Alexa, kauf meine Lebensmittel!

: a study assessing the impact of smart voice assistants on the german food retailing industry

Abstract

Alexa, will you buy my groceries by 2030? With advancements in voice technology and the growing adoption of smart voice assistants, a new online channel emerges for companies to interact and do business with customers. Making purchases and other retail-related use cases of smart voice assistants promise an innovative, convenient and time-efficient shopping experience in the future. Focusing on Germany, this dissertation explores the impact of smart voice assistants on the food retailing industry and illustrates potential future industry developments until 2030. The analysis is based on qualitative and quantitative primary data which is supplemented by findings from literature and industry reports. The impact of smart voice assistants on food retailing was qualitatively analyzed from two perspectives: the customer and the company view. It was found that regardless of the barriers for implementation and adoption, grocery voice commerce is likely to be provided by suppliers and adopted by shoppers in the future. In addition, to deliver a feasible future prediction, three scenarios differing in adoption speed of smart voice assistants were developed and evaluated. The scenario with moderate adoption speed was found to evolve most likely. It is characterized by voice commerce representing roughly 25% of online grocery sales and 1.1% of total grocery sales in Germany by 2030. As it is crucial for established and new industry participants to understand potential changes and dynamics in future food retailing, but extant research on the topic is scarce, the findings of this study may serve as a basis for strategic decision-making.

Date of Award	12 Oct 2020
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	Universidade Católica Portuguesa
Supervisor	André de Almeida Pinho (Supervisor)