WEBVTT

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- Every retailer in the world wants

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to have the most relevant assortment,

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the most relevant offering
for their clients.

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And you want to have it
faster than anyone else.

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- Eric, Marian, welcome.

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Eric, where in your
business has AI gone from

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a nice to have to absolutely essential?

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- AI is touching all
our areas at Metro AG.

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Over the last one-and-a-half
years, we analyzed a lot

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of use cases in which areas.

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So a couple of them stood out,

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a lot in the finance area

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because we have a lot
of transactional tasks.

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Forecasting, for example,

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but also financing and
accounts receivable.

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Other areas is our sales.

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So we have a big sales force,

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we have 9,000 employees
working in our sales force,

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a lot of administrative tax,

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and they want to focus on long-term

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relationships with our customers.

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And AI is supporting them
with the data to come closer

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to the customer and
support them all the way.

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- And Marian, from your perspective,

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looking across the industry,

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where are you seeing AI
making a real difference,

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real competitive
advantage, rather than just

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incremental changes?

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- I think that's exactly
the type of discussions

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that we are having with clients.

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Think a little bit to what
Eric was saying, right?

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I think when you are applying AI really

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to commercial decision-making

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and not just thinking about
it as a productivity tool,

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I think that's really making a difference.

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Thinking assortment, thinking
pricing, thinking promo,

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thinking, you know, shelving
and availability in stores.

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That's the important stuff for retailers,

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that's where we need to apply it.

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Speed is a big thing
that we are discussing.

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Specifically, Metro is all about speed.

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It's part of their DNA.

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It's part of their strategy.

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So faster, more precise decision-making.

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One of the examples that I like a lot that

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we are discussing with
clients is every retailer

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in the world wants to have
the most relevant assortment,

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the most relevant offering
for their clients.

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And you want to have it
faster than anyone else.

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That's the differentiation.

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So kind of when you think a
typical retailer has a period

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of 35, 40 weeks from the idea of a product

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to our customers can buy it on the shelf.

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Now what about we shrink
that to half, 15 to 20 weeks?

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That's the impact of AI.

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That's what we're working on with clients.

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I think that's where
it makes a difference.

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- Yeah, I absolutely agree to this.

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Actually, we had a couple of projects,

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which were really fast. With AI,

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you just have a much faster developments

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phase than beforehand.

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Two, three weeks.

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If we got your first
prototype, try it out.

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So actually we have really good benefits

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and speed to market.

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- Eric, in this environment
with companies under pressure

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to invest, to grow, and to control costs,

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how do leaders get that balance right?

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- Talking about Metro AG,
we have a growth strategy.

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Our strategy is called "sCore."

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So one of the key elements
is growth is king.

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We are doing this for
the last couple of years,

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really successfully, but
we are in an environment

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with high inflation.

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There's a lot of cost pressure externally.

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So we are working on our cost structure.

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So we set up cost initiatives
together with BCG as well.

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So we initiated that in 2024

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and now we are two years in.

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We are already achieving
now much better cost

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structure than beforehand.

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The original plan was three years.

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So we want to continue on this,

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but we are on a good track

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of it being a profitable growth leader.

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- And I think, Eric, that's exactly

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what we are hearing in a
lot of conversations, right?

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Profitable growth.

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I think that's a key theme for a lot

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of retailers these days.

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And therefore also for AI.

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The clear prerequisite is I need

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to see value, I need to see value fast,

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I need to see value in here.

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So therefore, wherever they're investing,

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they're not waiting for strategy phase,

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not for value identification.

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They want to see results,
quick pilots, implement it,

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see the benefit for the company.

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Profitable growth is what we are after.

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- Marian and Eric, thank
you so much for your time.

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- Thank you so much, Georgie.

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- Thank you so much.

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(pleasant outro music)