Walmart wants us to believe it’s turning into a tech company

Its latest partnerships and new services show the retailer’s continued evolution toward becoming a tech-focused business.
The latest ventures: Earlier this week, Microsoft and Walmart announced a cloud computing partnership—that is, a collaboration between Amazon’s biggest retail and cloud competitors. Then the Information reported Walmart is planning to launch a video streaming platform that could be priced below Netflix and Amazon’s Prime Video services.
Walmart’s tech makeover: The retail giant is not shying away from introducing new innovations. For example...

• Walmart has partnered with Google to use AI to bolster online shopping.
• Last year, shelf-scanning robots began patrolling aisles in the company’s stores.
• It launched Jetblack, a same-day delivery service in June. It has plans to connect that to a voice ordering interface.

The business impact: The company's initiatives are at least one part genuine attempt to challenge Amazon’s innovations and one part PR push to seem technologically savvy and innovative. It's hard to say yet how these efforts have affected Walmart’s revenue. The company did see a big jump in e-commerce growth in the first quarter of 2018 but that was largely driven by its investments in website redesign and online grocery sales.
SOURCE:MIT DOWNLOAD