Israeli Startup Shopic Offers Shopping Cart Solutions

Shopic Team. (Photo: Shopic)

Shopic is an Israeli startup which offers an AI based retail shopping solution. The company just raised an additional $10 million in equity funding bringing the total amount raised to date by Shopic to $21 million. The round was led by technology growth investor Claridge Israel, with the participation of the company’s existing investors, Entrée Capital, IBI Tech Fund, and Tal Capital.

We have all gotten so used to online shopping that sometimes we forget what it is like to actually go into a real store, take products off the shelves and then go with our shopping carts to the checkout line. This has become especially so during the extended Covid-19 shutdowns. When shopping online you just need to click on something and it gets added to your virtual shopping cart. Then, when you wish to review your selections, or proceed to checkout and pay, you simply click on that little shopping cart icon at the top of the page.

Now think about shopping in the supermarket. You have just spent an hour or so looking for what you need and filling up your cart. Then you make your way to the cashier to pay for everything. But in busy times you find yourself waiting on long lines. And, like Murphy’s Law, once you are second in line the guy in front of you always seems to have some sort of problem which takes forever to fix. Or you got on the shortest line only to see that the people at the end of the long lines are already done and that you are still waiting.
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So what can Shopic do about all of this?

Shopic creates frictionless, personalized shopping experiences in brick-and-mortar stores. Already deploying its solutions in stores of major grocery chains worldwide, Shopic will use the new funds to accelerate commercial activities and expand its team.

Shopic says that the company is changing the user experience in brick-and-mortar stores. Online shopping is changing daily, but the way in which people shop in physical stores has not changed significantly in decades, explains Shopic. Shopic boasts that the company brings the online shopping experience to the offline world.

But how exactly does Shopic do this? Using computer vision technology, Shopic’s clip-on device “instantly recognizes items placed in or taken out of the cart in real-time, automatically registering them by price and displaying the shopper’s active receipt on the device’s screen.” Shopic states that they personalize the in-store experience by offering digital promotions based on consumers’ previous buying habits, store location, and item selection all in real-time – saving them time and money. This is kind of like the suggestions which you see after selecting an item to buy on a website like Amazon.

For retailers, Shopic boasts that their analytics engine optimizes store management with “real-time tracking of shopping carts and store shelves, solving retailers’ lack of information from the moment a shopper enters a store and until they checkout.” Shopic provides retailers with live data on a shopping journey and the shopper’s various interactions in the store. This data can be used for footpath personalization, contextual promotions and better understanding of shopping habits.

“Our computer vision technology solves many of the challenges of the noisy, visual-heavy environment of big supermarkets, while still delivering fast performance at very high accuracy levels,” said Eran Kravitz, Shopic’s Co-Founder and CTO.

We’re excited to announce this additional funding that will help us progress more rapidly as we expand our solution into new stores and retail partners,” said Raz Golan, CEO and Co-founder of Shopic. “This investment, from a long-term growth investor such as Claridge Israel, is a vote of confidence in our approach to build and deliver frictionless retail solutions that are practical, immediately deployable, and cost-effective, without having to make major changes to the way stores are run.”