Topic
15 facts from 4 episodes, in date order. These are what speakers said on the shows, each linked to the moment it was said. They aren't independently verified.
2025
Walmart created a new AI-focused role reporting directly to McMillon, filled by Daniel Dancker, who came from Instacart.
“we decided to create a new role that reports directly to me that we announced just, uh, maybe a couple months ago. And that role, um, is is, uh, one filled by Daniel Dancker, who came to us from Instacart”
Undated
Liu cites Webvan as arriving about a decade before Instacart, illustrating the importance of timing.
“Web van predated Instacart by at least what, like, a decade, and that timing was wrong”
Undated
Asha Sharma was previously chief operating officer at Instacart and vice president of product at Meta, where she ran Messenger, Instagram Direct, Messenger Kids and Remote Presence.
“She was previously COO at Instacart and VP of Product at Meta, where she ran Messenger, Instagram Direct, Messenger Kids and Remote Presence.”
Undated
Instacart acquired Caper, a company that makes a smart shopping cart.
“Caper was an acquisition we made a number of years ago, and it's a smart shopping cart.”
Undated
The Caper cart has a digital screen, camera sensors, a basket that works as a scale, and location sensors.
“with a digital screen, camera sensors, the entire basket's a scale so you can weigh produce in the scale, location sensors, so the cart knows where it's at”
Undated
Caper carts charge when pushed into each other or into a charger, whereas McIntosh says the industry previously relied on manually plugging in carts.
“as you push the carts into each other or to a charger, they just charge. Sounds obvious, uh, you know, in hindsight, but before us, the industry was really based around manually plugging in carts”
Undated
Caper added a 'Did you forget?' screen shown to shoppers as they approach checkout.
“we launched a capability where as a user was approaching checkout, we surface a screen that says, Did you forget?”
Undated
Instacart let store staff perform checkout verifications on the cart instead of on a tablet, a change McIntosh called important.
“giving staff the option of conducting those verifications on cart versus on the tablet, that slight tooling change, that slight tooling tweak”
Undated
Instacart built the Caper cart to process AI on the device because many stores have large gaps in Wi-Fi coverage.
“And so we had to build the cart to really deal with these big gaps in Wi-Fi throughout the store, which means a lot of these intelligent systems need to be on device at the edge.”
Undated
Instacart's Store View product lets its shoppers scan store shelves with a mobile phone while picking orders.
“We have a product called Store View, where Instacart shoppers that are going in a store to pick an order can also scan the shelf with their mobile phone.”
Undated
David McIntosh said Instacart spent its last decade bringing retailers online with e-commerce, fulfillment and retail media solutions.
“The last decade of Instacart's history, we brought their business online with e commerce solutions, fulfillment solutions, retail media solutions.”
Undated
Instacart sells its in-store technologies as modular products rather than requiring retailers to adopt all six at once.
“our approach is that the technologies have to be modular. So we don't go to retailers and say, hey, you should adopt all these six products at once.”
Undated
Instacart's connected-store offering includes FoodStorm software for the deli and prepared counter, plus electronic shelf tags with pick-to-light technology.
“the deli and the prepare or counter with FoodStorm, the software, the shelf tags, the ESL tags that sit on the shelf with our pick-to-light technology”
Undated
David McIntosh proposed that an AI agent could communicate with suppliers about low stock without a human in the middle.
“why put a human in the middle of that? Why not have, for example, an agent communicate with the suppliers in the background?”
Undated
Instacart's stated vision is that within five to ten years customers will not have to choose between shopping in store and online.
“Our vision is that on a five to ten year horizon, customers won't have to choose between shopping in store and online.”
Episodes