12 December 2006

A New Zealand company’s idea of creating an enjoyable shopping experience for parents with pre-schoolers has led to the development of a high-tech entertainment shopping trolley – TV Karts – which is now used in all 10 of the largest supermarket chains in the United States.

Children are able to watch parentally approved TV programmes inside the cab of the trolley while parents complete their shopping thanks to unique technology loaded into each of the brightly coloured plastic TV Karts.

Auckland-based Cabco Group began negotiating with the world’s largest retailer, Wal-Mart, three years ago, resulting in the company signing a contract in 2005 to supply its carts to Wal-Mart through a deal that could ultimately see up to 15,000 of the carts operating in Wal-Mart’s stores. Demand has grown rapidly and Cabco now has contracts for its carts with most of the major US retail chains. In addition the company has created an entirely new niche market based around entertaining shoppers by using vending technologies to enhance their retail experience.

The total vending market in the US is valued at US$30 billion, with the service sector within that being worth an estimated US$10 billion. Cabco’s new niche is on track to gain a substantial share of that service sector business.

Each ride in a cart branded with children’s favourites such as Bob the Builder, Wiggles or Barney costs US$1, with the money releasing the brake and starting the entertainment system. Each electronic cart is fully automated with another major technological breakthrough, being the induction power transfer system that uses energy transfer to recharge the batteries when the cart is returned to its base after each ride. The brake is automatically reapplied as it passes through the checkout and the cart is parked and ready for the next customer.

Cabco says research shows shoppers spend an extra 72 cents for every minute their children are happily entertained in the carts, equating to higher sales for the host retailer.

It took Cabco almost five years to research and develop its TV Kart using investment from the New Zealand Government through the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology and tapping into the expertise of other New Zealand specialists.

That included Harvest Electronics (www.harvest.co.nz), which adapted its online telemetry and monitoring solutions to provide a system for Cabco that remotely monitors the carts, providing instant information on battery voltage, mains power, hire times, hire charge revenue and money jams, and a reconciliation of the takings with the amount collected and banked from each cart.

Auckland UniServices, the commercial research and knowledge transfer company of the University of Auckland (www.uniservices.auckland.ac.nz), was responsible for the intervention-free charging of the batteries in the carts. Without the new technology, batteries would have had to be changed every three days, a drawback that threatened the profitability and reliability of the carts, particularly when Cabco added other technology, such as LCD movie screens, which drew heavily on power.

New Zealand Trade and Enterprise (NZTE) also assisted Cabco to carry out market analysis and research into the US supermarket sector and navigate complex safety, licensing and compliance issues.

Darrell Wong, sector manager – specialised manufacturing at NZTE, says Cabco’s achievements to date are impressive, with significant potential for further growth.

“The technology involved in the Cabco TV Karts and the sophisticated monitoring system operated in New Zealand are world class and demonstrate New Zealanders’ ability to use smart ideas and innovative technologies to become world leaders.”

TV Karts are New Zealand manufactured and the company is wholly New Zealand owned, with eight shareholder entities. Earlier this year Cabco announced it had successfully concluded its latest round of fundraising, with a combination of new and existing investors bringing in a total of NZ$12 million in new capital.

For more information, please contact:

darrell.wong@nzte.govt.nz

+64 9 919 9032