Today's retailers have to find profitable strategies to deliver on their customers' expectations, amid significant fulfillment challenges and complexities. Customers don't understand the massive omnichannel fulfillment operation that is set into motion when they click "Buy Now." Whether they purchase a product on your e-commerce site for home delivery or order a product to be delivered to your nearest brick and mortar location, customers want immediate inventory availability, fast shipping and a seamless end-to-end purchasing experience. Here's a closer look at how AI and cognitive technologies are helping improve omnichannel fulfillment in a world of rising customer expectations, free 2-day delivery from the competition, and rapidly shrinking margins. What does intelligent fulfillment look like?

Robotics, machine learning and artificial intelligence are already redefining the industry, with platform companies pioneering the use of these smart technologies. Traditional retailers and manufacturers need to catch up or risk becoming uncompetitive. Dr Thomas Erwin, Global Head of KPMG Lighthouse Center of Excellence for Intelligent Automation and Data & Analytics, says that companies need to learn to work with these technologies – especially AI – and recognize the cultural challenges ahead. These relatively young technologies are changing so fast that companies also need to keep their options open. In 10-15 years' time, AI could be making most of the operational decisions in a business.

Prime Day 2018 will begin on July 16. Amazon Prime members can once again look forward to getting steep discounts gadgets, things for your home, travel gear, and more. While Amazon's Prime Day is not as big as Black Friday (yet), at least you don't have to endure the psychological trauma of being pushed around in large crowds and waiting in long lines out the door at brick and mortar shops. And an added benefit -- without major gift giving holidays coming up, as Amazon puts it, this is a day to focus on yourself. Prime Day is a time Amazon Prime members can enjoy lightning deals, price cuts, and promotions.

Even if you carefully check the labels, stickers, and stamps on every product you buy at retail stores or online shopping websites, chances are high, you'll still end up purchasing a product from today's booming illegal economy and across illicit markets.

To be honest, the Fourth of July is not the first, or even the fifth or sixth, retail holiday on our calendars. And a lot of people--both customers and retailers--are saving up their big guns for Amazon Prime Day, our real national summer shopping holiday. Nevertheless, it's still possible to save a couple bucks, especially if you're shopping for travel and outdoor gear for your summer vacaciones. In our opinion, the best deal of all is a year's subscription to WIRED for $5, which still comes with a free Yubikey. But we've rounded up a few others for you to look at on National Fireworks Day.

Autonomous grocery delivery buggies may roam U.S. neighborhoods if Kroger's pilot program works out. The largest American supermarket chain announced a partnership with Mountain View-based Nuro this week to test the concept of driverless home deliveries. The pilot will start this fall in an as-yet-unnamed market. Nuro applies robotics, artificial intelligence, and computer vision technology in partnership with local businesses looking for innovative ways to deliver goods that are cost effective for merchants and convenient for customers. "We are incredibly excited about the potential of our innovative partnership with Nuro to bring the future of grocery delivery to customers today," says Yael Cosset, Kroger's chief digital officer.

If you squint a little, you can see the Apple Store clerk as a cyborg, a hybrid of human and machine. Each store is flooded with smartphone-wielding salespeople who are able to help customers with everything from technical questions and support to purchase and checkout. There are no cash registers with lines of customers waiting with products pulled from the piles on the shelves. The store is a showroom of products to explore. When you know what you want, a salesperson fetches it from the back room. If you're already an Apple customer with a credit card on file (and as of 2014, there were 800 million of us), all you need to provide is your email address to walk out the door with your chosen product.

Today we have Amazon Prime and Amazon Marketplace, and the company is still three steps ahead, inventing what is possible by both shaping and anticipating the needs of consumers. According to a recent CNBC article, Amazon was issued patents last year for augmented reality mirrors that would enable users to try on clothes virtually by projecting different outfits onto the user. They've also patented a "smart" sensor-studded package delivery air vehicle, an option that would mute the Amazon Echo's video mode for user privacy and even one that would detect hacked self-driving cars.

Details are limited at this stage, but the company suggests it will roll out a pilot test later this year. It's unknown where this will take place but it will utilize Kroger's pre-existing online ClickList ordering system and and Nuro's app. The process is pretty straightforward, place an order for groceries online and they are picked, packed and loaded onto a Nuro vehicle. These small autonomous vehicles will then navigate to their destination where customers meet it at the curb and take receipt of their groceries.

Spain-based AI-powered retail intelligence platform Nextail has landed $10 million in a Series A round led by KEEN Venture Partners LLP, with participation from Sonae IM and existing investor Nauta Capital. The company plans to use the capital injection to further develop its product and double the headcount to over 100 people. Nextail focuses on the sector of fast fashion, where process optimisation is important to bring the most current designs to a store as quickly as possible. It uses AI techniques and prescriptive analytics to provide actionable insights for inventory planning and merchandising. The company claims that its clients see their sales increasing between 5-10 percent, in-store stock coverage reduced by 30 percent and stockouts reduced by 60 percent within the first 30 days of using the platform.