State Trading Organisation (STO) has opened first smart store in Hulhumale' using AI vision.

The store in Hulhumale' Phase I was inaugurated by Vice President Faisal Naseem at a ceremony held on Thursday morning. The ceremony was attended by Technology Minister Aminath Shauna, STO's Managing Director Abdulla Saeed, MIFCO's CEO Ismail Fauzy, and FSM's Managing Director Mohamed Gasam.

This is the largest smart store in South Asia, with AI vision technology replacing cashiers and sales assistants.

Speaking about the store, STO MD Saeed stated that only a few countries in South Asia have such stores. The main purpose of opening the store is to provide many conveniences to businessmen and the public through this innovative technology, he said.

“I think the technology being tested here will be used in different ways by other businesses. This is a start,” Saeed said.

According to STO, the smart store will reduce the time customers have to spend shopping by a great deal and confusion in making financial transactions will be eliminated. Those who wish to do business in the store will have to register with a special mobile application and include the customer's bank card information. The application will allow customers to do all the business transactions in the store.

The smart store has cameras installed that can identify the customer, while sensors installed in the shelves will detect if the goods are removed no matter how small. The required goods will be added to the customer's virtual cart as they are removed from the shelves. If customers return the item to the shelves, it will be removed from the cart.

One customers are done with shopping and need to leave the store, the bill amount will be automatically deducted from the customer's account. The store will use the "tokenization" feature on the cards.