Loyalty360 Reads: December 4th, 2018

Ikea Goes Urban
 
Ikea is planning to open its first city-centered store in the United States next year, as it looks to shift its retail space from big-box outlets on urban edges to smaller spaces in cities. The “Ikea Planning Studio” is opening in Manhattan this spring. The world’s biggest furniture retailer has opened similar stores in London and Stockholm. Ikea recently announced a drop of 36 percent in its yearly pretax profit, and said it was cutting 7,500 office jobs worldwide.
 
Walmart Employs Robo-Janitors
 
The world’s largest retailer is rolling out 360 autonomous floor-scrubbing robots in some of its stores in the United States by the end of the January. Walmart will partner with Brain Corp, which makes the machines, to introduce the robots. The autonomous janitors can clean floors on their own even when customers are around, according to Brain Corp.
 
“We can take anything that has wheels and turn it into a fully autonomous robot, provided that it can go slow and stopping is never a safety concern,” says Brain Corp Chief Executive Officer Eugene Izhikevich. “And it’s more than just navigation. It is to robots what Android operating system is to smartphones.”
 

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