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You are here: Skip Navigation LinksRILA » Innovation

RILA's Retail Innovation Center

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RILA Innovation

The RTech Center for Innovation, an initative of the Retail Industry Leaders Association was created to help retailers navigate the industry’s transformation by empowering innovation executives with research, insights, and collaboration, as well as, exposing other executives to the technologies and innovations defining retail’s future. 

RTech is a new term that describes the confluence of retail and technology. An RTech company embodies the strongest values of both industries – global and local, nimble and entrepreneurial – to delight profoundly empowered consumers. The term is meant to accelerate retail innovation and to invigorate retail’s reputation with innovators, the next generation of retail talent, policymakers, and the public.


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What Is RTech

RTech is a new term that describes the confluence of retail and technology. An RTech company embodies the strongest values of both industries – global and local, nimble and entrepreneurial – to delight profoundly empowered consumers. The term is meant to accelerate retail innovation and to invigorate retail’s reputation with innovators, the next generation of retail talent, policymakers, and the public.


Four Cardinal Challenges

The Pressures Driving Industry Change have helped the RTech Center identify four critical challenges that face the retail industry. The Center embraces five Industry Pathways forward, that guide the RTech communities to address these challenges.

1. PRIORITIZING

Identifying and scaling high value projects by assessing consumer insights, futures planning, and innovators networks.

2. FUNDING

Battling unknown ROI with the desire for immediate payback and developing new measures of success for innovation.

3. TALENT

Dedicating resources and attracting the right combination of talent for the changing industry.

4. CULTURE

Breaking free from legacy structures, established processes, and operating enviornments.

Structure

The RTech Center for Innovation is structured with four councils to convene the industry’s innovation leaders and address their needs:


RTECH ADVISORY COUNCIL
Guides the strategy and priorities for the Center. Composed of RILA Premier member and founding member innovation chiefs, the Advisory Council acts as a sounding board for the Center’s activities and growth, and identifies potential collaborative interests.

RTECH COUNCIL
Acts as a pre-competitive forum to share best practices, and identify potential collaborative interests and industry needs. The RTech Council will be composed of retail chief innovation officers.

DIGITAL RETAIL COUNCIL
Convenes retail executives and digital technology firms to discuss e-commerce, omni-channel, and digital retailing. The Digital Retail Council provides a forum for retail’s digital executives to learn from digital technology leaders, identify future needs, and benchmark and share best practices.

RTECH INNOVATION NETWORK
Convenes venture capitalists, incubators, and accelerators with a focus on retail technologies and innovations; allowing the Center to keep a pulse on the latest ideas, technologies, and startups. The Network is a source for content at the Center’s events and a distribution channel for the Center’s research.

Innovation Partners

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RTech Talent Pipeline


RILA and The RTech Center for Innovation are building an RTech Collegiate Network to accelerate a talent pipeline: exposing young people to the opportunities in retail, then activating and employing them in the industry.

The talent pipeline addresses the need for recruiting employees with tech skills; it will do that in three phases. Phase one, beginning in 2018, focuses on four strategies the initiate the pipeline. Then phases two and three represent the holistic program to recruit new talent into the industry and help retailers build tech skills in-house.

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The RTech Center is advancing four strategies in 2018 to expose individuals with the retail-tech skills needed for the industry’s future:


1. HACKATHONS




Expose students to real retail challenges and attract them to the industry.

2. GLOBAL CASE COMPETITION

Host a student design thinking case competition for creative ideas to redesign retail in the circular economy.

3. LIVE-LEARNING STORES

Create physical, flexible, modular, multi-use stores on select university campuses.

4. RTECH ONLINE CERTIFICATION

Develop a certification specifically for mid- and senior-level retail executives to educate them on innovative trends, technologies, and practices.

Please contact Katie Nicholos at katie.nicholos@rila.org for additional information regarding this program or questions related to the RTech Center for Innovation.

RTech Open Innovation Engine

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Through the ROI engine RTech connects retailers to a diversity of innovative, entrepreneurial and creative problem-solvers to build a forum for retail open innovation – a new way of addressing complex business problems in a rapid, cost effective, and efficient way.

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 Recent Blog Posts

  • RILA Celebrates Supply Chain Innovation
  • RILA Hosts First HR Innovation Awards
  • Retailers Mentor Students in Innovation
  • CRC Brings AI to Environmental Compliance
  • Retailers Invite Students to Hack the Way Consumers Shop

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 Press Releases

  • RILA Recognizes Profitect as Leader in Data Analytics, Industry Innovation
    RILA today recognizes Profitect, a leader in prescriptive analytics software, as a valuable strategic partner to the Association and the industry.
  • WINNERS ANNOUNCED: RILA Recognizes Three Startups Driving Retail Innovation
    RILA today announced the winners of the 2019 RTech CEO Forum Innovation Awards, a program designed to connect retailers with companies enabling the industry's future.
  • Retail Industry Leaders Association Launches (R)Tech Open Innovation Engine: Connecting Retailers with Solvers
    Today, the Retail Industry Leaders Association, the trade association for America’s largest and most innovative brands, launched its (R)Tech Open Innovation (ROI) Engine.
  • Retail Industry Leaders Association Launches “September is for (R)Tech”
    ​Today, RILA kicked off its month-long initiative "September is for (R)Tech." Throughout the month, RILA will showcase news, initiatives and research focused on the future of retail and shopping experience.
  • RILA Announces First-Ever (R)Tech Global Retail Challenge
    ​Today, RILA announced its first-ever (R)Tech Global Retail Challenge in partnership with the Bensadoun School of Retail Management at McGill University

 Upcoming Events

  • Rtech Council Meeting March 2019
    March 3, 2019 in Las Vegas, NV
  • (R)Tech Center for Innovation Meeting
    September 17-19, 2018, Silicon Valley, CA

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