Alphabet’s (GOOG -0.06%) (GOOGL -0.18%) Google is teaming up with France supermarket operator Carrefour (OTC: CRRFY)) to roll out voice-activated food shopping in France.
In a press release, Carrefour said the new voice-activated service, which works with Google Assistant, is part of its efforts to expand in e-commerce and reflects widespread usage of voice-activated technology in France.
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Through the new service, users will be able to dictate a shopping list of generic food items to Google Assistant which will then automatically add products to Carrefour’s shopping cart for checkout. Google Assistant is integrated with Carrefour’s e-commerce inventory to ensure products are available. The tech stock and Carrefour have had a partnership since June of 2018, the companies noted in the press release.
Users call out items, say eggs or milk, and the products Google Assistant adds to the shopping cart are based on users' preferences if they have already purchased from Carrefour. If not, the brand is determined by the Assistant based on general purchasing habits. The AI system learns over time and will better be able to finetune shopping lists the more the user engages with Google Assistant. If there is no shopping history Google Assistant will recommend the items based on price and sales.
In order for the service to work, customers have to link their Google account with their Carrefour account and allow Carrefour France to share the history of the person’s purchases at the supermarket with Google. The supermarket operator said users can dissociate their accounts at any time at which point the purchase history with Google is stopped and data that was transmitted is deleted. If a person doesn’t use the service for 30 days, it will automatically disassociate the accounts.
