Opportunity 

Data privacy policy, such as GDPR, is often viewed as an obstacle for digital sales and service companies (DSS-companies). But what if personal big data could be used to create successful and friction free shopping experiences without jeopardizing privacy? And what if consumers could increase the control over their private big data at the same time?  

Online purchases, especially within retail, are often being return due to a gap between customer expectation and the actual product. Returns raise costs across the network and to environment. What if personal big data could increase the rate of purchases of products matching the expectation from the customer? And what if utilization of personal big data within e-commerce could have a positive impact for our planet? 

Approach 

The concept Cipers offers consumers and DSS-companies a digital solution that combines privacy and advanced analytics. Cipers is short for Consumer Integrity Personal data relevant Recommendations and Success attributes identification. It is the result of a six-week innovation sprint where professionals from four tech companies and five researchers from Borås University created and evaluated a tech solution for personalized e-commerce. 

Cipers offers consumers to sign up for an account which safely stores their personal data, making it friction free to get a more personalized treatment. The Cipers account offers consumers to get control and an overview of where, how, and why their personal data are being used. Lastly, at every given moment, the user of Cipers can use their account to retrieve their personal data and remove it from where it has been stored.  

For DSS-companies Cipers offers a cloud service that supports personalization of consumer offers and increases the intent to buy. Also, it helps DSS-companies to retrieve value and insights from consumers’ personal big data within threatening privacy. Taking all of this into account, Cipers will help DSS-companies achieve more successful purchases and less returns. 

The Rewards 

The cost for a DSS-company to use Cipers will be covered within 4 months of integration and the revenue will be more than four times the investment by the second year of usage, resulting in an increase in profit by SEK 2 million. Cipers as a business will reach break-even by the fifth year when targeting a local market with a revenue of SEK 184 million. When targeting a global market, break-even will be reached by the end of the first year with a revenue of SEK 296 million