Imagine shopping in a grocery store of the future. Upon entering, scan yourself in with you palm. Moving about the store, you place your items in a smart cart that tabulates your bill, and you can leave the store without spending a single second in a check-out line.
Sound like a utopian pipe dream? To most shoppers, it still does, even though Amazon, Walmart and other retail giants have begun making big investments in the technology needed to power such smart stores. What will it take to make them a reality?