The newest retail unicorn made in Switzerland

It’s Saturday afternoon and you're standing in the hardware store trying to find out if the product you’re looking at does what you need it to do. After five minutes wandering up and down the aisle, you decide to ask an employee for advice. Another three minutes pass before you find someone among the endless rows of tools and paint. Luckily, there is now a unique data capture solution for smart devices that will save you the effort. Software by the Swiss company Scandit allows retailers to integrate augmented reality features into their apps and offer customers all kinds of additional information when they scan a product’s barcode.

The technology can be used in a variety of ways. Scandit sells its software worldwide to customers in the retail, transport and logistics, healthcare, and manufacturing industries. In Switzerland, the second largest supermarket chain Coop uses mobile computer vision technology to allow customers to scan products with their own smartphone in store and skip the queues at check-out.

According to a case study, France’s largest mail delivery provider La Poste upgraded the scanning component of its employee app for mail and parcel deliveries with Scandit, making scanning 55% faster and more accurate in low light, at awkward angles and on damaged barcodes. Over 90,000 employees are now using the technology. The video below shows how Scandit makes the delivery process truly digital and thus more efficient:

Word has spread about Scandit's added value for a wide range of industries. What was launched as a start-up in 2009 by three researchers from MIT, ETH Zurich and IBM Research has become Switzerland’s newest unicorn. According to a recent press release, the Zurich-based company secured series D funding worth $150 million. The new investment takes the company’s value to over $1 billion and will further cement its position as the global leader in smart data capture. More than 1,700 global customers already count on the Swiss solution for better scanning results. From its headquarters in Zurich, Scandit coordinates seven different global locations and over 400 employees.