Wine Technology Archives

Winechain (wiNeFT) Partners with CMA CGM Group for Logistics of Fine Wines

Winechain the NFT platform (wiNeFT /Winechain NFT name) designed to create direct links to new generations of wine consumers around the world, has today announced the partnership with the CMA CGM Group. This global player in sea, land, and air logistics solutions will take a minority shareholding in Winechain alongside its founders.

Winechain is the first independent NFT platform for fine wine estates. This wine-meets-technology project has been designed to create direct links with new generations of wine consumers around the world has now raised over €1 million in backing from top international wine estates and others.

The initiative was launched in April 2022 by three Frenchmen: Xavier Garambois, former head of Amazon Europe, Guillaume Jourdan, CEO of VitaBella, Paris, and Nicolas Mendiharat, CEO of the San Francisco Palate Club. The plan is to go live by the end of 2022 with the issue of the first wiNeFT (Winechain name NFT).

Xavier Garambois, joint founder of Winechain states:

“Although the acquisition of NFTs will be the first thing that enthused buyers will do on Winechain, the day will come when the owner of the wines will want to have them shipped to their homes, wherever that might be in the world, and in the very best conditions. Apart from enabling access to rare wines, Winechain also takes care of logistics to ensure that the wines arrive at their final destination in perfect condition. This worldwide partnership with the CMA CGA Group is a mark of confidence in the future and our strategy that enables us to look to the long term. We will be able to benefit from the expertise and experience of CMA CGA and the major support that they can bring in terms of sea and air transport and logistical services.”

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Vivino Raises $155 Million in Series D Funding

Vivino, the world’s most downloaded mobile wine app and largest online wine marketplace closed (this week) a $155m Series D funding round led by Swedish based investment firm Kinnevik with Sprints Capital accompanying as a new investor. Additional participants include GP Bullhound and existing early-stage investor Creandum. This latest round brings Vivino’s total funds raised to date to $221 million and includes a mix of primary and secondary investment.

Vivino currently boasts a community of 50 million wine enthusiasts, who turn to the platform for its personalized recommendations, unbiased rating system, and expansive selection of wines from more than 700 marketplace partners worldwide. The new capital will enable Vivino to improve its core technology and artificial intelligence platform to create better and more personalized recommendations for Vivino users. The company will also deepen its focus on select markets with the greatest potential for growth, including the US, Germany, the UK, Italy, Japan, and Portugal.

“This is a testament to the remarkable work that our teams around the globe have done to build an extraordinary business,” said Heini Zachariassen, Vivino’s Founder and Chief Executive Officer. “This round has raised important capital for our rapidly growing company and drawn some exceptional new leaders to our board. The funding will enable us to continue to build on our core strengths, expand industry partnerships drawing more merchants and wineries to our marketplace, and support our continued global growth.”

Alcohol e-commerce sales worldwide have grown immensely, and it is estimated that by 2024, they will exceed $40 billion. Zachariassen credits the company’s growth to this continued shift in consumer behavior. “Our user retention rates are high, and we’re seeing a steady conversion of app users to wine buyers. That’s a good move in the right direction. By creating more value for our users, we also create more value for the company and industry at large.”

Since its Series C raise in February 2018, led by Vivino’s current board chairman, Christophe Navarre and former CEO and Chairman of Moët Hennessy, Vivino has increased its user base from 29 million to 50 million and has significantly grown its marketplace business, which connects wineries and wine merchants to its community. The company has posted a 100% annual growth rate for the last seven years and a 103% increase in year-over-year sales in 2020.

#vivino #vivinonews #winenews #ecommerce #winemarketing #winesales #consumerbehavior #AI #mobleapp #economics #winebusiness #winelovers #winelover #wine #wineapp #vivinoapp #winetrends #winetechnology

IWSR announces acquisition of Wine Intelligence

IWSR Drinks Market Analysis, the leading authority on the worldwide beverage alcohol industry, today announced the acquisition of London-based Wine Intelligence, the top global experts on wine consumer research and insights. The combined offering provides the industry with robust insight into consumption trends, consumer behavior and growth opportunities for the global beverage alcohol sector.

Founded in 2002, Wine Intelligence conducts projects on behalf of wine businesses in more than 35 wine markets. This acquisition enables the IWSR and Wine Intelligence teams to build a world-class consumer behavior division focused exclusively on the global beverage alcohol industry.

“As Covid-19 reshapes consumer behavior and beverage alcohol drinking occasions, industry stakeholders are looking for a deeper understanding of the consumer attitudes driving the market,” remarks Mark Meek, CEO of IWSR. “Our vision is shaped by our clients, and this acquisition is a tremendous opportunity for us to expand on our existing offerings and work with the Wine Intelligence team to provide the industry with access to comprehensive consumer insight across all categories of the drinks industry, including beer, wine, spirits and the ready-to-drink sector.”

This acquisition follows a successful decade-long relationship between IWSR and Wine Intelligence. Recent collaborations include the IWSR Covid-19 Consumer Tracker, an in-depth consumer sentiment research report series tracking the on-going impact of Covid-19 on the consumption of and attitude to beverage alcohol over an 18-month period.

“We are delighted to join the IWSR family after nearly 10 years of our organizations partnering on behalf of our client base,” says Lulie Halstead, CEO of Wine Intelligence. “I share Mark’s vision of us building a world-class and comprehensive offering of data and consumer insights to support the global beverage alcohol sectors, which we are uniquely positioned to do.”

About the IWSR

The IWSR is the leading source of data and intelligence on the alcoholic beverage market. The IWSR’s database, essential to the industry, quantifies the global market of wine, spirits, beer, cider, and RTDs (ready-to-drink) by volume and value in 160 countries, and provides insight into short- and long-term trends, including five-year volume and value forecasts. The IWSR tracks overall consumption and trends at brand, price segment and category level. Our data is used by the major international wine, spirits and beer companies, as well as financial and alcoholic beverage market suppliers. The IWSR’s unique methodology allows us to get closer to what is actually consumed and better understand how markets work. The IWSR boasts a team of global analysts, each of whom is equipped with local market expertise and an expansive network of on-the-ground industry contacts. Our analysts meet and speak with their industry contacts throughout the year in order to capture local insight, key market trends, and the ‘why’ behind the numbers. For more information about the IWSR, please visit www.theiwsr.com

About Wine Intelligence

Wine Intelligence is the global leader in wine consumer research and insights. Founded in 2002, we now conduct projects on behalf of wine businesses in more than 35 wine markets. With a team made up of wine industry and research specialists, we offer a broad range of research, insights and strategy services to help wine businesses make better and more profitable business decisions.

Meredith uses AI to sell wine

Meredith Corporation the US largest brand-powered food, lifestyle and entertainment media company, and Ste. Michelle Wine Estates, the third-largest premium wine company in the U.S., are exclusively partnering to position the remarkably broad and deep Ste. Michelle Wine Estates portfolio as the perfect wine pairings of choice through the use of Meredith’s smart technology capabilities, including proprietary first-party data, real-time consumer insights and predictive advertising capabilities. This alliance marks the first time a major advertiser has joined forces with Meredith to create and deliver a program rooted in artificial intelligence.

The program taps machine learning techniques to automatically classify recipes on Allrecipes, the world’s largest recipe site with a reach of 55 million consumers, and the diverse wines in the Ste. Michelle Wine Estates portfolio. An AI-based algorithm then combines the classifications to automatically generate specific wine pairings for each recipe. Suggested pairings appear adjacent to recipes and are automatically linked directly to local grocery stores or to e-commerce partners such as Instacart and Amazon Fresh for fulfillment using Meredith’s proprietary Shopper Marketing platform. Automated wine and side dish pairings can also appear in interactive meal plans which permit users to customize various elements of the meal based on their personal preferences.

Real-time insights generated from this program include user location store proximity, impressions by channel, trending products and trending recipes to help create usage occasions that reinforce the Ste. Michelle Wine Estates wines of choice, keeping the brand top of mind for all entertaining purposes. As part of the campaign, high-impact and targeted media also engages users with Ste. Michelle Wine Estates across Meredith platforms, including strategic video alignments, custom native content, high-impact media and editorial sponsorships.

“We are very excited to partner with Meredith to accelerate consumer engagement with our portfolio of world-class wines,” said Jim Mortensen, President and CEO of Ste. Michelle Wine Estates. “This data-driven approach represents a smarter, more impactful, results-oriented form of advertising, allowing us to reach high-value consumers at the point at which their wine purchasing decisions are made.”

Corbin deRubertis, Head of Innovation for Meredith, commented, “Consumers are increasingly expecting media platforms to do more than just present search results. They’re gravitating to smart platforms that take into account all available data to make intelligent recommendations. Picking the perfect wine to pair with a new dish is exactly the type of challenge we can solve at scale, and we’ve combined our deep, first-party insights, including our unparalleled context taxonomies, with new machine learning and AI techniques to deliver a next-generation consumer experience that also drives brand equity and product purchase for our client.”

In addition to investing with Allrecipes, Ste. Michelle Wine Estates will leverage Meredith’s scale by extending its exclusive partnership across the company’s O&O assets. Meredith owns the largest premium content digital network for American consumers, reaching 175MM engaged consumers across its platforms.