The following consortium partners support the project
Consortium leader: team neusta
With its 23 subsidiaries the owner-operated group of companies, team neusta, covers all aspects of the digital value chain. The group’s core business consists of consultancy, development and implementation of complex software-, mobile- and e-commerce solutions. Additionally services in the sectors of conception, staff, design, usability and communication are offered. Currently team neusta employs 1.100 employees as well as 500 freelancers and is located in Bremen, Hamburg, Hannover, Munich, Berlin, Cologne, Essen and Lachen (CH). The group, which has celebrated its 25 anniversary in 2018, has generated a turnover of 120 Mio. Euro in 2019.
AI is a strategic forward-looking topic which is looked after by the business development on a holding level. For the project, team neusta is building a team consisting of several of its subsidiarie’s experts. Project leadership and business development is assumed by team neusta. The relevant subsidiaries delegate employees to the project team, who bring with them their technological competences, the industry and problem solution know-how as well as their customer networks. Together, the company group team neusta holds active partnerships with relevant product and technology providers such as SAP Commerce (formerly known as hybris), Microsoft, Salesforce, Atlassian, Sitecore, Shopware and many more. Furthermore essential open source products such as Magento and Typo3 are utilized.
The customer network consists of many mid- to large-sized commercial enterprises. Additionally, there are customers in multiple industries who have similar processes and who therefore can also be addressed by the projects outcomes.
Partner
DFKI
The German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) is Germany’s leading business-oriented research institution in the field of innovative software technologies based on artificial intelligence methods. Currently, approximately 630 highly qualified scientists, administrative staff and 450 student employees from more than 65 nations are working on more than 250 research projects.
The Robotics Innovation Center (RIC) combines the two focal points of artificial intelligence and robotics. At the RIC, scientists under the direction of Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Frank Kirchner, are developing mobile robot systems which are used for complex tasks on land, at sea, in the air and in space.
The resulting ideas and findings from research and application of the research results are not only taken into account in the development of novel vehicle concepts, but are also applied in other fields.
In the Innovative Retail Lab (IRL) of DFKI, research is conducted under the direction of Prof. Dr. Antonio Krüger on the topic of intelligent shopping of the future and the benefits for customers and employees are tested. For example, virtual allergy or diet assistants, personalised cross- and up-selling, intelligent changing rooms, interior positioning and navigation as well as novel logistics concepts are being tested. In addition, the preparation and follow-up of purchases at home also play a role, as can be seen, for example, in the intelligent pantry, the digital household book or topics such as voice commerce.
The RIC also contributes its expertise in creating an overview platform of AI strategies, which the retail trade can use as a basis for orientation in order to use the appropriate technology for the respective application, making the retailer competitive and promising for the future.
dm-drogerie markt
Since the opening of the first drugstore in Karlsruhe in 1973, dm-drogerie markt (dm) has focused on holistic, entrepreneurial and social thinking. Today, dm is one of the leading trading companies in Europe with more than 60,000 employees and just under 2,000 dm stores in Germany.
dmTECH
With more than 800 employees, dmTech is revolutionising the digital world of commerce. Thus, with the help of machine learning and big data, innovative digital services are created for customers of dm, e.g. individual product recommendations in the online shop. dmTech would now like to apply these experiences in the stationary store world too, and create a relevant experience for customers using the various available data. Decades of experience in the construction and operation of ERP systems and in process consulting for retail round off the portfolio of dmTECH.
EHI Retail Institute
Founded in 1951, today the EHI Retail Institute is a research and consulting institute for retail and its partners with about 80 employees. The network comprises around 800 member companies from the retail, consumer and capital goods industries as well as IT service providers. These include both international corporations and small and medium-sized enterprises. In addition to identifying 25 cross-industry structural data, the research topics include digitalisation and IT solutions, payment systems, marketing, shopfitting, energy management, omnichannel trading, commercial properties and expansion as well as logistics.
fortiss
fortiss is the Munich-based research and transfer institute for software-intensive systems and services of the Free State of Bavaria and affiliated institute of the Technical University of Munich. The institute has the expertise to handle technical and economic tasks in heterogeneous ecosystems holistically. As part of the BayernCloud project, fortiss is developing a platform ecosystem for SMEs in Bavaria. Contributions are the modeling and simulation, the definition of growth strategies and the creation of concepts for data integration and monetisation. Relevant technical contributions are semantic data integration using ontologies and semantic web technologies.
Fraunhofer Gesellschaft
The department “Robotics and Assistance Systems” of the Fraunhofer IPA designs with more than 70 scientists automation solutions for commercial applications, the service sector as well as the everyday support. Due to industrial projects with various retailers, there are long-standing contacts and experience in the retail sector. In addition to systems for robot perception and manipulation of objects and environments, algorithms have been developed for creating digital 3D models of products. For this, there is a cooperation with the SME Kaptura.
Fraunhofer IIS mainly deals with audio and media technologies and cognitive sensors. The focus of research are technologies for sensors, data transmission technology, data analysis methods and the exploitation of data as part of data-driven services and corresponding business models.
Nagarro AES
nagarro AES is a German, innovation-driven SAP and Microsoft full-service provider for critical enterprise applications and complex ERP landscapes. With innovative IT solutions nagarro ES supports, among others, leading trading companies to create a more attractive customer journey, to save costs and to increase efficiency.
Technische Universität München
The Technical University of Munich (TUM) has extensive experiences in the environment of ecosystem analysis and digital platform business models. For example, in a large joint project “Living Lab Connected Mobility” (LLCM), a digital platform was initiated in the mobility sector.
TeamViewer
TeamViewer is a leading global technology company that provides a connectivity platform to remotely access, control, manage, monitor, and repair devices of any kind – from laptops and mobile phones to industrial machines and robots. Though TeamViewer is free of charge for private use, the company has more than 550,000 subscribers and enables companies of all sizes and from all industries to digitalize their business-critical processes through seamless connectivity. With TeamViewer Frontline, it offers a fully integrated end-to-end augmented reality solution platform for smart glasses, various wearables, smartphones, or tablets. Frontline is optimizing processes along the entire industrial value chain, and thus can be used in logistics, production and assembly, after sales service, and for training purposes.
Since the company’s foundation in 2005, TeamViewer’s software has been installed on more than 2.5 billion devices around the world. The company is headquartered in Goeppingen, Germany, and employs more than 1,200 people globally. TeamViewer AG (TMV) is listed at Frankfurt Stock Exchange and belongs to the MDAX. Further information can be found at www.teamviewer.com.
Universität Bremen, IAI
The institute for Artificial Intelligence (IAI) at the University of Bremen, directed by Prof. Dr. h.c. Michael Beetz, PhD, is one of the leading research facilities in the field of cognitive robotics. One of the institute’s main goals is to advance research, not only via the publication of research papers but also by publishing open source software and providing robotic test data. With this goal in mind, the institute has already initiated and advanced multiple open source projects, such as PCL, RoboSherlock, KnowRob or CRAM. IAI successfully finished the EU FP7 projects RoboHow, RoboEarth, SHERPA, ACat and SAPHARI and is currently working on international projects such as the H2020 project REFILLS. In REFILLS, IAI has developed a functional model, which enables the logistic in retail stores via mobile service robots in a tight and intelligent collaboration with humans. In it, the most important internal logistic processes of retail stores are addressed. Since 2017 Prof. Michael Beetz, PhD, is coordinating the special field of research Everyday Activity Science and Engineering (EASE). EASE is investigating how information processes need to be conceptualized and realized in order for humans and robots to be able to master complex everyday manipulation tasks. Additionally EASE is concerned with research on which knowledge, competencies, and skills are required from the agents in order to solve the manipulation tasks in a flexible, efficient and reliable fashion.
Funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action on the basis of a resolution of the German Bundestag.