The Business Case Has Shifted From Potential to Proof

A year ago, the argument for connected store platforms was largely forward-looking. By 2026, the data is in, and it’s convincing enough to make CFOs reconsider the category of investment, too, not just CTOs.

According to the IBM Institute for Business Value (January 2026), “80% of retail and consumer products companies today have a long-term innovation strategy for their use of artificial intelligence,” signifying the clear transition away from experimentation towards a strategic approach. Also, according to this study, “58% of retail executives report that artificial intelligence increases customer loyalty and satisfaction,” with a 31% improvement in the last year. ¹

Looking further out, IBM’s January 2026 global study of over 2,000 C-suite executives found that 79% expect AI to significantly contribute to revenue by 2030, up from 40% today, with AI investment forecast to surge 150% by the end of the decade. The caveat is important: 68% of those same executives worry their AI efforts will fail due to poor integration with core business activities. ² 

The gap between expectation and delivery is not a technology gap. It is a platform and governance gap, which is precisely what this webinar addresses.

KEY FIGURES AT A GLANCE

• 80% of retailers now have a long-term AI innovation strategy, IBM IBV, January 2026 ¹
• 68% of retail wireless budgets increased over the past 5 years, with 82% expecting continued increases, Cisco State of Wireless, April 2026 ³
• 2.7x return on every dollar spent on generative AI in retail and consumer goods, Microsoft-commissioned IDC study, November 2025 ⁴

Microsoft: The Case for a Unified Intelligence Operating System

The retailers generating the strongest returns from connected store investment are not the ones with the most technology. They are the ones with the most coherent platform. Microsoft’s position, articulated at NRF 2026 in January, is that the future belongs to retailers who build a unified, intelligence-driven operating system that reaches every corner of the value chain. ⁵

The financial validation is significant. The findings of a Forrester Total Economic Impact analysis carried out on behalf of Microsoft (May 2026) show that there is expected to be a return on investment of between 124% and 282%, along with a net present value of between $7.7 million and $17.6 million for a hypothetical $5 billion retailer, while AI-driven demand forecasting and inventory optimization contribute $3 million to $6.3 million in savings. The C-suite is not asking whether to spend. It is demanding proof of what the spending achieves. ⁶

What separates the retailers capturing that return is not the budget size. It is the decision to stop treating connected store technology as a collection of point solutions and start building it as a platform. That shift in thinking, and what it requires operationally, is the thread running through everything RETHINK Retail’s webinar covers.

Cisco: Why Platform Investments Compound and Point Solutions Do Not

Cisco’s inaugural State of Wireless 2026 report, based on interviews with 6,098 wireless decision-makers across 30 markets (April 2026), documents what platform-first wireless investment actually delivers: 78% of organisations report operational efficiency improvements, 75% report stronger employee productivity and customer engagement, and 68% link wireless investment directly to revenue gains. Four out of five organisations increased wireless budgets over the past five years, and 82% forecast continued budget increases in the years ahead. ³

This is the crucial factor, the multiplier effect, recognized by Cisco: a single investment in an organizational network creates compounded gains in productivity, customer service, and income all at once. Companies that solve for all three issues, complexity, security, and people, are 4x more likely to see good returns on their wireless investment, and artificial intelligence automates tasks, giving back 850+ hours per year per IT worker. ³

The lesson is straightforward: retailers investing in platforms compound their advantage. Retailers investing in point solutions keep paying integration costs without accumulating structural returns.

Palo Alto Networks: Security Is a Platform Decision, Not an Add-On

Every connected store platform decision is also a security architecture decision. The two cannot be separated, and the retailers who have learned this the hard way paid a steep price.

Palo Alto Networks’ 2025 Device Security Threat Report, based on telemetry from over 27 million connected devices across 1,803 enterprise networks, found that 48.2% of all connections from IoT devices to company IT systems originate from high-risk devices. Additionally, approximately 21% of IoT devices carry at least one known vulnerability, introducing systemic risk into enterprise networks from the moment of deployment. ⁷

For retail specifically, 72% of retailers report being hit by a cyberattack via one or more IoT devices in the past year, with IoT technology in retail expected to soar to $297 billion by 2030. ⁸ 

The risk grows in direct proportion to the platform, which means security architecture must scale with it. Zero Trust is not a future goal. It is the foundation that every connected store platform needs before the first device is deployed.

The retailers winning on connected store investment have made this decision early and built it in structurally. Those who have treated security as an afterthought are managing incidents instead of managing growth.

Google Cloud: Platform Thinking Starts at the Edge

The most effective connected store platforms are not centralised systems pushing instructions to the store. They are distributed intelligence architectures that process, decide, and act where retail actually happens, at the shelf, the checkout, the stock room, and the store floor.

Google Cloud’s edge AI infrastructure enables retailers to process real-time inventory and customer interactions locally, ensuring zero latency even when store connectivity is unstable, with data federated into a central warehouse powering the broader commerce engine. ⁹ 

At Google Cloud Next 2026, the practical results were visible: The Home Depot, building on a 10-year partnership with Google Cloud, is using Gemini Enterprise to power AI tools that deliver product expertise to every customer on every channel at any hour. ¹⁰

Google Cloud’s own 2026 AI Agent Trends report, based on a survey of 585 senior retail and CPG leaders, identifies a clear direction: the industry is moving beyond simple automation to intelligent agentic systems that streamline workflows, secure operations, and engage shoppers across every touchpoint. The retailers building that architecture now, with a platform foundation designed to scale, are the ones who will define what connected store leadership looks like in 2028 and beyond. ¹¹

What the Webinar Delivers That Research Alone Cannot

According to a Forrester Total Economic Impact study commissioned by Microsoft (May 2026), there is a forecasted return on investment of 124%-282%, net present value of $7.7M-$17.6M in a total $5B retailer case, where AI-powered demand forecasting and inventory optimization contribute up to $3M-$6.3M in three-year gains. Total spending on retail technologies is expected to reach $113 billion in 2026. That is the conversation RETHINK Retail’s webinar exists to facilitate.

The practitioners in this session have made those decisions under real pressure. They know what held up and what did not. They know which technology promises survived contact with the store floor and which ones did not. Attendees leave with sharper thinking, more honest questions, and a clearer view of where to focus investment and where to pull back.

If you lead a retail organisation that has invested in connected store technology and is still closing the distance between what it promised and what it delivers, this is the session built for your next 90 days.

Register Now: The Connected Store at Scale: From Tech Hype to Operational Reality Hosted by RETHINK Retail | In partnership with VusionGroup

Register Here: https://intenttechpub.com/webinar/the-connected-store-at-scale-from-tech-hype-to-operational-reality/

References

1. IBM Institute for Business Value, The AI Decisions That Will Define Retail for the Next Two Years, 12 January 2026
2. IBM Institute for Business Value, IBM Study: AI Poised to Drive Smarter Business Growth Through 2030, 19 January 2026
3. Cisco Newsroom, Cisco Report: Strategic Wireless Investments Are Driving Higher ROI, 2 April 2026
4. GeekWire, Microsoft Launches Copilot Checkout, Joining the AI Shopping Race, 9 January 2026
5. Microsoft, Microsoft Propels Retail Forward with Agentic AI Capabilities, 8 January 2026
6. Microsoft Cloud Blog, Agentic AI Is Reshaping Retail and Consumer Goods Economics, 21 May 2026
7. Palo Alto Networks Blog, 2025 Report Exposes Widespread Device Security Risks, 29 October 2025
8. Palo Alto Networks, IoT Security for the Retail Industry, 2025
9. Google Cloud Blog, How Inference at the Edge Unlocks New AI Use Cases for Retailers, 13 January 2025
10. Google Cloud, Next 26: Building the Agentic Enterprise, May 2026
11. Google Cloud, AI Agent Trends in Retail and CPG 2026