Walmart in Partnership with OpenAI, Training with Games in New Retail Competition

In its escalating battle against Amazon, the retail giant Walmart is turning to new technology—in-store robots and artificial intelligence. In an open letter, its Chief People Officer Donna Morris said that the company is teaming up with OpenAI, an AI research lab, to create a new internal AI workforce and provide education about AI to all its US associates.

This investment is the latest in Walmart’s Glide As You Guide program, which will see the company invest nearly 1 billion USD in skills training programs to 2026 with the goal of upskilling all of its U.S. associates—from the frontlines to the home office and beyond—for the future of the retail industry.

Fundamentally, this partnership is centered around Walmart offering its associates the chance to further their knowledge with free access to custom OpenAI-developed certification programs, delivered through the company’s Walmart Academy—the largest corporate training program. It’s not just to make employees more efficient in their daily work, but also a profound practice of Walmart’s strategic plan of “people-oriented, technology-driven” to build core competitiveness in the future retail battlefield by boosting AI literacy for all its employees.

AI is No Longer a 'Back-end Capability' but a 'Frontline Tool'

What Walmart’s floor plan illustrates is that the application of A.I. is migrating from the remote “back end” to the movable “frontline”. The idea is that the AI tools would be woven into the fabric of employees’ daily work, from streamlining inventory checks to optimizing scheduling and customer service. AI digital assistants could even be deployed to handle routine tasks.

What makes this initiative so powerful is that it will unshackle the productivity of employees and give them more time to give customers high value-added service and innovate with their services. And, for third-party sellers who sell on Walmart Marketplace, a more efficient and better-off Walmart in terms of workforce satisfaction equals a more dependable fulfillment network, a superior customer service experience, and a more competitive sales channel overall.

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A Traditional Giant’s 'Counterattack'

Faced with the online absolute advantage of Amazon, Walmart's goal is to exceed, and the method is the dual-wheel drive model of “physical store network + digital capability”. Its partnership with OpenAI could be viewed as a turbo charger being welded on to its digital muscles.

Be it a situation whereby Walmart did not have much of a choice, the retailer is now racing to catch up through massive aid from AI and is trying to set a benchmark in the new retail model of “human and machine interaction”. A retail network of millions of workers trained on AI skills will be a potent lever of operational efficiency and innovation potential that Walmart can use to fight back against pure-play e-commerce platforms.

This also means for all retailers and brands that future competition will be a full competition from the organizational capabilities and technological capacity.

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