The news: Retail media platform Topsort is driving major gains, with retailers seeing 60% revenue growth just one month after adopting its new AI model, CEO Regina Ye told EMARKETER in an exclusive interview. The company’s AI-powered optimization systems—and its Data Genie tool, which turns billions of data points into instant, natural-language answers—are replacing the traditional, multi-day wait for analytics.

According to the company, major retailers including Woolworths, Australia's Coles, and Brazil’s Magalu have implemented these solutions to address core operational challenges.

Why it matters: These results come as retail media teams face several challenges, including fragmented reporting systems that slow the turnaround times for basic analytics requests.

Advertisers are leaving planned budgets on the table, Ye notes, often due to clunky systems that make campaign execution too slow or complex. At the same time, growing demands for unified reporting and smoother buying experiences are pushing retailers to reassess whether their current infrastructure can keep up.

• Cost and measurement transparency are the top pain points for US retail media buyers, cited by 32% and 31% of respondents, respectively (see chart). These concerns align directly with Topsort’s product focus—automating ad placement verification and integrating directly with first-party data warehouses like Databricks and Snowflake.
• Challenges like fragmentation across platforms (25%) and the difficulty of integrating on- and off-site campaigns (26%) also underscore the need for faster infrastructure and cross-platform compatibility—areas where Topsort is already investing through upcoming fall product launches.
• More than 4 in 10 (41%) brand and agency marketers cited retail media as a key area of investment, validating the importance of improving infrastructure, speed, and transparency within these ecosystems. Topsort’s AI-powered automation and analytics positioning aligns tightly with what marketers are actively seeking.

Our take: Topsort's success with large-scale implementations suggests that complex retail operations are keen to move beyond outdated solutions that no longer meet operational demands.

Just 31% of retail media buyers use multi-retailer platforms, and only 21% use DSPs—signaling that most retail media isn’t yet fully programmatic or cross-network. That fragmentation strengthens the case for vendors like Topsort, which prioritize performance, flexibility, and interoperability.

However, the bigger test is whether cross-network collaboration can overcome competitive silos that limit advertiser efficiency. Topsort’s fall product launches will indicate whether the market is ready for true interoperability or if individual platforms will continue protecting exclusive advantages.