New Technology Development and Trade Association: A Case Study of Retail AI

Abstract

This study aims to explore why and how firms use trade associations to facilitate collaborative experiments when they face rising disruptive technology such as artificial intelligence (AI). An in-depth case study research was conducted to investigate Retail AI Institute in Japan, a new grocery retail industry consortium of consumer-goods manufacturers and retailers which was established in 2017. The data were collected by 24 interviews, 32 meeting observations, and a thorough review of internal literatures including Slack chats, from February 2019 until March 2020. With the data, this study reveals three consistent themes in the motivations and processes observed in the activities—complementarity, uncertainty, and flexibility—particularly in collaborative experiments which explored various ways to use the new technology to improve the performance of retail stores.