Amazon Pushes Further into Fashion in Europe

Amazon Pushes Further into Fashion in Europe This week, Amazon officially launched its first fashion private label that is designed in Europe specifically for European shoppers. The Find brand launched with a flurry of press coverage as well as an… Continue Reading

Facial Recognition: Coming Soon to a Smartphone Near You

Source: istockphoto.com

Facial recognition has long been the stuff of science fiction, with books and movies including scenes of facial or retinal scans being used to identify entrants to sensitive military complexes. The technology has also been used for certain niche purposes… Continue Reading

Walmart and JD.com Strengthen Partnership and Launch New 8/8 Shopping Festival

The past week brought news that Walmart and JD.com, China’s largest e-commerce company by revenue, are expanding the strategic partnership they formed last year. One element of this is the launch of a new shopping event—the JD-Walmart 8/8 omnichannel shopping… Continue Reading

Amazon Is Playing Its Part in Changing the Back-to-School Shopping Season

Economic conditions look good for back-to-school spending this year—unemployment is low, consumer confidence is at a 16-year high, housing prices have risen and gas prices remain low—leading to healthy forecasts for shopping this season. Fung Global Retail & Technology expects… Continue Reading

Reviewing WeChat, a Communication, Connection and Commerce Ecosystem with Almost a Billion Users

We recently attended the Rise 2017 Conference in Hong Kong, which is one of the largest technology conferences in Asia. The event featured a talk by Stephen Wang from Tencent, which owns the WeChat mobile app. Wang gave an overview… Continue Reading

Prime Day’s Importance Lies in Driving Reconsideration, Not Just Sales

This week saw Amazon offer up its third annual Prime Day—a feast of special offers available exclusively to Amazon Prime members. By the time this is published, many readers will have seen a slew of statistics on the sales values… Continue Reading

The Third Annual Amazon Prime Day Is Coming in Mid-July

As we look forward to the Fourth of July holiday and start easing into the dog days of summer, we also approach a major, if recently invented, shopping event—Amazon Prime Day—which will celebrate its third anniversary on Tuesday, July 11.… Continue Reading

Amazon Takes a Bite Out of the Grocery Market

Source: istockphoto.com

Amazon Takes a Bite Out of the Grocery Market Amazon’s planned purchase of Whole Foods Market is one of the most startling retail news stories of this decade, for several reasons: It is Amazon’s largest acquisition by far. The company… Continue Reading

A Visit to the New Amazon Bookstore in New York City

The Fung Global Retail & Technology team recently visited the newly opened Amazon Books location at The Shops at Columbus Circle in New York City. This is Amazon’s seventh bookstore, and follows store openings in California, Illinois, Massachusetts, Oregon and… Continue Reading

Thoughts on Voice Technology, Artificial Intelligence and Drones in Retail

Voice technology, artificial intelligence (AI) and delivery drones have been at the forefront of our conversations with retailers in the past week. Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com this week announced that it is planning to build China’s largest drone logistics network.… Continue Reading