The retail industry has been pressurized by digital transformation more than any other industry as it has always been at the forefront of technological innovation

Retail stores have been around for hundreds of years, thriving across cities, but is it possible that they may come to an end soon? In today’s competitive business climate, it is no surprise that providing intelligent retail experiences is necessary to survive and thrive. 

Surveys indicate that as many as 2 out of 3 customers agree that shopping tech improves customer experience. The rise of e-commerce, especially in the past couple of years, is causing consumers to increasingly prefer the convenience of online shopping. That being said, the consumers’ experiential sensory needs necessitate a certain physical shopping experience as well. In smart retail, as this marriage of digital and physical shopping experience is called, camera technology and edge-based processing offer superior experiences to customers and retail store staff. 

Giants like Amazon and Walmart have already started cashierless and automated retail services, such as the Amazon Go and Walmart Self-Checkout stores in the US. These new-age stores rely on embedded vision, deep learning algorithms, and sensor fusion for the purchase, checkout, and payment steps that are associated with retail transactions. Embedded vision technology remains at the front and center of this new experiential economy. 

The Emergence of Smart Retail and Embedded Vision

With smart retail, firms are combining cutting-edge (AI-based) technology with conventional retail. The use of advanced cameras, sensors, and AI algorithms is what makes it possible. Together, these build a system that can improve customer satisfaction and maximize supply chain effectiveness, security, and surveillance, while minimizing the costs of operations.

Closed-circuit television (CCTV), intelligent Internet protocol (IP), and embedded vision cameras are used in smart retail to take pictures and videos. However, compared to previous methods of gathering image data, the embedded vision has seen increased popularity due to the capacity for edge-based processing, improvements in camera and sensor technologies, and the shrinking size of embedded camera systems.

How can Embedded Vision Systems be Used in Smart Retail

Some of the retail functions optimized and expedited by embedded vision cameras are:

Inventory and Warehousing - Pick and place, goods-to-person, cleaning, and other robots are employed in warehouse and inventory management. Embedded cameras function as the ‘eyes and ears’ of various robots and drones, allowing them to navigate effectively. Robots may execute a variety of activities with the aid of these cameras, including barcode scanning, and remote warehouse management. 

Shelf Management - Cameras are used for shelf surveillance by keeping an eye on the quantity and caliber of goods on retail shelves. When an item's supply falls below a certain level, these integrated camera-based systems notify the store employees so that it may be quickly restocked. They are also capable of evaluating the quality of perishable goods displayed on store shelves.

Digital Signage - Today, a lot of digital signage is equipped with cameras that are used to count individuals and analyze demographic data. The picture data gathered enables the delivery of tailored advertisements to viewers based on their gender, age, length of watching, etc.

Payment and Checkout - The consumer and employee experience in retail businesses have been revolutionized by smart trolleys and smart checkout technologies. Multi-camera systems installed on a shopping cart are used by a smart trolley system to automatically take pictures of items placed inside it. The checkout procedure is automated using this information. Thus, a smart checkout system uses cameras to enable automatic checkout at the checkout counter without the need for human monitoring.

Automated/ Assisted Product Delivery - Delivery and assistance robots and drones have begun to take over product delivery, helping retail personnel in-store, and delivering purchases to customers' homes. For effective navigation and delivery, such robots and drones require camera systems that can dependably recognize objects and detect impediments. To accommodate the intricate design of robots and drones, these camera systems also need to offer flexible wiring choices.

Retail Store Analytics - In addition to improving the consumer and employee experience, embedded cameras used in different smart retail devices also assist owners of physical stores in gaining actionable insights into customer behavior, real-time inventory data, purchasing trends, etc. Through improved product positioning, improved product placement, improved inventory management, and improved retail automation, this data may be used to further optimize and improve store results.

Security and Smart Surveillance - Retailers may use AI-based algorithms to evaluate the image and video data using camera systems that are equipped with edge-level processing. These sophisticated surveillance camera systems are employed for a variety of tasks, including theft detection, demographic research, and people counting. Due to their potential for edge-level processing, these embedded vision camera systems are far more efficient than conventional CCTV or IP-based camera systems.

Retailers must invest in robust camera-enabled systems for greater data collecting, processing, and analysis if they want smart retail to become even smarter. Vision cameras that are integrated with computer vision and AI algorithms speed up retail automation, increase sales and profit margins, and decrease waste.

Embedded Vision Cameras: The Future is Already Here

The reality is that embedded vision cameras are essential for addressing operational problems and improving the experiences of customers and employees. Embedded vision will help retail store managers to examine important data points, thereby enabling the continual development of business operations. 

Many market research companies offer compelling information to support the phenomenal rise of integrated vision cameras. Senior research experts at 360-degree Market Updates, for instance, forecast that the global market for embedded vision cameras will grow from $974 million in 2021 to $2,993.6 million in 2026, at a CAGR of 25.17 percent. 

According to Global Market Insights, developments in technology like 4K resolution, edge-based video analytics, and H.265 high-efficiency video encoding will increase the market for embedded vision cameras. And as AI algorithms get more sophisticated and can handle more complicated use cases, embedded vision systems are a trend that will certainly continue to grow, especially in the smart retail sector.