Iberia Sports Retail Group partners with Extenda Retail

Iberia Sports Retail Group partners with Extenda Retail to deliver next-generation, unified customer experiences with a cloud-native checkout engine, the Hii Retail platform.

• Iberia Sports Retail Group (ISRG) has selected Extenda Retail’s High-Intensity Intelligent (Hii) Retail platform to deliver multi-experience shopping journeys for its customers.
• The Hii Retail platform is powered by Google Cloud for maximum scalability and security
• Hii Retail empowers ISRG’s staff and consumers throughout the customer journey, regardless of where that journey starts and finishes.

Stockholm, Sweden, Friday, 24 March 2022

Today, the global retail software provider, Extenda Retail, has announced a partnership with sports retailer, ISRG. The partnership will see the technology provider roll out their cloud-native Hii Retail platform across ISRG’s physical and digital channels in over 400 stores across the Netherlands, Spain, and Portugal.

Delivering a holistic approach to digital retail

In order to establish a holistic approach to digital retail, and better harmonize the technologies deployed to support the consumer shopping experience across the group, ISRG embarked on a selection process to launch a single, unified commerce platform addressing the increasing business requirements to support an omnichannel consumer shopping experience. After a thorough market review, Extenda Retail’s Hii Retail platform was selected.

In 2018, leading British sports, fashion and outdoor brand JD Sports announced the merger of their in-house brands, JD Group, JD Sprinter, and Size? with Portuguese-based Sports Zone. The new Spanish-headquartered group initiated a joint-venture with Sonae to create a multi-channel leader in the sale of sports equipment in the Iberian Peninsula – ISRG. Since then, the group has grown further with the acquisition of Netherlands-based Sports Unlimited, a multichannel leader in sports equipment in Iberia DeporVillage and Spanish professional gym machines and equipment producer Bodytone.

Mohit Paul, Chief Commercial Officer at Extenda Retail commented: “The creation of Hii Retail was founded on Extenda Retail’s 40 years’ worth of experience in delivering value to market-leading retailers across Europe. We understand that retail is evolving quickly and monolithic, legacy technologies are no longer fit-for-purpose because they are far too expensive and time-consuming to adapt to today’s new reality.

“Hii Retail provides simple, innovative, component-based technologies delivered quickly on the Google Cloud Platform (GCP). And delivery via GCP means that these components can be orchestrated to deliver agile and enjoyable shopping experiences for consumers consistently across multiple sales channels.”

Alberto Tortosa, Head of PMO & Store Operations at Iberia Sports Retail Group said: “We embarked on this journey to find a unified retail platform to provide us with the ability to create compelling shopping experiences for customers, regardless of how they shop, where they shop and when they shop. And at the same time, the omnichannel offer has to be fiscally compliant with trading standards in the countries in which we operate.

“It was clear to us that a deep-domain cloud-native solution would deliver the flexibility and agility we are seeking, and with our existing relationship with Google, Extenda Retail’s “Hii Retail” solution built on Google Cloud was the winning choice for our current and future needs.”

David Segarra, COO at JD Iberia & Real Estate & International, commented: “Our stores are excited about the journey with Extenda Retail, and we look forward to implementing amazing experiences for our customers. We are transforming the business and strong partners such as Extenda Retail are key to our future success. With Hii Retail, we will be able to empower our staff and serve our customers the way they prefer today – and in the future.”

Ted Schönbeck, Head of Cloud Technology at Google, commented: “We are delighted to partner with ISRG and Extenda Retail to deliver the most innovative solution in consumer retailing today. Extenda Retail’s Hii Retail platform is the winning choice for European retailers who require market-leading flexibility, speed and security. We look forward to continuing the journey with Extenda Retail as they deliver an exciting roadmap for the future of consumer shopping experience.”