Tesco Checks Out 'Wearable' Computers

UNITED KINGDOM - Tesco plans to equip its staff with $9 million worth of wearable computers in a bid to boost fulfillment efficiency for customer orders placed over its tesco.com Web site.

The largest grocery supermarket company in the UK has signed a deal to purchase several thousand Xybernaut Atigo mobile and wearable computers for deployment to more than 300 grocery stores within its UK operation.

An initial rollout of 1,300 Atigo units will be shipped pre-configured with Tesco's client workstation and enterprise network applications beginning this month.

Xybernaut will also configure the units with predetermined wireless communications capabilities optimized for interoperability with existing and planned Tesco communications systems.

"We wanted a product to make our in-store operations better and simpler so we can continue to improve our customer offer," said Mike Yorwerth, head of operations and infrastructure for tesco.com.

"After evaluating several manufacturers, we quickly realized that the Xybernaut Atigo offered us the most flexibility and performance to meet our needs."

The supermarket chain is also evaluating additional Atigo applications for supply chain, logistics, inventory/stock management, promotional efforts, remote register/cashier services, and employee productivity.

In addition to the Atigo hardware order, the Xybernaut services team has been engaged to provide Tesco with a customized build and installation process.

-- Robert Jaques, Vnunet.com, a VNU Business Media Europe company
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