Earlier this month Synqera, a provider of solutions for retailers, announced that its “Loyalty Generators” kiosks have been installed in three stores of Korablik, a Russian retail chain specializing in children’s goods. Customers who enter the store can swipe their loyalty card at these kiosks to access their history of purchases and customer profile. The system will also provide them with personalized discount coupons.
The St. Petersburg-based company previously announced partnerships with Ulibka Radugi and Land, two other Russian retailers.
Synqera’s Head of Marketing, Ekaterina Savchenko, told East-West Digital News that the company is the only one to offer such a technology in Russia. On the global market, the only direct competitor is Index, a San Francisco-based startup founded in 2012 by former Google Wallet team-members Marc Freed-Finnegan and Johnathan Wall. The service obtained $7 million in funding last year from US investors.
“The other players in this field are not direct competitors: they either specialize in one particular aspect – data collection, data analysis and interpretation, or creation of real-time communication with customers – or focus on online communication channels without addressing physical stores. Synqera combines all these dimensions,” Savchenko said.
Synqera is focused on Russia for the moment, but has plans to develop internationally. “We are in discussions with a few European and US retailers – in particular, grocery chains – as well as with potential partners and investors,” Savchenko said. “We plan to start of operations in these marlets in early 2015.”
