Ocado pens deal with Japanese grocer Aeon

This partnership marks the online grocer and technology platform’s first international deal in Asia.

Aeon is one of Asia’s largest retailers, with over 21,000 stores across 14 countries, 580,000 employees and approximately 100 million customers.

Ocado will develop a national network of customer fulfilment centres (CFCs) , with the first planned to go live serving the Kanto region in 2023.

Aeon expects to have sales capacity in this region in excess of 200bn JPY (£1.4bn) by 2025, with expected sales capacity across the whole Japanese market forecast to be approximately 600bn JPY (£4.2bn) by 2030.

The Japanese grocer is expected to commit to further CFC capacity following the opening of its first CFC, and will also use Ocado solutions such as its proprietary store-pick software within parts of its existing store network to offer click-and-collect in selected stores.

Ocado expects an additional £25m of operating costs in its upcoming financial year, as a result of the early costs of implementation for Aeon and “extra support costs for Solutions generally”, but said these costs will not impact the business’ current financial year.

Ocado chief executive Tim Steiner said: “I am delighted to welcome another extraordinary retailer, and the first from Asia, to the unique international club of grocers powering their ecommerce operations with Ocado. This partnership marks a major milestone for the food retail landscape in Japan, and I am excited that Ocado will play a key role in bringing ever greater levels of convenience and choice to Aeon’s customers.”

Aeon chief executive Motoya Okada added: “We see Ocado as a state-of-the-art, exciting and transformative partner aligned with our strategy of accelerating Aeon’s digital shift to serve Japan’s consumers.

“We will be able to give consumers the convenience and more importantly ‘time’ to let them fulfil other more meaningful aspirations.

“We will forge stronger relationships with our customers by offering a more personalised service driven by the capabilities of the Ocado Smart Platform, coupled with Aeon’s capabilities to curate an exciting and compelling product mix centred around serving the lifestyles of our consumers.”