GK has acquired Nomitri, a start-up company specialising in vision recognition. Nomitri has made a name for itself with self-checkout solutions that protect retailers from customer fraud, reduce the frequency of manual interventions such as age checks and automatically detect loose products without barcodes.
Major GK customers such as Aldi Nord, Lidl and the African market leader Shoprite are currently introducing self-checkouts in their stores. Fraud prevention at these checkouts is one of the most important retail technology issues for these companies. With the acquisition of Nomitri, GK now adds a viable computer vision technology to its solution portfolio in this area.
The Berlin-based start-up’s solutions will be fully integrated into GK’s retail platform Cloud4Retail under the name GK Vision. Nomitri will continue to exist as a wholly owned subsidiary of GK. The founders Trinh Le-Fiedler and Max Fiedler will remain in management positions.
Challenge of theft at self-checkout
With an annual market value of over 600 million Euros, the self-checkout market is one of the most dynamic segments in retail technology. While self-checkouts reduce customer waiting times and help retailers cope with rising labour costs and staff shortages, they also bring challenges such as rising theft rates and high implementation costs. “Retailers are demanding fast, scalable, and cost-effective self-checkout solutions, and Nomitri has delivered time and time again,” says Michael Scheibner, CEO of GK.
With GK Vision, GK aims to offer a cost-effective retrofit module that uses existing hardware and connects it directly to GK’s cloud solutions. This approach means up to ten times less hardware investment for retailers. The technology can also be implemented in just two working days and is compatible with all POS software.
Cost-effective and safer at the SCO
“Access to a cost-effective method that is not prone to more fraud is of utmost importance when considering the transition to a self-checkout solution,” says Matthias Blodig, EVP Ventures and Strategy at GK: “We can extend GK’s range in this strategically important area even more and increase the speed of deployment while reducing costs for our customers.”
