IoT Hero - Zliide develops Bluetooth tags with BGM220 to enhance fashion consumption experience
Latest update time:2021-10-06 08:44
Reads:
Silicon Labs
recently
interviewed
Morten Møgelmose
,
co-founder and CEO of
Zliide
, a Denmark-based company that provides solutions that integrate the digital and physical worlds for the fashion retail industry. Zliide’s Bluetooth tags, based on
Silicon
Labs
’
BGM220
Bluetooth
module
,
enable a seamless integration of virtual and in-store retail activities, providing a more intuitive customer experience.
Zliide
tags connect to shoppers’ smartphones, allowing them to conveniently self-checkout at any time and access product information, photos and videos to enhance their shopping experience. The tags also provide retailers with valuable data, including analysis of specific stores, items and customer preferences.
Morten
shares
the background of
Zliide
and how its innovative tag technology works in this article. Please click
Read the original article
or scroll down to browse the full content.
Please briefly introduce
Zliide
company and products
Morten:
Zliide
is a Danish company founded in
2016
with the philosophy of putting the consumer experience first. Fashion retail has always been very good at providing a good experience for consumers, but because many stores have ignored the digital evolution,
Zliide
's solution aims to enable fashion retailers to provide an omnichannel experience, combining offline and online experiences.
We are doing this with
the
Zliide
Bluetooth tag, which is attached to every item in the store and operates like a standard security tag, but allows the user to scan the tag with the
Zliide
app and access a digital version of the item in the app. It can display videos and images of the item on a model or in motion, allowing shoppers to really imagine themselves in the item, and then consumers can purchase the item on their phone using mobile payments. Once the item has been paid for, the security tag unlocks and the customer can leave the store with their purchase. For now, the technology is only available in Denmark, but the hope is to expand to other Nordic countries, perhaps the UK, in the coming years.
Please share the process of creating
Zliide
tags
Morten:
The idea for the
Zliide
label started from an experience I had at a Nike store in London. I was using
Airbnb
and
Uber
when I arrived in London
, and everything was just a click away on my phone, but then I went into a store and actually had to wait for someone to process my payment before I could buy something. This was inconvenient because people have become so used to having a lot of cool technology in the last few years to make the user experience easy. This experience got me into starting a company and product.
How do Zliide
tags differ from the security tags commonly seen in fashion stores?
Morten:
The basic purpose of traditional tags is to maintain the safety of goods and meet the basic requirements of stores; but we also believe that if store owners install hardware on every item in the store, the potential for building data collection on the tags and providing a better consumer experience will be huge.
Zliide
's products enable customers to interact with every item in the store, accessing pictures and videos of anything they want, anytime, anywhere. It's all about freedom and convenience for stores and consumers, as well as building data collection possibilities for retailers. We allow communication by introducing Bluetooth connectivity on the tag with the end user's mobile device. We have done this in the
Zliide
tag and are now bringing products to the market based on
Silicon Labs
'
BGM220
Bluetooth module.
Additionally, in recent years we have seen
growth in
RFID
tags that allow dealers to do limited inventory counts using
RFID
scanners. With our solution, retailers have the added benefit of doing an instant daily inventory count.
Why did you decide to use
Silicon Labs
' solution?
Morten:
We first
became aware of
Silicon Labs
’ solutions through
Arrow,
a distributor
. The company’s representative introduced us to
the BGM220
and its features, and we were very impressed. All the features we wanted, including security, battery life, and over-the-air (
OTA
) updates, were met, as not being able to easily update software would have been a big risk.
On top of that, by using
the
BGM220
module, we were able to minimize the size and
the number of components on
the PCB
. Another important factor for us was the reduced cost of the equipment due to mass production, a fashion store could easily introduce
10,000
Zliide
tags
.
In fact, we have received a lot of support from
Silicon Labs
. For a young company like us, we can get key technical support and commitment, which helps us to truly thrive in a competitive world. With these valuable and rich resources,
Zliide
can create better products and truly differentiate itself from other products in the industry.
How do you think
retail IoT will develop
in the next
5-8
years, and what impact will
COVID-19
have on the market?
Morten:
From a technology perspective, we see a lot of technology going on in retail right now. Recently, a lot of investment has gone into the back end of retail businesses to optimize the supply chain. I think if you have a large number of stores, you need to leverage consumer-facing technology to take those stores to the next level. We may see that technology in fashion retail still lags behind some other retail stores, such as supermarkets, convenience stores, etc., because the fashion industry has high-value items that they want to protect, while in convenience stores and supermarkets, the security requirements are relatively low; you can just use a barcode scanner to speed up the customer experience. Our technology will be the fastest solution to enable more high-value items to be self-checked out.
COVID-19
has had a significant impact on the revenue streams of these fashion retail companies. When closing stores, they can lose
80-90%
of their revenue per day. This has made retailers realize two things: First, they need to prepare differently now than they did before. Second, they need to realize that digitalization is the only way out. If the
COVID-19
outbreak continues to have an impact, retailers can still use
the
Zliide
online platform to allow users to buy things from their stores and ship them.
In 5
years, we will see a lot of changes in the industry, and companies that fail to keep up with technological advances will likely face losses.
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