Innovation in retail doesn’t happen in isolation. It thrives when retailers, investors, startups, accelerators, and academic pioneers come together to experiment, scale, and commercialize new ideas. As part of our continuing series from the 2025 Retail Innovation Forum in London, this blog explores how ecosystem collaboration is shaping the next wave of retail innovation?
One message is clear: great ideas are only the starting point. Real impact comes from partnerships that help scale those ideas into commercially viable solutions. Here are five key themes that emerged.
Large organizations have resources but often lack the speed and agility of startups. Increasingly, they are turning to external partners such as venture-backed startups, accelerators, or research labs to help them test and scale new ideas. PwC research finds that companies participating in ecosystems are 1.7x more likely to be faster to market, 1.2x more likely to be agile, and 2.3x more likely to be highly innovative than peers relying solely on their own R&D capabilities (PwC).
Retailers are increasingly building formal pathways for innovation, from open calls for startups to dedicated venture arms and accelerator partnerships. These approaches allow them to access fresh thinking while ensuring solutions are enterprise-ready. Without these partnerships, many promising innovations would never reach customers at scale.
Startups bring agility and bold ideas, but many underestimate the operational complexity of scaling within large retailers or CPGs. The “commercialization gap”—the space between a successful proof-of-concept and a large-scale rollout—is often where ideas stall.
Ecosystem partners like accelerators, VCs, and corporate innovation teams help bridge this gap. They provide guidance on go-to-market models, help startups adapt their solutions to enterprise requirements, and connect them with industry decision-makers who can champion adoption. This type of support is often the difference between a clever demo and a solution that can operate across hundreds of stores or thousands of SKUs.
Some of the most transformative technologies originate in universities, but they often remain “trapped in the lab” without structured industry collaboration. Translating research breakthroughs into commercial applications requires mentorship, entrepreneurial training, and access to industry partners who can validate and scale them.
Retail and CPG companies stand to benefit significantly from this collaboration. Academic advances in computer vision, material science, and linguistics, for example, are already powering innovations in shelf monitoring, sustainable packaging, and customer understanding. Programs like Conception X demonstrate how giving PhD researchers entrepreneurial pathways and industry mentors can unlock hidden potential and bring science-backed innovation into retail ecosystems.
The way ecosystems function varies across geographies. In Europe, retailers themselves often drive innovation, incubating and co-funding solutions alongside partners. In the United States, venture capital and accelerator models play a more central role, enabling rapid experimentation and scale but with less direct retailer involvement. Neither approach is inherently better, but the differences create opportunities to learn. European ecosystems can adopt more of the U.S. model’s speed and risk-taking, while American ecosystems can benefit from the structured pathways and retailer involvement seen in Europe. Increasingly, cross-border initiatives are blending these models to accelerate innovation globally.
Cross-geography collaboration also helps organizations break into new markets more quickly and cost-effectively. Partnering with retailers, investors, or accelerators outside a home region provides immediate market knowledge, distribution access, and credibility. For startups, this means faster and less expensive entry. For retailers, it enables easier adoption of innovations already proven elsewhere. Global initiatives like the W23 venture fund, which is funded by five leading retails around the world – Tesco, Woolworths, Ahold Delhaize, Shoprite, and Empire, show how collaboratively pooling resources across continents accelerates international expansion and scale.
At the heart of any successful ecosystem is trust. Innovation partnerships work only when each participant, whether a retailer, brand, startup, investor, or academic, feels that real value is being created for them. The focus must shift from control to co-creation. Partners need to align incentives, share risk, and ensure that innovations deliver benefits across the chain. When collaboration is built on trust and shared value, adoption is faster, partnerships last longer, and innovations scale more successfully.
Tesco’s Red Door Initiative
Launched in 2020, Red Door invites innovators with disruptive ideas and emerging technologies to connect with Tesco’s Group Innovation team, a central access point for entrepreneurs to introduce and scale their solutions alongside one of the UK’s largest retailers.
The Group Innovation team evaluates submissions swiftly, supports successful innovators in navigating Tesco’s operational landscape, and helps implement pilot projects. This initiative has already attracted hundreds of proposals and enabled rapid experimentation by aligning startups with the right people, processes, and executive sponsorship within Tesco.
Through programs like Red Door, Tesco demonstrates how an organizational innovation ecosystem, built around structured outreach, internal innovation teams, and rapid piloting, acts as a powerful enabler to transform startup ideas into commercially viable solutions in retail.
REWE Digital’s Collaborations
REWE Digital, the tech arm of Germany’s REWE Group, has partnered with startups in areas such as AI-driven customer insights and delivery/logistics innovation. These partnerships focus on improving in-store experience, personalizing customer journeys, and building more efficient e-commerce and delivery networks.
Target and Shipt
Target acquired Shipt, a same-day delivery startup, to accelerate its omnichannel capabilities. Shipt continues to operate independently while fueling Target’s same-day fulfillment operations, a critical innovation in improving customer convenience.
W23 Global Venture Fund
Five major grocery retailers (Tesco, Woolworths, Ahold Delhaize, Shoprite, and Empire Company) teamed up in 2024 to launch a $125 million venture fund investing in startups that are transforming consumer experience, grocery value chains, and sustainability, providing entrepreneurs with funding and potential access to adoption across multiple retail markets.
The takeaway is clear: developing and nurturing an open innovation strategy is no longer optional. The future of retail innovation lies in the strength of its ecosystems and our joint ability to break down decades of siloes between ecosystem stakeholders. Whether through structured retailer–startup programs, venture capital partnerships, or research collaborations, the ability to connect ideas, capital, and scale will define who thrives in the next decade.
These insights were collected by gathering feedback from our Retail Innovation Network, the fastest growing global open innovation programme for retail technology leaders. We would like to thank contributing panellists and showcase participants, including Sandra Stanley (dunnhumby), Manuel Queiroz (Bright Pixel Capital), Darrian Harris (Fuel Accelerator), Carrie Baptist (Conception X), and Sam Thompson (Progress Ventures).
To receive insightful thought leadership and engagement, explore joining the Retail Innovation Network, the fastest growing open innovation networks in retail, for free at www.dunnhumby.com/ventures and find out more about the next Retail Innovation Forum in Bentonville at www.dunnhumby.com/retail-innovation-forum.
Cookie | Description |
---|---|
cli_user_preference | The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store the yes/no selection the consent given for cookie usage. It does not store any personal data. |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-advertisement | Set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin, this cookie is used to record the user consent for the cookies in the "Advertisement" category . |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics | Set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin, this cookie is used to record the user consent for the cookies in the "Analytics" category . |
cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary | This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary". |
CookieLawInfoConsent | The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store the summary of the consent given for cookie usage. It does not store any personal data. |
viewed_cookie_policy | The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data. |
wsaffinity | Set by the dunnhumby website, that allows all subsequent traffic and requests from an initial client session to be passed to the same server in the pool. Session affinity is also referred to as session persistence, server affinity, server persistence, or server sticky. |
Cookie | Description |
---|---|
passster | Set by Passster to remember that a visitor has entered a correct password, so they don’t have to re-enter it across protected pages. |
wordpress_test_cookie | WordPress cookie to read if cookies can be placed, and lasts for the session. |
wp_lang | This cookie is used to remember the language chosen by the user while browsing. |
Cookie | Description |
---|---|
fs_cid | Set by FullStory to correlate sessions for diagnostics and session consistency; not always set. |
fs_lua | Set by FullStory to record the time of the user’s last activity, helping manage session timeouts. |
fs_session | Set by FullStory to manage session flow and recording. Not always visible or applicable across all implementations. |
fs_uid | Set by FullStory to uniquely identify a user’s browser. Used for session replay and user analytics. Does not contain personal data directly. |
VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE | Set by YouTube to estimate user bandwidth and improve video quality by adjusting playback speed. |
VISITOR_PRIVACY_METADATA | Set by YouTube to store privacy preferences and metadata related to user consent and settings. |
vuid | Vimeo installs this cookie to collect tracking information by setting a unique ID to embed videos to the website. |
YSC | Set by YouTube to track user sessions and maintain video playback state during a browser session. |
_ga | The _ga cookie, installed by Google Analytics, calculates visitor, session and campaign data and also keeps track of site usage for the site's analytics report. The cookie stores information anonymously and assigns a randomly generated number to recognise unique visitors. |
_ga_* | Set by Google Analytics to persist session state. |
_gid | Installed by Google Analytics, _gid cookie stores information on how visitors use a website, while also creating an analytics report of the website's performance. Some of the data that are collected include the number of visitors, their source, and the pages they visit anonymously. |
_lfa | This cookie is set by the provider Leadfeeder to identify the IP address of devices visiting the website, in order to retarget multiple users routing from the same IP address. |
__Secure-ROLLOUT_TOKEN | YouTube sets this cookie via embedded videos to manage feature rollouts. |
Cookie | Description |
---|---|
aam_uuid | Set by LinkedIn, for ID sync for Adobe Audience Manager. |
AEC | Set by Google, ‘AEC’ cookies ensure that requests within a browsing session are made by the user, and not by other sites. These cookies prevent malicious sites from acting on behalf of a user without that user’s knowledge. |
AMCVS_14215E3D5995C57C0A495C55%40AdobeOrg | Set by LinkedIn, indicates the start of a session for Adobe Experience Cloud. |
AMCV_14215E3D5995C57C0A495C55%40AdobeOrg | Set by LinkedIn, Unique Identifier for Adobe Experience Cloud. |
AnalyticsSyncHistory | Set by LinkedIn, used to store information about the time a sync with the lms_analytics cookie took place for users in the Designated Countries (which LinkedIn determines as European Union (EU), European Economic Area (EEA), and Switzerland). |
bcookie | LinkedIn sets this cookie from LinkedIn share buttons and ad tags to recognise browser ID. |
bscookie | LinkedIn sets this cookie to store performed actions on the website. |
DV | Set by Google, used for the purpose of targeted advertising, to collect information about how visitors use our site. |
ELOQUA | This cookie is set by Eloqua Marketing Automation Tool. It contains a unique identifier to recognise returning visitors and track their visit data across multiple visits and multiple OpenText Websites. This data is logged in pseudonymised form, unless a visitor provides us with their personal data through creating a profile, such as when signing up for events or for downloading information that is not available to the public. |
gpv_pn | Set by LinkedIn, used to retain and fetch previous page visited in Adobe Analytics. |
lang | Session-based cookie, set by LinkedIn, used to set default locale/language. |
lidc | Set by LinkedIn, used for routing from Share buttons and ad tags. |
lidc | LinkedIn sets the lidc cookie to facilitate data center selection. |
li_gc | Set by LinkedIn to store consent of guests regarding the use of cookies for non-essential purposes. |
li_sugr | Set by LinkedIn, used to make a probabilistic match of a user's identity outside the Designated Countries (which LinkedIn determines as European Union (EU), European Economic Area (EEA), and Switzerland). |
lms_analytics | Set by LinkedIn to identify LinkedIn Members in the Designated Countries (which LinkedIn determines as European Union (EU), European Economic Area (EEA), and Switzerland) for analytics. |
NID | Set by Google, registers a unique ID that identifies a returning user’s device. The ID is used for targeted ads. |
OGP / OGPC | Set by Google, cookie enables the functionality of Google Maps. |
OTZ | Set by Google, used to support Google’s advertising services. This cookie is used by Google Analytics to provide an analysis of website visitors in aggregate. |
s_cc | Set by LinkedIn, used to determine if cookies are enabled for Adobe Analytics. |
s_ips | Set by LinkedIn, tracks percent of page viewed. |
s_plt | Set by LinkedIn, this cookie tracks the time that the previous page took to load. |
s_pltp | Set by LinkedIn, this cookie provides page name value (URL) for use by Adobe Analytics. |
s_ppv | Set by LinkedIn, used by Adobe Analytics to retain and fetch what percentage of a page was viewed. |
s_sq | Set by LinkedIn, used to store information about the previous link that was clicked on by the user by Adobe Analytics. |
s_tp | Set by LinkedIn, this cookie measures a visitor’s scroll activity to see how much of a page they view before moving on to another page. |
s_tslv | Set by LinkedIn, used to retain and fetch time since last visit in Adobe Analytics. |
test_cookie | Set by doubleclick.net (part of Google), the purpose of the cookie is to determine if the users' browser supports cookies. |
U | Set by LinkedIn, Browser Identifier for users outside the Designated Countries (which LinkedIn determines as European Union (EU), European Economic Area (EEA), and Switzerland). |
UserMatchHistory | LinkedIn sets this cookie for LinkedIn Ads ID syncing. |
UserMatchHistory | This cookie is used by LinkedIn Ads to help dunnhumby measure advertising performance. More information can be found in their cookie policy. |
yt-remote-connected-devices | YouTube sets this cookie to store the video preferences of the user using embedded YouTube video. |
_gcl_au | Set by Google Tag Manager to store and track conversion events. It is typically associated with Google Ads, but may be set even if no active ad campaigns are running, especially when GTM is configured with default settings. The cookie helps measure the effectiveness of ad clicks in relation to site actions. |