RTIH rounds up the stand out retail systems deals, deployments and pilots from the past seven days. Featuring Boots UK, Kroger, Walmart, Amazon, Sephora, Hot Topic, Co-op, and Marks and Spencer.

Boots UK is working on drone deliveries, featuring temperature controlled storage, with Apian.

The latter is a startup working with the NHS on delivery capability in harder to reach areas.

The Boots UK tie up kicked off last week, with flights between Southampton and the Isle of Wight to ensure critical time sensitive patient needs are being met on the island.

Pacvue has announced general availability of Pacvue Advertising for Kroger, in partnership with Kroger Precision Marketing (KPM), the retail media business of the Kroger Co.

Advertisers on Kroger.com can now use Pacvue to programmatically manage advertising campaigns to “create cost efficiencies, grow share of voice, and increase sales”.

Australia’s Munro Footwear Group (MFG) has created an integrated data foundation platform using the Boomi AtomSphere Platform to support an e-commerce transformation push.

Kyle Field, home of the Texas A&M Aggies, is set to become the first collegiate venue in the world to open stores equipped with Amazon’s Just Walk Out technology and the Amazon One palm recognition and payment service.

Three checkout-free stores are slated to open this autumn so fans can use them during the college football season.

They will be able to insert their credit card at the entry gate or hover their palm over an Amazon One device to enter.

Just Walk Out technology determines what items shoppers take from or return to the shelves, and when they leave, the credit card they inserted or linked to their Amazon One ID will be charged for the items they took, with no checkout required. 

Walmart has inked a deal to buy 4,500 all-electric delivery vehicles, beginning with the Lifestyle Delivery Vehicle (LDV), from Canoo.

The retailer also has an option to purchase up to 10,000 units as part of its goal to achieve net-zero emissions by 2040.

Tool and homeware supplier Helton Tool & Home has signed up with Brightpearl’s retail operating system as it looks to transform its multi-channel operations. 

The brand will now have Brightpearl in place as its central source of truth, and have access to such features as the Automation Engine and Inventory Planner Premium tools.

Sephora has enlisted commercetools as it moves away from an older legacy system to a composable architecture.

It says that it is “accelerating its digital architecture growth with state-of-the-art MACH (Microservices Based, API-First, Cloud-Native, Headless)-based technology, continuing to provide modern, seamless digital experiences for its customers”.

Toonstar has become the official Web3 partner for Hot Topic.

It will be the US retailer’s preferred Web3 provider to produce NFTs and other digital activations for both original projects and Hot Topic developed IP.

Hot Topic will officially launch the relationship at Comic-Con on 21st July with an exclusive opportunity for The Hot Topic HT Fanatics community to have a cameo in an upcoming episode of The Gimmicks, a Web3 animated series that Toonstar co-produces with actress Mila Kunis’ digital studio Sixth Wall.

Co-op and Starship Technologies have partnered with North Northamptonshire Council to roll-out autonomous grocery delivery to residents across Wellingborough, Higham Ferrers and Rushden in Northamptonshire.

The service started last week and the partnership will see up to 45,000 residents in 33,000 households able to access on-demand delivery from four Co-op stores located in Olympic Way and, Northern Way, Wellingborough; Grangeway, Rushden and High Street, Higham Ferrers.

Buy now pay later firm Afterpay has announced a partnership with beauty retailer Sephora, enabling US customers to pay both online and in-store in four instalments.

The Walt Disney Company has announced the six companies that will be joining the 2022 Disney Accelerator.

This year's class is focused on building the future of immersive experiences and specialises in technologies such as augmented reality, non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and artificial intelligence characters.

The Disney Accelerator kicked off last week. Over the course of the programme, each participant company will receive guidance from Disney's senior leadership team, as well as a dedicated executive mentor.

It will conclude with a Demo Day during the autumn at The Walt Disney Studios lot in Burbank, CA.

Workforce scheduling company, Rotageek, has added Lakeland, a chain of British kitchenware stores in the United Kingdom, to its client list.

Marks & Spencer has extended a software and services agreement with Flooid for up to another five years.

Flooid (formerly PCMS Group), agreed with the retailer in 2007 to supply software to run PoS and self-checkouts across the M&S store estate, and will now extend this to include access to its unified commerce basket services platform, which enables retailers to build omnichannel experiences in house or with other partners.