Morrisons is aiming to capitalise on its World Cup sales boost with the appointment of its first chief AI officer with a brief to put data and tech at the heart of its turnaround strategy.
Dr Mohsen Ghasempour, who has a PHD in computer science and a proven track record of driving AI innovation at enterprise-scale, joins from Kingfisher where he held the same role, leading the team which built and scaled Kingfisher’s AI function in its operations across Europe. Prior to that, he held senior technology roles at The Hut Group.
In this newly created role Ghasempour will establish a central data science and AI function for Morrisons which will take overall responsibility for data and AI strategy, with a focus on customer growth; empowering colleagues; operational efficiency; manufacturing excellence; and commercial excellence.
His appointment comes just two weeks after Morrisons delivered its strongest sales growth for a year as the World Cup helped to bring shoppers through its doors.
The supermarket, which is in the process of a major turnaround, said hot weather and the football tournament lifted group like-for-like sales by 3.2% over the 13 weeks to July 26.
Morrisons holds roughly an 8.4% to 8.5% market share, ranking as the sixth-largest UK supermarket behind Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda, Aldi, and Lidl, which recently overtook it.
Its tech strategy is led by a partnership with Google Cloud. The retailer recently implemented an in-store product finder powered by Gemini, Vertex AI, and BigQuery to help shoppers locate specific items and aisles instantly.
However, as many of Morrisons’ customer are from an older demographic, the retailer has to tread carefully when it comes to implementing digital schemes. In fact, earlier this year, Morrisons launched a major expansion of its use of physical coupons, only this time with added personalisation,
The supermarket, which unveiled 2,500 price cuts in January, has also signed a new partnership with digital marketing specialist Ecrebo to enhance its ability to generate immediate personalised coupons, offers and messages to shoppers in-store at the till and also through its app.
Ghasempour will take up his post on October 1 and will report to CEO Rami Baitiéh who said: “The creation of this new role reflects our commitment to ensuring Morrisons is embracing the opportunities in data and AI at pace, with focus and in the right way.
“Mohsen is a recognised expert in the field with hands-on experience of unlocking the potential of technology to deliver innovative new solutions that serve customers, empower colleagues and deliver measurable business impact. I’m delighted to welcome him to Morrisons and look forward to his contribution to our growth plans.”
Ghasempour added: “I’m excited about joining Morrisons and building the team that will help the business make effective and responsible use of AI in the years ahead, to deliver real benefits for customers and colleagues.”
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