Inspire Us’
2019 -
• ‘10 best tech entrepreneurs in IT’
• ‘The 10 most promising POS solution
providers’
• ‘The 10 most recommended retail
solution providers’
2018 – ‘Top 25 leading retail & solution
companies in India’
2017 -
• ‘The 30 most preferred tech
workplaces’
• ‘Top 20 most promising POS’
Awards and Accolades
Intuition Systems
www.thebusinessberg.com
18 | January 2021

21. We envision creating
a digital shop that
can perform billing,
business
management,
business automation,
payments, credit
facilities, social
media, CRM and
everything from just
one device.
The IVEPOS restaurant POS and retail POS accepts
different payment modes including cards, QR-payment,
UPI, etc. and comes with nearly 100 major features
including taxes, payments, wallets, loans, e-commerce,
etc., and is also available in 78 currencies.
Customer is the Boss
With a disruptive, cloud-enabled POS and ‘ERP
lite’ platform and with more than 100 features
that can be seamlessly integrated into a small 5.5-
inch mobile POS device, the IVEPOS software can
transform the POS hardware into a powerful all in
one device and aggregator, using a SaaS business
model.
This technology can digitally empower all merchants
including the micro-merchants to build and run a
successful business, perform complex operations, boost
revenues, communicate with vendors and customers,
avail banking functionalities anywhere, anytime, and at an
affordable cost. Intuition merchants are able to provide
customers with features for a more personalised,
wholesome experience.
The Leader of the Innovators
The CEO of this innovative company is Anand
Asaithambi. A mechanical engineer, having graduated
from Anna University, Anand is a serial entrepreneur with
a specialization in FinTech, food technology, and
engineering. He has co-founded two companies, Intuition
Systems being one of them. He holds a bachelor’s degree
in mechanical engineering. Anand is skilled in software
architecture, robotics, design, UI/UX, product
management and marketing. He led Intuition Systems
from a start-up to a leading POS, billing, and business
management platform company.
Perseverance Through Adversity
Talking about the challenges that Intuition Systems came
across, Anand says, “Expanding in an unorganized retail
and food sector in India as a small company is surely a
challenge. It is beneficial, at times, to leverage corporate
partnerships to organize and expand domestically and
globally. This is one of the major challenges we see.”
“Additionally, educating large number of customers about
a product with more than 100+ features and unlocking
the value of the IVEPOS system economically is another
Anand Asaithambi, CEO
The 10 Most Innovative Retail Solution Providers
www.thebusinessberg.com January 2021 | 19

22. major challenge. But owing to the digital India
initiatives and rising customer awareness, these
challenges can be overcome in time,” he adds.
The covid-19 pandemic has severely impacted
businesses globally. However, companies are slowly
getting used to the new normal and are pivoting their
strategies for the future. Pertaining to the same, the
leadership team at Intuition Systems has developed an
omni-channel strategy. They have in progress, an e-
commerce web-app that will be created specifically for
merchants to conduct online sales. Through this,
merchants can have their own store, their own
products listed, and receive payment online.
For brick-and-mortar customers, the e-commerce
module is integrated to the IVEPOS software suite. So,
they can manage both the online digital store and
physical store sales integrated from the IVEPOS app.
This new omni-channel capability will empower
customers to boost sales from both channels and
overcome the challenges posed by the pandemic.
A Future to Aspire For
For Intuition Systems, some of the strategically driven
plans and future milestones to scale the business
include:
1. Integrating e-commerce and omni-channel sales
features.
2. Focusing on product and partnership development
with key enterprise partners.
3. Building an efficient sales, advertising, and
marketing strategy.
4. Special focus on tier B and C cities.
“There is a promising future ahead for the company and
the industry. With initiatives like digital India, so many
small and large retailers are now in a digital platform.
The advanced payment methods including UPI has
changed the digital payment landscape in India,” says
Anand.
Another goal for Intuition Systems is to create an
ecosystem to manage store automation using mobile
and powerful all-in-one android POS system. “We
envision creating a digital shop that can perform billing,
business management, business automation, payments,
credit facilities, social media, CRM and everything from
just one device. We also aim at making sales of about
2.5 million licenses in the next four years to our retail
partners,” says the team at Intuition Systems.
www.thebusinessberg.com
20 | January 2021

24. Designing the Digitized Shopping Experience
T
he global retail landscape is experiencing a major
transformation and becoming increasingly
competitive. With the advent of the digital era,
conventional modes of customer service are getting
disrupted. Even the way a customer shops or shares
his/her opinion on their shopping experience is being
propagated through technological mediums such as
websites, social media, blogs, and vlogs.
To keep up with these changes, the retail industry has
undertaken drastic changes in recent years to improve
business operations and become more customer oriented.
Change is the name of the game. One of the major players
of this revered game is SoundPays.
Started in the year 2015, this Toronto, Canada based
company has made quite a name for itself in the retail and
purchasing innovation space. SoundPays is an early-stage
media-tech company with a cutting edge, mobile
engagement solution that utilizes patented ultrasonic
sound wave technology to connect consumers to
advertising content in real-time.
Sounds Like a Plan
SoundPay’s vision is that every single point-of-sale (POS)
will eventually be transmitting the purchased ticket
directly to the phone through ultrasonic sound to enable a
remote, phone-based payment engagement by the
shopper.
SoundPays aspires to emerge as a new standard in touch-
less, contact-less payment. One that will be as universal as
QR Code payment currently is in China. Every single
screen or display, whether in or out-of-home, will be
perpetually transmitting supplemental information
(ultrasonically) which can be downloaded and instantly
acted upon by any phone, in any location, at any time.
Fundamental Contributions
SoundPays has been instrumental in the transformation of
the retail and purchasing landscape through technology in
recent times. But to add to its portfolio, SoundPays
dictates two fundamental things as its most notable
contributions in the sector:
1. In-store or physical locations of conventional
commerce: The ability to make in-store checkout
purchases at a safe distance from the counter and
salesclerk, while at the same time eliminating any
requirement to touch or handle a physical payment device.
2. Out of store: The technology at SoundPays allows for a
truly mobile experience. The company enables advertisers
and broadcast content providers to engage their audience
as they are seeing/hearing their content, whether it is
playing on TV, online, OOH signs, live events, or stadium
screens. The technology provides a profound opportunity
to convert viewers to the ‘power-of-the-moment’ by
combining next-generation marketing, advertising,
commerce, and user convenience in a truly mobile manner.
Viewers can engage while on the flight, while relaxing
watching TV or sitting in a stadium: a complete
omnichannel offering, provided from a single SDK
(software development kit).
Going Ultrasonic!
The customers of SoundPays admire the company for its
user-friendly services despite the advanced tech it keeps
in its arsenal.
These patrons are provided with a solution based on the
company’s patented technology, that they can deploy at
either the media side (enabling advertisements or
programming content with supplemental information
accessible directly from the content) or at the app/wallet
side which allows for receiving and easily accessing the
supplemental information.
This distinguishes both the media content from all
competitor content and the app/wallet capability above all
other conventional apps/wallets. But what makes the
service provider so unique is its patented ultrasonic
technology.
Soundpays sound codes are comprised of a combination of
near-ultrasonic inaudible tones derived mathematically
based on their patented process for converting
www.thebusinessberg.com
22 | January 2021

25. We expect that
SoundPays will
emerge as a new
standard in
touchless and
contactless
payment
frequencies and tones into codes. They are delivered between
mid-18 and 20 kHz, tending to the inaudible frequency.
When an inaudible sound wave embedded into a video is
broadcasted through any type of speaker (TV, phone,
computer, digital sign, stadium speakers, etc.), and when
the SoundPays SDK is activated from a mobile app or
wallet, the mobile device is instructed to listen for tones
above 18 kHz.
The device microphone picks up this sound wave and
the company’s proprietary algorithm then de-codes it
into a human-readable 8- or 10-digit code. This 8- or
10-digit code is then relayed to specific product offers
which are then displayed on the mobile device screen
for review, making it potentially a one-step purchasing
experience.
When fully enabled using SoundPays Commerce, once a
customer clicks on ‘purchase’, the transaction is processed in
the cloud: charging the customer’s selected credit card and
transferring funds to the merchant’s existing merchant account
using the current industry transaction processing ecosystem.
For security purposes, we instruct the microphone to only
listen above 18 kHz. Furthermore, no sounds are recorded, and
no microphone activity ever leaves the mobile phone, and no
microphone activity is delivered to SoundPays server as all the
tones are processed and mathematically calculated locally on
the phone.
A Pioneering Leader
To develop the commercialization strategy, raise the required
funding, and build the team to take the company from a nascent
concept to widespread commercial success, they brought in the
dynamic Steve Doswell.
Steve has been the co-founder or on the initial executive teams
of three Canadian start-ups, all of which grew 400-500
employees prior to being acquired. He has also held executive
entrepreneurship roles as GM of Ericsson Canada and COO of
AOL Canada.
At SoundPays, Steve was responsible for the international
expansion plan, including the signing of a marquee customer in
Europe and lining up the four licensee candidates in Japan.
Steve, as the CEO was also the speaker for some notable
company awards as:
• Finovative Fall (2015) – Best of Show
• Street Contxt (2016) – FinTechTO winner
• Women in payments (2016) – Unicorn challenge winner
Steve Doswell, CEO
The 10 Most Innovative Retail Solution Providers
www.thebusinessberg.com January 2021 | 23

26. • VISA Global Contest for FinTech Startups (2016) -
Finalist
• NTT Data Open Innovation (2017) – Toronto winner
• NTT Data Open Innovation (2017) – Global finalist
• Financial Innovation Japan Business Conference
(2018) – Audience award.
Course-correction and Facing Obstacles
Like many retail solution providers, SoundPays had to fare
through its share of hurdles.
The initial funding was an issue, as it is for most startups in
Canada. Streaking relationships and working closely with
the major Canadian Financial Institutions (FIs) was an
obstacle, as all FIs were at the stage of de-emphasizing and
reducing investments in wallets and mobile payments.
In fact, by late 2016, most entities were de-funding mobile
app strategies, which made it difficult for SoundPays to
establish partnerships based on investing in and elevating
the capabilities of existing apps. In the early days, it
seemed that major entities were highly impressed with the
potential of digitally connecting to media content but
viewed it as a future concept rather than one to initiate at
the time.
To emphasize further on the struggle of the team at
SoundPays, Steve Doswell stated - “Just as the company
started to gain traction and momentum with major entities,
Covid hit the scene and suddenly the SoundPays proposition
became of secondary importance as retail entities were trying
to figure out how to regain traffic in their malls and stores, and
while sports franchises were suddenly having to operate with
empty stadiums.”
The fact that broadcasters, malls, retailers, sports
franchises, cinemas are all focused on dealing with the
impact of Covid above all, and at the expense of their
innovation initiatives represents the startup’s biggest
struggle at this time.
For adapting to the need of the hour, the company
introduced new practices keeping the health and safety of
everyone involved into perspective. Now, all of its
interactions with customers and prospective customers
are exclusively remote. This has made it challenging to
proceed with third-party initiatives.
Steve additionally stated, “Internally, our technology team
has been able to accomplish our product road-map and R&D
objectives for 2020, so this area of our business has not been
materially impacted. However, market-based initiatives have
been.”
Aspiring to Make a Difference
When asked about the strategically driven plans that the
company plans to implement to scale the business in 2021,
the team at SoundPays graciously provided these five of
their major focuses:
1. Get their two marquee customers back into play. Both
have put their SoundPays initiatives on hold, even
after having very positive results in initial 2019
rollouts. The company plans to help them utilize their
technology as part of adaptive response strategies to
Covid and other issues now facing them.
2. Complete a small ‘Seed’ raise which was started in
2019, but the final closing has been delayed because of
Covid-related factors with several of its prospective
investors. This raise is specifically targeted towards US
VC(s).
3. Complete the product roadmap and R&D initiatives for
2021; including commercializing new technology
designed for the TV and FM radio sectors that was
patented in 2020. SoundPays also intends to file a
third patent in 2012.
4. Close impending contracts with the top-eight of their
key pipeline prospects in North America. All of these
prospects were initially expected to be in the market
during 2020, but all were delayed because of Covid-
related matters, and the resulting new priorities. They
expect that all will be ready to proceed with initial
plans in 2021.
5. Launching in Japan, the company has amassed a group
of four potential licensees that it has been in
discussion with. It completed highly successful POCs
with three of these entities early in 2020. All of these
led to discussions and negotiations around commercial
launches. SoundPays also signed an agreement with a
fourth entity to collaborate on a commercial launch.
All four entities are major corporate conglomerates or
major brands in Japan. All were impacted by Covid-
related delays but should be ready to proceed in 2021.
Conclusively, SoundPays is proving to be commercially
viable in dozens of different sites and use cases. The team
is growing, dynamic and enthusiastic, and dedicated to
creating new frictionless engagement and commerce
channels that will inevitably simplify consumer lifestyle
and become an everyday part of our lives.
www.thebusinessberg.com
24 | January 2021

28. Retail
Solutions
Using Most
Distinctive
Ways to Improve
www.thebusinessberg.com
26 | January 2021

29. RETAIL DISRUPTION
quality of retail solutions.
The strong brand identity like Amazon also helps for
connecting with shoppers easily and establishing trust.
Amazon offers facility and various tools to build unique
brand identities. Amazon continues to offer and
emphasize opportunities for brands to tell their unique
story and build strong brand equity on its platform with
good content.
Tracking metrics that comes with it will inevitably need
to continue to expand as different brands become
increasingly interested in understanding the increased
impact their advertising and different creative strategies
have on attracting new consumers to purchase.
Amazon is continuing to support and enhance brands’
abilities to advertise and differentiate their brand
identities distinctively and creatively. This helps these
brands to reach to larger audience.
Ethical and values-based brands are also seeing the rise
in attracting more consumers. This is also one of the
innovative solution retailers are coming up with because
many people value transparency, ethics, and value-based
purchasing.
Offering same day delivery platform to as many number
of products possible is certainly very attractive retail
solution. Smart speaker shopping option also improves
consumer experience.
Brands can leverage smart speaker and voice search
technology. Increased use of chatbots is also one of the
innovative solution retailers are preferring to use. Use of
all these various innovative technologies are certainly
playing important role in boosting traffic and providing
more quality retail solutions.
Unprecedented time calls for unprecedented, win-
win, decisive and innovative solutions. Retail
solution providers prefer to use innovative
methods to improve the ease of the consumers as well as
improve their own business. Changing times lead to
changing trend in the world of retail and eCommerce.
From innovative retail technologies to surprising
different new sales channels can improve the way retail
solution providers improve the quality of their solutions.
Online shopping is there to stay no matter what. During
the times of pandemic especially this trend to use online
platforms has increased tremendously and it will rise
even more in coming times. Shopping experience on a
social media platform gives consumers a seamless
opportunity to shop online. Social commerce is seeing
rise in the recent few months and it can become more
integral part of eCommerce experience. Facebook and
Instagram are especially offering both sellers and
consumers opportunity to do online business through
these platforms. Through these two platforms sellers
have global audience in front of them. Facebook is
creating a more personalised shopping experience.
A new approach to influencer marketing is also another
innovative way retail solution providers are preferring to
use. Influencer content branding is about raw, real
aesthetic exposure of products along with genuine
captions about it. Authenticity in influencer marketing
attracts consumers. Various brands using authentic video
for the purpose of keeping their influencer marketing
engaging can also help. Different brands creating offline
experiences that leverage the technology and
convenience of e-commerce is also an innovative retail
solution.
As many shoppers preferring to rely on online shopping
especially since the pandemic, retailers are leveraging
Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR)
technology to bridge the gap between the digital and the
physical. According to various estimate the pandemic
has accelerated online shopping by almost five years.
Consumers prefer to use these technologies to assess
products. AR, VR these technologies have gone from
nice to have to an essential part of e-commerce offerings
of retailers. Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology has
also a huge role and potential to play to improve the
www.thebusinessberg.com January 2021 | 27
- Sharad Chitalkar

30. Taking Automation to the Next Level
T
his ongoing pandemic has presented a rise in
demand for business processes to be automated
at a rapid pace. Due to related restrictions in
many places, business owners have realized the need
for adopting technological advancements and the
automation of operational processes tops their list.
In response to COVID-19 and travel limitations,
Tompkins Robotics has been offering and delivering
virtual tours of its autonomous mobile robot (AMR)
solutions in use at the company’s Orlando, Florida
facility. The interactive tours demonstrate the various
configurations and capabilities of Tompkins Robotics’
award-winning t-Sort systems, including the t-Sort, t-
Sort Mini and t-Sort Plus models.
In addition to witnessing its solutions in action,
companies also get a chance to learn about the
technologies that are integrated into the company’s
systems, including automated induction and charging;
integrated weight and dimension capture; Tompkins
Robotics’ proprietary wireless network and warehouse
execution system (WES); and new innovations such as
an automated sorter exit robot, among others.
The company is focused on the robotic automation of
distribution operations. Its primary system, t-Sort,
consists of autonomous mobile robots that sort a wide
range of items and parcels to consolidation points,
optimizing client distribution performance and
capabilities.
Tompkins Robotics has maintained forward progress
during the pandemic and enters 2021 with a large
backlog of orders for delivery. These consist of orders
for new sites for existing customers and orders for new
customers.
“We continue to expand this core system with
complementary robotics and integrated material handling
systems to automate fulfillment operations,” explains Mike
Futch, President and CEO of the company. Its systems
maximize performance with mobile, scalable, flexible,
and portable robotic solutions, making the clients more
agile, adaptable, and profitable in today’s dynamic
marketplace.
Wait…. What is t-sort again?
Ideal for small to large distribution operations, t-Sort is
a portable, scalable robotic sortation system that
operates like a tilt tray or cross belt sorter without a
fixed track, with independent robots that move freely
along the shortest path to any divert or induction
station. It can be used for both item and parcel
sortation in a variety of environments and applications,
including e-commerce fulfillment, store replenishment,
shipping and returns and retail and postal backrooms.
The system can process and sort a greater range of
goods than any other single type of sorter. Systems
have been deployed doing up to 36,000 items an hour
• Modern Materials Handling, Material
Handling Product News and Material
Handling 24/7 – 2019 Readers’ Choice
Product of the Year Award
• Supply Chain Management Review –
2020 NextGen Supply Chain Robotic
Solution Provider Award
• Postal and Parcel Technology Interna-
tional Awards 2018 – Sorting Centre
Innovation of the Year
• Beyond! – 10 Innovative Robotics
Solution Providers (2019)
• CIO Review – 20 Most Promising
Robotic Solutions Providers (2019)
Awards felicitated to Tompkins Robotics
& t-Sort:
www.thebusinessberg.com
28 | January 2021

31. The range of
applicable locations
to use a t-Sort is at
every node in the
Supply Chain,
anywhere from a
large distribution or
fulfillment center to
the backroom of a
retail store
and as large as 2,700 individual sort destinations. With its
flexible and scalable design, t-Sort is changing the way
firms look at material handling across their supply chain.
t-Sort is creating a huge paradigm shift in the supply
chain and how the basic distribution function of
order fulfillment is accomplished. While initially
conceived as a parcel sortation solution, Tompkins
Robotics has evolved the t-Sort suite across a wide
range of supply chain and distribution applications.
“Our ingenuity and decades of experience in the
design of operations has resulted in a line of products
with the ability to provide previously unseen
modularity, flexibility, and speed of implementation, all
at a lower cost than traditional solutions,” says the
team of Tompkins Robotics. The company has
developed a solution in its t-Sort product suite that can
enhance almost every step in the supply chain.
In addition to the original t-Sort solution, Tompkins
Robotics’ AMR suite also features the t-Sort Mini for
sorting small and lightweight items and the t-Sort Plus,
which is capable of handling items up to 66 pounds—six
times the weight of the original t-Sort solution. In 2020,
Tompkins Robotics also released t-Rail, which enables
overhead transportation of goods without disruption to
floor-level activities. t-Rail can be used as part of
Tompkins Robotics’ new micro-fulfillment solution which
optimizes operations in small, standalone distribution or
fulfillment centers, hyperlocal operations, or even inside a
retail store. The t-Sort applications are used across the
entire supply chain. Since the system is plug and play for
all elements, a client can make their system any size or
shape and ramp up the volume by adding robots.
Switches and Glitches
One of the biggest challenges in the early history of
Tompkins Robotics was overcoming the fact that t-Sort
was new and different. Firms that had decades of
experience in using traditional sortation systems were
slow to accept this new technology. Getting the first few
customers was difficult as there were no sites to tour, no
customer references, and the company was a startup. In
addition, Tompkins Robotics’ team was still evolving the t-
Sort models, use cases, physical designs, and vendor base.
“Our system has improved through this evolution,” says Mike.
Currently, the company does not have any major
struggles. “We have manufacturing capacity, staff, and
technology to meet the demands of 2021 and beyond. If our
business were to grow faster than anticipated, then we may
Mike Futch, President and CEO
The 10 Most Innovative Retail Solution Providers
www.thebusinessberg.com January 2021 | 29

32. have an issue with onboarding new staff to keep up with the
demand. However, that has not been an issue to date,”
states the team of Tompkins Robotics.
It has partnered with integrators such as Bastian, Pulse,
and Conveyco, which add sales, marketing, and
deployment bandwidth to the firm. It has multiple
vendors and sources for procured elements and has
partnered with suppliers with the bandwidth to add
shifts, staff, and production lines to increase capacity.
The company’s team proactively hires new staff to
allow them to have a training period prior to full
autonomy. “We keep a 13-week and an annual projection
of all key elements of our business that are updated every
two weeks to recognize upcoming issues and adjust to meet
them,” says the team of Tompkins Robotics.
An Automation Expert
Mike Futch is one of the original leaders that created
Tompkins Robotics and brought the t-Sort sortation
system to life for global customers. He has been
involved from day one in the
evolution of this unique and
innovative system,
recognizing the potential,
designing the applications,
and creating the value
proposition for Tompkins
Robotics' customers.
He continues to lead the
design and forward
movement of the company,
driving much of the new
application development,
new product
conceptualization and the
integration with partners
solving unique problems with complementary robotic
automation. His focus is to deliver Tompkins Robotics
and its systems to customers across the globe to
maximize their service, performance, and operations in
ways never possible.
Mike has had a long, successful, prior career in the U.S.
Air Force and as a leader in consulting practices at
several firms. He now brings that same level of success
to the leadership of Tompkins Robotics and its
customers. The demand for robotic sortation is just
now picking up speed and Mike, along with his team, is
uniquely positioned to lead in this space. Tompkins
Robotics patents and unique designs allow it to do
robotic sortation better than any competitor and its
team is the current leader in AMR sortation. “We will
have our largest and best year in 2021. We expect our
business to double in 2021 and 2022,” concludes Mike.
www.thebusinessberg.com
30 | January 2021