amless online-offline customer experience. Over 20,000 items are available for purchase at Home Times, including furniture, kitchenware, home decor, stationery and travel essentials—a majority of which are sourced from merchants already selling through Alibaba’s B2C shopping platform Tmall. And a phone in hand is all it takes for seamless shopping. Shoppers scan each item’s QR code with their smartphones to see the product name, price, description, and instantly purchase using Alibaba’s mobile payment service Alipay. “We have the hardware and know-how to build New Retail-driven stores, and we work with partners that have access to offline channels and expertise in operating physical storefronts,” said William Chen, who heads the Home Times project at Alibaba’s Cloud Retail division. “We provide the technology and Tmall’s pool of consumer insights.” Tmall analyzes the behavior and preferences of users within a five-mile radius of the shop. Products are then handpicked from these users’ top preferred categories and added to store shelves. This system cuts the time required to source products worldwide for traditional retailers down to a single day, while store offerings will change every 10 to 15 days, added Chen. Each product has an electronic price tag that can automatically sync prices with the latest seen online, removing the need for staff to manually print and replace the labels. Large screen displays on the wall allow customers to see their desired furniture and décor in a virtual home setting. This also indicates that Home Times requires significantly less display space, compared to traditional furniture sellers, since products can be displayed virtually. Home Times is set to open two new branches in Hangzhou by the end of 2017, including one at the In77 shopping center in the Hubin business district and another at an undecided location in West Hangzhou. It plans to open 15 to 20 new stores in 2018. “We definitely want to open this system to more businesses. Plans to apply our New Retail infrastructure to industries beyond home furnishing are underway,” said Chen. $15 billion global research program launched Meanwhile Alibaba Group has also launched a global research program, Alibaba Damo Academy, “Damo” standing for discovery, adventure, momentum and outlook. It designed to increase technological collaboration worldwide, advance the development of technology and make the world more inclusive by narrowing the technology gap. Alibaba expects to invest more than US$15 billion in research and development over the next three years, and the academy will oversee the opening of labs worldwide and seek to recruit 100 talented scientists and researchers. Headed by Alibaba Group’s chief technology officer, Jeff Zhang, the academy will first focus on opening seven research labs – in China (Beijing and Hangzhou), Singapore, Israel, Russia and the US (two). The labs will concentrate on both foundational and disruptive technology research including data intelligence, internet of things (IoT), fintech, quantum computing and human-machine interaction. Those broad research areas will include topics such as machine learning, network security, visual computing and natural language processing (NLP). It is also intended the Damo labs will collaborate with technology and education experts to explore breakthroughs aimed at improving the lives of technology end-users and boosting the efficiency and security of enterprises globally. “Over the past 18 years we have developed a robust technology infrastructure that supports the rapid growth of our business,” says Zhang. “With our global expansion, we have grown and refined our technology manifold. We are now looking for talented and driven researchers to join us in the quest for new disruptive technologies.” * Photo courtesy: Alizila, which is the Alibaba-funded, but independent news source on Alibaba Group activities. This content first appeared on sister site, Inside Retail Asia.