Alejandro Delgado, the Yankee raised in Tías, who loves to develop applications to improve people's lives, has just received one of the awards from the Canary Islands incubator of technological companies of the National Institute of Cybersecurity (INCIBE) for his business idea Scango.
Scango combines emerging technologies such as Augmented Reality, Artificial Intelligence, Internet of Things, Blockchain and Big Data to allow customers to scan products in real time with their phones and pay without having to queue.
In an interview with Ekonomus, Delgado explains the advantages of his application and at what stage of development it is.
- How did the idea for Scango come about?
The idea comes from my own frustration. I have very complicated schedules, so many times I find myself in a supermarket on the eve of closing, with many other customers in my situation, with only one physical cashier and with all the automatic scanning stations closed to account for the day.
- What does it consist of and what are its advantages?
Scango is a free application, whose main mission is to revolutionize the user experience in the retail sector.
Our vision is that your mobile is like your second pair of eyes and that, in a very comfortable and simple way, using new technologies, you can skip the line.
- How does it work?
The idea is that Scango accompanies you from the moment it detects that you are near a supermarket that has the services of the application.
Then Scango alerts you in case you want to make a purchase. If you decide to do so, inside the supermarket, the application allows you to scan in real time the products you want to buy with your mobile.
- How does it organize the products?
The idea is that tomorrow the application will identify the products with augmented reality. That is, in real time, as if you or I were seeing it.
The application will include a digital cart, related to the customer's physical cart.
- How will you pay with it?
Once the products have been selected, you will have to reach a verification point to confirm the products and pay.
You can pay in a very comfortable way from the same application using commonly used payment methods, such as Apple Pay or Google Pay and magically exit through the door.
- What is the verification point?
The verification point, which uses the same technology, will be linked to the supermarket's inventory, in real time and will ensure that the transaction has been done correctly and that the products you have in your cart are correlated with what you have purchased.
Once verified, it will give you the green light to go out the door.
- When will Scango be ready?
Now I am in the development and fundraising phase to launch the prototype in the next three years and do the test. I am collaborating with development and marketing consultancies.
- Who will be Scango's customers?
The application will be free, although there will be a small commission on user spending. Supermarkets will be charged a subscription for the service. A small supermarket chain in the Canary Islands has already shown interest.
- Is there nothing similar to Scango now in the world?
As I am implementing it, no. Yes, there are other automation solutions but they are much more expensive and complex. Scango's solution costs a quarter of other automations.
For example, the company Trigo, based in Tel Aviv, uses very sophisticated artificial intelligence algorithms for instant recognition, but requires introducing a magnetic code in all supermarket products and a camera system that shoots costs.
