Diario Financiero (often referred to as DF) is the premier source for business, economic, and financial news in Chile. Having our technology and growth strategy showcased in their DF MAS weekend edition is a major milestone that validates the hard work of our founders—Ariel Schilkrut, Luis Vera, and Álvaro Soto—and our entire global team.

Expanding Our European Footprint The article zeroes in on a pivotal moment for our company following our team’s recent visit to the EuroShop retail trade fair in Düsseldorf, Germany. Today, Zippedi robots are actively operating in stores across The Netherlands, Germany, and Denmark. We are successfully working with major home improvement chains in the region, including Hornbach, and are actively planning further rollouts in additional European countries.

The feature also notes the invaluable support of our long-time strategic partner, Sodimac, whose expansive presence has helped us gain a strong foothold and recognition within the European retail ecosystem.

Record Growth and Looking Ahead Beyond our push into Europe, the DF MAS piece highlights the massive operational milestones we have hit recently:

• We now have nearly 200 robots operating worldwide.
• Our fleet has accumulated around 14 million kilometers of navigated retail aisles.
• We are currently valued near US$ 100 million and are preparing for a projected growth of at least 3x this year.

As our CEO, Ariel Schilkrut, discussed in the interview, we are continually looking toward the future of retail technology. This includes exploring “Physical AI”—developing robots capable of manipulating objects and executing physical tasks on the store floor through natural language instructions.

From the aisles of Chile where our robots are known as “Tito,” to Japan, and now across Europe, we remain fiercely committed to transforming global retail operations from the ground up.

Read the full article here: https://www.df.cl/df-mas/punto-de-partida/el-salto-a-europa-de-los-robots-de-zippedi

“It’s getting crazier and crazier… Soon we’ll no longer need any staff in the stores,” wrote one Hornbach visitor on social media, sharing photos of Zippie driving through the aisles.

According to a Hornbach spokesperson, things won’t get that bad, she emphasized after RTL Nieuws asked. The new robot won’t replace any staff members at the store. 

Scan empty shelves

So what exactly does it do? The robot circulates around Zwolle, scanning the shelves with a camera to detect which ones are (almost) empty. It then relays this information to colleagues, who can then reorder or replenish the products. “This prevents empty shelves, frees up colleagues to focus on customers, and ensures customers don’t miss out.”

The robot was “test-driven” in Zwolle for six months. Before it could be put to work, it was programmed to navigate the hardware store. According to the spokesperson, there were no collisions. “No, customers are positive too. Children, in particular, enjoy seeing the robot.”

The robot states that the camera does not capture recognizable images of people, and that the images the robot takes will be deleted after 14 days.

Next month, Zippie will also be crossing the border and starting work at a German Hornbach store, where the robot’s deployment will be further investigated. The entire Netherlands may then be next. According to Hornbach, the DIY store is the first in the Dutch retail market to have such a robot operating.

Source: https://www.rtl.nl/nieuws/binnenland/artikel/5569179/hornbach-robot-producten-scannen-zippie

The article highlights the fantastic, long-standing partnership between Zippedi and our valued customer, Sodimac, focusing on their incredible commitment to driving innovation and enhancing the customer experience.

More Than a Client: A Strategic Partner

The feature dives into how strategic partnerships with startups like ours are helping retailers transform their in-store operations. As highlighted in the piece, our relationship with Sodimac dates back to 2019. Over the years, they have become much more than a client; they are a true strategic partner.

By continuously supporting our R&D processes, we have been able to co-create solutions that directly impact daily store operations and high-level corporate decision-making.

Meet “Tito”: Empowering Teams with AI

One of our favorite highlights from the article is the mention of how Sodimac’s store teams have embraced our technology—even affectionately naming our autonomous robot “Tito.” Operating at night, Tito navigates the store aisles to detect out-of-stock items and validate prices. By automating these essential but routine tasks, our technology frees up valuable time for Sodimac’s team members, allowing them to focus on what matters most: helping customers and ensuring product availability.

Expanding Across Latin America

The La Tercera article features a special shout-out to our VP of Customer Success, Sebastián Oyanedel Martínez. In the piece, Sebastián summarizes the impact of our collaboration:

“Thanks to this alliance, today our robots help customers and collaborators in all Sodimac stores in Chile, and we are expanding our service to the rest of the stores in Latin America.”

Thank You

We want to extend a massive thank you to Sodimac for this incredible partnership and for believing in the power of AI and robotics to revolutionize retail. We also want to thank La Tercera for telling our story and highlighting the real-world impact of our technology.

We remain dedicated to our mission of optimizing retail operations and look forward to continuing our expansion across Latin America and beyond!

This prestigious recognition from one of Chile’s leading newspapers is a tremendous honor. It serves as a powerful testament to the relentless hard work of our amazing team, the ambitious vision of our founders—Ariel Schilkrut, Luis Vera, and Alvaro Soto—and the unwavering trust our clients and investors have placed in us over the years.

A Mission to Transform Retail

Since our founding in 2017, Zippedi’s mission has been clear: to revolutionize retail operations. Through our autonomous robots and advanced AI platform, we provide retailers with real-time, high-precision data. By tackling critical everyday challenges like out-of-stock items and price inaccuracies, we empower retailers to optimize their operations and ultimately deliver a vastly improved shopper experience.

From Chile to the Global Stage

While we are incredibly proud of our Chilean roots, our vision has always been global. Over the past few years, we have successfully expanded our operations to countries across the Americas, Europe, and Asia—including highly competitive and challenging markets like Japan.

As our co-founder, Alvaro Soto, perfectly captured in the El Mercurio feature: “This is a validation that we can compete globally and a huge honor.”

Looking Ahead

We want to extend a massive thank you to Innovación El Mercurio for this incredible feature, and to everyone who has been a part of the Zippedi story so far. Whether you are an employee, an investor, or a client, your support has been integral to our success.

This recognition doesn’t just celebrate our past; it fuels our future. We are more motivated than ever to continue pushing the boundaries of AI and robotics, optimizing the retail industry with reliable, real-time data.

Read the full report: Check out the complete “Top 100 Startups” feature by El Mercurio here: https://top100innovacion.elmercurio.com/

Recently featured by Google Japan (originally published on Think with Google), this pilot demonstrated exactly how powerful AI-driven robotics can be when integrated into a bustling, real-world retail environment.

Real-Time Digital Twins on the Sales Floor

For this pilot, Zippedi’s shelf-scanning robots, powered by advanced deep learning models and control systems running on Google Cloud, were deployed to operate autonomously within CAINZ’s Japanese store environments.

The goal was to accurately detect on-shelf inventory and price tags, transforming physical aisles into a real-time digital twin of the store. To make this actionable, the system delivered two daily alert reports directly to store associates, perfectly optimized for their specific operational workflows and timing.

The Results: A Leap in Operational Efficiency

The results of the pilot speak for themselves. By giving store teams highly efficient visibility into the sales floor, we achieved massive improvements:

• 12% decrease in in-store stockouts.
• 50% reduction in pricing display errors.
• 74% cut in investigation time for stockouts, leading to vastly faster issue resolution.

Lifting the Entire Value Chain

This successful pilot proves that optimizing offline store operations doesn’t just help the associates on the floor—it leads to greater efficiency across the entire value chain.

We want to extend a huge thank you to Hirotoshi Nakahara and the brilliant team at Google, our partners at CAINZ, and every single Zippedi teammate who worked hard to make this incredible milestone possible. We are excited to continue driving digital transformation in retail across the globe!

You can read the full article here: https://business.google.com/jp/think/future-of-marketing/zippedi/

That is why we are incredibly proud to be officially featured as a Google Cloud Success Story!

The newly published case study dives deep into how our transition to Google Cloud’s serverless, auto-scalable architecture has revolutionized our operations, reduced our costs, and most importantly, amplified the value we deliver to our retail partners.

The Challenge: Scaling on Demand

Our robots operate in dynamic environments. We needed a system that could provide immense computing resources when the robots are actively scanning aisles, while keeping costs low when they are inactive.

As Rodrigo González, our VP of Software Engineering, explains in the feature:

“The core vision of the business is scalability—making use of resources on demand and aligning with our operational distribution. The goal was to provide resources to the robots when they are active, and keep them on a low budget when inactive.”

By migrating to Google Cloud and utilizing technologies like Cloud Composer, Cloud Run, Vertex AI, Vision AI, BigQuery, and Bigtable, we built a fully auto-scalable system capable of processing visual information in real-time.

The Impact by the Numbers

The results of this cloud transformation have been monumental, not just for our internal efficiency, but for our clients’ bottom lines. By leveraging Google Cloud, we have achieved:

• Faster Insights: We reduced the time it takes to supply real-time data from 2 hours to just 15 minutes.
• Operational Efficiency: We saw a 60% decrease in operational and administrative costs.
• Unmatched Reliability: Our system recovery time dropped dramatically from 6 hours to just 20 minutes.
• Client ROI: Our clients are seeing incredible returns, securing an ROI between 4x and 10x, alongside a reduction of up to 350 labor hours per store per month and a potential 3% increase in sales.

A Strategic Partnership

This leap in efficiency means our team can focus less on maintaining local servers and more on innovating.

“Previously, maintaining our local servers required a lot of effort,” says Zippedi Co-Founder and Executive Director, Ariel Schilkrut. “Today, thanks to the auto-scalable system we built on Google Cloud, we don’t need to take extra actions. We just need to ensure the robot arrives at the store where we want to implement it and that it is easy to use.”

Our CTO, Kishor Taywade, also highlighted the human element behind this success:

“The dedication and professionalism of the Google Cloud team have facilitated the optimization of our solutions and the continuous growth of our company, consolidating a very positive and productive collaboration.”

Looking Ahead with Generative AI

We aren’t stopping here. The future of Zippedi with Google Cloud is incredibly bright. We are already exploring deeper integrations with Vertex AI to automate our AI model training processes. Furthermore, we have begun testing Gemini, Google’s most advanced AI model, to provide our clients with even deeper visibility into store conditions—from product presentation and cleanliness to promotional displays.

We are thrilled to continue this journey alongside Google Cloud, pushing the boundaries of what is possible in retail technology!

Read the full success story: Check out the complete feature on the official Google Cloud website here: Zippedi Caso de Éxito | Google Cloud

Expanding Our Footprint

This expansion brings our autonomous retail technology to a wide range of new locations. We are thrilled to have our robots rolling out to stores in the following cities:

• Bogotá
• Medellín
• Cali
• Bucaramanga
• Pereira
• Cartagena
• Cúcuta
• Barranquilla
• Chía

Say Hello to “TEVO”

While many know our shelf-scanning robot as “Zippy,” it has received a special new identity for this Colombian deployment. The Homecenter Sodimac team has officially baptized the robot “TEVO”!

TEVO is hard at work capturing real-time, highly accurate shelf data to help store teams optimize operations and ensure customers can always find what they need.

Moving Forward

We are incredibly grateful for the hard work and collaboration of the entire Homecenter Sodimac Colombia team and our dedicated Zippedi crew who made this launch a reality. Expanding our footprint in Latin America with such a committed strategic partner is a tremendous step forward for our company. We look forward to seeing the continuous impact TEVO will have on retail operations across Colombia!

Held in the beautiful and historic city of Rome, Italy, from June 11th to 13th, 2024, this marked our third consecutive year attending the world’s premier networking event for the Do-It-Yourself and Home Improvement retail industry, and our second time as official sponsors.

Standing Out as a Platinum Sponsor

Seeing the Zippedi logo displayed on the main stage as a Platinum Sponsor alongside other global industry leaders was an incredibly proud moment for our team. It is a true testament to how much our footprint has grown within the global home improvement sector, building on our successful partnerships with leading DIY retailers around the world.

Connecting with the Future of Home Improvement

The Global DIY-Summit is the ultimate gathering for retailers and manufacturers to discuss the future of the home improvement market. Sponsoring and attending this event gives us the perfect platform to connect with industry visionaries and showcase how AI-driven robotics and real-time digital twins are revolutionizing store operations.

From preventing stockouts to ensuring pricing accuracy, our conversations in Rome reaffirmed that digital transformation and operational efficiency are top priorities for home improvement retailers worldwide.

Looking Ahead

We want to extend a huge thank you to the organizers of the Global DIY-Summit for hosting such a spectacular and insightful event in Rome. We also want to thank all the partners, clients, and new friends who stopped to connect with the Zippedi team.

We are already looking forward to continuing these conversations and helping more DIY retailers transform their aisles with high-precision data!

A nivel internacional, la empresa creció en cuanto a la gama de productos y a la oferta a nivel de cada país, “porque la clave para nosotros siempre ha sido escuchar al consumidor y aprender que si por ejemplo, pruebas una Not Milk en Chile y una en Brasil, no son iguales, porque están desarrolladas para públicos distintos, con gustos distintos y apreciaciones diferentes, y es ahí donde debemos aprender a adaptarnos”, explica Rodrigo Contreras, director de Investigación de NotCo.

Esta es una de las historias que reúne el libro “Innovación y Emprendimiento, 100 casos de alto impacto”, iniciativa de la Vicerrectoría de Investigación, con el apoyo de la Vicerrectoría de Comunicaciones y Extensión Cultural, y de ANID, Fundación Copec UC y DICTUC. Se trata de innovaciones que han llegado o están prontas a llegar al mercado, y que han nacido en la Universidad Católica o han contado con su apoyo. Asimismo, se incluyen casos ejemplares desarrollados por ex estudiantes de la universidad, en los cuales la impronta UC ha tenido un rol relevante.

Desde Chile con innovación

Un factor clave entre estas 100 historias destacadas, es que tienen proyección fuera de las fronteras nacionales, “porque es posible no solamente impactar a la sociedad chilena, sino que de aquí hacia el mundo, y eso es lo que realmente estamos logrando a partir de numerosos casos”, asegura el vicerrector de Investigación Pedro Bouchon.

Probablemente una característica que une todas estas historias sea la perseverancia. “A nosotros nos dijeron que no muchas veces, y seguíamos insistiendo, creyendo en nuestro proyecto, pensando que sí se podía lograr”, comenta Álvaro Soto, co-fundador de Zippedi.

Se trata de un robot que revisa el stock de los productos en las góndolas de los supermercados y crea de manera automática un informe que permite la reposición de dichos productos. Al relatar el camino con este emprendimiento, el también profesor de Ingeniería UC, reconoce que “fue la insistencia la que nos llevó a estar hoy en Colombia y Estados Unidos con nuestro robot”.

Es sabido que en el camino al crecimiento, muchas veces las complicaciones terminan por hacer desaparecer una muy buena idea o un muy buen proyecto, “es por eso que es fundamental la interacción entre las entidades públicas, privadas y la universidad, para promover que estas tecnologías lleguen a la sociedad y la transferencia sea exitosa. Sólo así podremos ser una fuente de inspiración para las futuras generaciones, solucionando muchas problemáticas que aquejan a la sociedad actual”, asegura Valentina Veloso, una de las creadoras de Yaku, el poderoso biofiltro que se ocupa para reutilizar las aguas grises, gracias a que contiene microorganismos que naturalmente remueven los contaminentes del agua, dejándola apta para riego y reduciendo el 50% del consumo de agua potable.

“Estamos orgullosas de ser parte de las pocas startups nacionales en ser fundados por científicas chilenas. Es más, es uno de los pocos en donde su tecnología fue 100% creada y desarrollada en Chile, logrando resultados acordes a estándares internacionales”, afirma junto a Camila Cárdenas, cofundadora de la iniciativa. La UC les permitió llevar a cabo la etapa de I+D inicial y validar la tecnología en laboratorio. Gracias al Capital Semilla de Corfo, realizaron las pruebas de laboratorio en la Universidad, junto al Dr. Ignacio Vargas de Ingeniería Hidráulica, experto en aguas grises. Cuentan con un acuerdo de colaboración, comparten la propiedad intelectual y tienen el respaldo de la Dirección de Transferencia y Desarrollo UC para todo el proceso de patentamiento de la tecnología.

Quizá uno de los casos más conocidos es el de NotCo. Una foodtech que utiliza la inteligencia artificial, a través de un algoritmo -creado por el profesor de la Escuela de Ingeniería Karim Pichara- que reconoce patrones entre los componentes de la comida y la percepción humana, entendiendo los sabores y texturas de cada uno de ellos y posicionando alimentos de origen 100% vegetal.

A nivel internacional, la empresa creció en cuanto a la gama de productos y a la oferta a nivel de cada país, “porque la clave para nosotros siempre ha sido escuchar al consumidor y aprender que si por ejemplo, pruebas una Not Milk en Chile y una en Brasil, no son iguales, porque están desarrolladas para públicos distintos, con gustos distintos y apreciaciones diferentes, y es ahí donde debemos aprender a adaptarnos”, explica Rodrigo Contreras, director de Investigación de NotCo.

Esta es una de las historias que reúne el libro “Innovación y Emprendimiento, 100 casos de alto impacto”, iniciativa de la Vicerrectoría de Investigación, con el apoyo de la Vicerrectoría de Comunicaciones y Extensión Cultural, y de ANID, Fundación Copec UC y DICTUC. Se trata de innovaciones que han llegado o están prontas a llegar al mercado, y que han nacido en la Universidad Católica o han contado con su apoyo. Asimismo, se incluyen casos ejemplares desarrollados por ex estudiantes de la universidad, en los cuales la impronta UC ha tenido un rol relevante.

Fuente: https://www.uc.cl/noticias/innovacion-en-la-uc-100-casos-de-alto-impacto/

Adclean
Industria: BioTechnology
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Mauricio Navarrete

AgendaPro
Industria: SaaS / software
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Julio Guzmán

Awto
Industria: Movilidad
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Francisco Loehnert

Bemmbo
Industria: SaaS fintech
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Rodrigo Oyarzún

Betterfly
Industria: Salud
Empleados: +200
Fundador: Cristóbal della Maggiora Herrera

Buda.com
Industria: Fintech / criptomonedas
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Guillermo Torrealba

Buk
Industria: Seguros
Empleados: +200
Fundador: Jaime Arrieta

Cacttus
Industria: Movilidad
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Agustín Escobar

Capitalizarme
Industria: Real estate
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Gabriel Cidn

Cero.ai
Industria: Salud, healthtech
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Felipe Rodríguez

Chipax
Industria: Fintech
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Felipe Urzúa

Cleanlight
Industria: Clean tech
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Jordan Butler

Colektia
Industria: Fintech
Empleados: +200
Fundador: Gabriel Monroy

Cornershop
Industria: E-commerce
Empleados: +200
Fundador: Daniel Undurraga

Cowork Latam
Industria: Business intelligence
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Horacio Justiniano

Cumplo
Industria: Fintech
Empleados: +200
Fundador: Nicolás Shea

Curo Art
Industria: Industrias creativas
Empleados: 1-5
Fundadora: Rocío Bravo

Easycancha
Industria: Sportech
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Roberto de Campos

Examedi
Industria: Salud
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Ian Lee

Fintoc
Industria: Fintech
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Cristóbal Griffero

Fintual
Industria: Servicios profesionales
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Pedro Pineda

GeneproDx
Industria: Climate fintech
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Hernán González

Global66
Industria: Fintech
Empleados: +200
Fundador: Tomás Bercovich

GoodMeal
Industria: Foodtech
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Rodrigo Haydar

Goplaceit
Industria: Bienes raíces
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Pablo Espinace

Houm
Industria: Proptech
Empleados: +200
Fundador: Benjamín Labra

INSTACROPS
Industria: Agrícola
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Mario Bustamante Bernucci

INTI-TECH
Industria: Energía
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Camilo Flores Garrido

Justo
Industria: Tecnología/ SaaS de e-commerce / delivery
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Rodrigo Segal-Wasserman

Koywe
Industria: Fintech
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Guillermo Acuña

Kredito
Industria: Fintech
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Sebastián Robles

KURA Biotech
Industria: Biotecnología
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Manuel Rozas

Levannta
Industria: Fintech
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Manuel Astaburuaga

Levita Magnetics
Industria: Medtech
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Alberto Rodríguez Navarro

Lirmi
Industria: Software
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Emerson Marín

Mediastream
Industria: Digital media
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Luis Ahumada

Mycobites
Industria: Food-tech
Empleados: 21-50
Fundador: Rodolfo Antonio Ulloa Iglesias

NotCo
Industria: Alimentos
Empleados: +200
Fundador: Karim Pichara

Odd Industries
Industria: Internet de las cosas
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Leo Prieto

PhageLab
Industria: Biotecnología
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Hans Pieringer Castro

Photio
Industria: Química y nanotecnología
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Matías Moya

Pignus
Industria: HR Tech
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Felipe Sanhueza

SimpliRoute
Industria: SaaS
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Álvaro Echeverría

Wild Foods
Industria: Alimentación saludable
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Javier Castro

Yourney
Industria: HR Tech
Empleados: 6-20
Fundador: Nicolás Morales

Zapping
Industria: Entretenimiento
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Gustavo Morandé

Zippedi
Industria: IA robótica
Empleados: 51-200
Fundador: Luis Vera

Fuente: https://www.top100startups.co/dl/d8fc49/s/783bbb