The digital transformation is spreading to supermarkets

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03:17

As online retail platforms experiment with brick and mortar shops, China’s grocery stores are moving in the opposite direction, integrating facial recognition systems and sophisticated checkout systems.

Suning has announced that it will open 50 Su Fresh groceries this year, while Alibaba has detailed plans to open 100 He Ma grocery stores. JD.com is even more aggressive with plans to open 1,000 7-Fresh groceries over the next five years.

Traditional supermarkets are also catching up with their competition.

Le Marché, Carrefour's smart life store has also benefited from a partnership with Tencent. They introduced a "scan and go" type system, which helps customers bypass checkout lines by simply scanning items. Besides, customers can also choose to authorize their payment via a facial recognition system installed at the cash register.

VCG Photo

"All the transformation is to think about the customer’s experience in the shop," said Yu Ying, vice president and CMO of Carrefour China.

Tencent also has ambitious plans to enter the supermarket space. The popular social network WeChat already has over one billion users and it plans to connect to every shop in China.

"I believe this is going to be a digital transformation for everyone. So we start with partnering with a giant like Carrefour,” said Davis Lin, vice president of Tencent. "Tencent’s vision is connecting people, and connecting people to the business. So it is only natural for us to move from Internet service to physical world.”