AI Disappointment Through The Story of Amazon's Checkout Free Stores

When we talk about AI these days, it seems we have reached the ultimate technological breakthrough and solutions for all or most problems is near. AI this, AI that. While general public is getting to know more and using various tools today, this topic hasn't been new for big tech. They have been dreaming about such innovations and they continue to do so. That's what they do. Innovate, experiment, and make money along the way. One of the biggest tech companies today is Amazon. There was a time when investors bet against it. Against all odds, at the time of uncertainty regarding where web was heading and what economic shifts were come along with it, Amazon made bold decisions and succeeded at its mission. When it was starting out, not many new that people would slowly abandon physical stores and would choose convenience of online shopping. Now there is much more shopping done online compared to shopping in physical stores. Both are needed and both serve a good purpose.

Amazon became a giant of online shopping. But that wasn't the only thing that make Amazin successful. Its Amazon Web Services side of business was a huge contribution to the companies success. Amazon is involved in many other business, projects, and developments as well. It has army of experts, programmers, builders, researchers, and a lot of money. Like any big tech company does, Amazon continues to pursue growing and not in one directions. One of the interesting ideas they decided to experiment with several years ago was the physical stores. Not regular stores, but stores powered with the lates technologies that would allow shoppers to enter and exit the stores without seeing a cashier or paying at the checkout. The promise has been, walk in, get what you need, and walk out. Technology will handle all the payments and stuff. Sounds amazing was my initial thought. Unfortunately I never got a chance to shop in one these stores. Maybe I will give it a try one day. But when I first read the story, it made complete sense. That is the future. That's the next big improvement physical stores need. Yes, online options will always be convenient. That doesn't mean we should completely get rid of physical stores. There is, and there still will be need for them in the years to come.

These Amazon stores, Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh were going to be powered by AI. Perhaps it would be the initial iteration of AI technology, but still AI. Computer Vision technology has been super advance already. Cameras are super advanced, software can recognize images and connect them with real world items, can recognize customers, actions, etc. Easy! We have been talking about driverless cars for as long as these stores have been around. Today, we have no doubt driverless cares are happening and will be big part of our lives. We don't need to fully understand the technology to make an educated decision that we are in the future already, almost.

To my surprise and disappointment Amazon's checkout free stores vision didn't turn out to be what they hoped it would be. It hasn't been successful yet. Will it ever be? Who knows. They have been closing some of the store at various locations. They have been changing the system to scanning bar codes, using RFIDs, etc. What happened to AI? What happened to walk in and out. I am not saying walk in and out without checkout doesn't exist today. I think it may still be active in some of the stores. But it hasn't been as successful as I was expecting it would be. Correct me if have shopped at any of these stores and what I am saying any of this is wrong. I am interested to know more such a good idea would fail. It is not always about idea. Execution of these ideas is more important.

What I have found out recently is that the AI technology Amazon was planning and advertising to use wasn't necessarily an AI, or very very bad version of it. It was semi-AI, if that is a thing. It wasn't the technology and system that Amazon built for these stores that would make such shopping experience, but rather outsourced team of thousand people keeping track of purchases, verifying payments, creating reports, etc. While it may seem for a shopper that technology is doing all the work. It turns out there is a team somewhere across the globe who is doing all the work. Basically, cashier jobs were outsourced. If someone said a decade ago that cashier jobs would be outsourced it was be very funny. How would you do that? Well, Amazon figured it out. Perhaps this was the initial testing phase and eventually there would be no need for outsourced workforce either. But the Amazon Go and Fresh stores have been failing due to the huge costs running them. Complete opposite of what the main goal of operating such stores. The idea was to get rid of the workforce, cut the human labor costs, and make more moneyz, all while advertising it as the better shopping experience.

There are several problems I see with what they did. First, it is very dishonest move. I guess they lie all the time, so why not. It reminds of a presentation of an advance robot that could do amazing things, and during the presentation having a human controlling it behind the scenes. This actually happened. So crazy. Isn't it is the same thing what Amazon did. Outsourcing have been a norm for a very long time, and it had negative economic effects to the local economies over the years. It's ok, we live in a global economy. A little bit of outsourcing doesn't hurt. But outsourcing cashier jobs seems strange. The main problem I have Amazon's experience is how they weren't able to accomplish something amazing with all the resources they have. They have all the money in the world, they have the best experts, they have the best programmers. What they don't have they can buy. This tells me all the money, staff, resources, and connections do not necessarily result in innovation.

That said I don't think they have completely failed. It is ok to fail once in a while, especially when you are big as Amazon. Some things will work, some things won't. You can learn along the way and make things better. Will that be the case with Amazon Go and Fresh stores. Why not? It may. But then there may be other visionaries and innovators building better systems. Especially in the AI field, when all the tech giants should have been leading the way, they weren't the ones who became the true innovators in the space. They will continue to fight for the market share, acquire companies, compete, etc. Will they continue innovating as they used to do? That is the question. Just talking about the idea of cashout free, cashierless stores, I think we will see many different systems created by startups who won't need to own and operate stores. They can just license or sell the system to existing stores. I am sure there will be many buyers, as companies always tend to go for cutting costs, especially if it means massive lay offs.

AI is awesome. It is the future. It is here. But we have also been overhyping the AI phenomenon, and expecting more than what it can deliver today. Tomorrow will be better. The innovation in computer technologies has been super fast, but not that fast that things would change in a year or two. Let me know your thoughts in the comments.