Electronics

Amazon has thousands of employees who listen to users' recorded commands to improve the algorithms of voice assistant Alexa. Of course, they do get to hear a lot of sensitive material that way.

Fnac, Darty and Vanden Borre may soon be joined by another chain: the group is said to be considering the acquisition of French retailer Nature & Découvertes. The hobby chain currently has 100 outlets, and might prove to be an interesting addition.

Two years after opening a French language web shop, Dutch Coolblue is now set to open its first physical store in Belgium's French speaking area. Bilingual Brussels has already been confirmed, but the company is also looking for suitable locations in Liège and Charleroi.

Two big names in Asian e-commerce are working together: Chinese JD.com and Japanese Rakuten have signed an agreement to start using technology developed by JD.com, such as drones and robots, in Rakuten's unmanned delivery solutions in Japan.

Despite difficult circumstances, Fnac Darty has finished 2018 with a small turnover growth and a 20 % profit increase. Sales improved in the Benelux as well, even after seven BCC stores were closed in the Netherlands.

Ceconomy, parent company of MediaMarkt and Saturn, is putting its alliance with Fnac Darty on hold for now. The company wants to find a solution for its ongoing poor performance and financial troubles first.

Voice commerce, shopping through a smart speaker like Amazon Echo, struggles to gain popularity. eMarketer had hoped that almost a third of users would be shopping through smart speakers by 2019, but it turns out less than one percent has adopted the practice.