At the same time, Ocado doesn’t expect all of its pandemic-driven revenue boost to last. Much of its sales bump came from customers buying dry goods and other nonperishables; the company predicts that demand for many of these items will fall below normal levels in the second half of the year, as customers work through their stockpiles. As a result, the company has not raised its full-year sales and earnings forecasts.
Clarke, who by then had been promoted to chief technology officer, had an even more ambitious version of that platform in mind. The day after Ocado launched Morrisons, Clarke gathered his staff for an off-site in a local hotel. He congratulated them on having gotten Morrisons up and running on schedule and in just six months—a significant technical achievement. What he said next made many in the room gasp. “We’re going to rewrite the whole technology stack from scratch,” he told them. At first, this largely meant software improvements. But, by mid-2015, Ocado had begun developing the army of robots that would eventually staff its “hives.”
Ocado于互联网繁盛时期创立，当时三位20多岁的英国人蒂姆·施泰纳、乔纳森·法曼和杰森·吉辛在高盛当交易员，投资创业公司亏了钱。2000年4月，三人联合成立了Ocado。（Ocado是个虚构的词，之所以选这个词是因为不属于任何一种语言，而且创始人喜欢这几个字母当标志的样子。）Ocado的首席执行官施泰纳是创始人里唯一留在公司的人。他看起来结实修长，短短的灰色头发，淡蓝色的眼睛，快速介绍Ocado的历史时散发出一种拳击手的气质。
投资者似乎相信Ocado能抓住当前的机会。2月28日以来，尽管全球市场暴跌，Ocado股价还是上涨了28%。然而，未来看起来有点灰暗。由于Ocado采取许可经营，前期要花巨资建设数十个订单分拣中心。相关债务导致一些分析师怀疑，目前背负逾7.5亿美元债务的Ocado承担的风险是不是太大。而且，即使大流行过去，有个问题也不容忽视，不管是哪家杂货商，即便引进Ocado的机器人帮助，能否挡住什么都卖的亚马逊，还有总部位于本顿维尔的沃尔玛的冲击。
Like most grocers, Ocado has faced skyrocketing demand fueled by social distancing measures and panic buying. Its U.K. grocery sales in March leaped more than 20% year over year. At one point, visits to its website were 100 times the normal rate—a level so high, it triggered the company’s cybersecurity systems to believe the website was under attack. “This is the peakiest peak we’ve ever had in the history of the business,” says David Shriver, Ocado’s group director of communications.
When Ocado made its debut, established British grocery chains such as Tesco, Sainsbury’s, and Walmart-owned Asda already had e-commerce operations. Those chains were using their stores to fulfill online orders, with store clerks gathering the goods and loading them onto delivery trucks. This process, known as “store pick,” is the way most retailers have grafted e-commerce onto their existing operations. Store pick requires little additional capital or labor investment, but it has disadvantages. Many stores’ stockrooms are too cramped to accommodate a sizable picking operation, which means employees may have to fill online orders from the supermarket floor, putting them in competition with in-store customers. With smaller inventories, there’s also a greater chance that items won’t be available—a leading driver of customer dissatisfaction.
2017年11月，Ocado宣布与法国零售商Groupe Casino达成协议，为电商业务提供技术。两个月后又与Sobeys达成合作，Sobeys在加拿大经营1500家不同品牌的店面。“这是我见过唯一能实现大规模盈利的电商模式。”Sobeys电商业务高级副总裁莎拉·乔伊斯谈到Ocado时表示。
单纯做超市业务的公司自动化速度慢得多。但在2017年6月，亚马逊推出的重大举措为Ocado推广现代化销售提供了V型助力。当时，线上百货商店亚马逊斥资137亿美元收购了在全球有500家门店的高档商品商店全食超市（Whole Foods）。杂货商普遍担心亚马逊也会吞掉自己的业务，因为亚马逊在其他行业有过先例，对Ocado技术的兴趣也骤然汹涌。