Amazon has announced a significant upgrade to its Just Walk Out checkout technology, unveiling an advanced AI model designed to boost the system’s accuracy, efficiency, and speed in providing receipts to shoppers. This update leverages the same machine learning models that power many generative AI applications. The new AI model departs from the previous method of processing data piece-by-piece from various sources like cameras and shelf sensors. Instead, it analyzes all inputs simultaneously, creating a streamlined process to pinpoint exactly what shoppers are selecting and walking out with.
The technology is currently used in 170 third-party locations, all slated to receive the upgrade over the next month, according to Jon Jenkins, Amazon’s vice president of Just Walk Out. This move underscores Amazon’s strategy of expanding the technology’s reach beyond its own stores and into third-party retailers, stadiums, arenas, and corporate buildings.
Jenkins explained that the enhanced system optimizes data processing, leading to significant improvements. “It increases the accuracy of Just Walk Out technology even in complex shopping scenarios with variables such as camera obstructions, lighting conditions, and the behavior of other shoppers, while allowing us to simplify the system,” he wrote in a blog post. The update aims to make Just Walk Out more attractive to retailers, who, so far, have been hesitant to adopt the relatively expensive technology.
Following its integration into Amazon’s retail, the technology was shifted to the Amazon Web Services division, to facilitate third-party sales. Despite its benefits, convenience and grocery companies have often favored less costly self-checkout kiosks. Earlier this year, Amazon started to move its Amazon Fresh locations toward the company’s proprietary smart carts, known as Dash Carts, instead of Just Walk Out. Whole Foods Market has also removed Just Walk Out from stores that had the technology.
“If I’m going to go hang out at a large format grocery store for an hour on my weekly shopping trip, maybe something like our Dash Carts make more sense in those cases,” Jenkins said in an interview. Amazon recently started selling Dash Carts to other grocers as well.
At Amazon’s headquarters in Seattle, Jenkins hosted a tour of the Just Walk Out labs where the company developed this new multi-modal system. Scientists demonstrated how the system can distinguish between similar products and accurately track selections even in challenging conditions, such as when a customer picks up two packages of deli meat at once.
Just Walk Out technology appears to be particularly successful in locations where customer wait times are a concern, such as stadiums, airports, and arenas. Hudson, an airport convenience operator, has 16 Just Walk Out locations, and stadiums like Seattle’s T-Mobile Park and BMO Stadium in Los Angeles also use the technology. Jenkins sees great potential in locations that require 24-hour service, such as hospitals and residential buildings, as well as new venues that value the space-saving design of Just Walk Out-powered markets.
“I think we’re just sort of scratching the surface of what’s going to be possible with this sort of high-level type of technology. It’s allowing us to address new types of stores and new verticals,” Jenkins said. Amazon aims to double the number of third-party stores using the technology this year, according to a blog post.
In addition to Just Walk Out, Amazon is also rolling out an RFID-powered checkout system appropriate for stores where customers prefer browsing without checking in at a payment station before entering, such as clothing stores and merchandise shops. Amazon currently operates RFID-powered merchandise stores in five stadiums, including Seattle’s Lumen Field, Florida’s Hard Rock Stadium and Children’s Mercy Park in Kansas City.
As the Just Walk Out system collects and processes more customer data, it learns and becomes more accurate and efficient, Jenkins said. Retailers will be able to install fewer hardware fixtures, resulting in decreased costs. Reducing costs to improve return on investment for retailers is a top priority for Just Walk Out: “It’s definitely our goal to drive costs down so that we can expand the market.”
