Batteries Plus’ modernization journey prepared it for agentic AI

Consumer electronics retailer Batteries Plus has made a deliberate, multi-year modernization journey that it said has positioned it to scale artificial intelligence (AI) across its business.

Karthik Jambulingam, senior director of enterprise architecture, shared with Digital Commerce 360 how Batteries Plus has transitioned its core systems to a scalable, cloud-enabled, and data-driven infrastructure. His team called the “strategic evolution” a way of “positioning Batteries Plus to more effectively deploy AI solutions that enhance the customer experience, improve operational efficiency, and accelerate business growth.”

Jambulingam said Batteries Plus’ focus has been on building a “future-ready” and “AI-ready” foundation.

“The AI readiness gap is something many organizations miss,” Jambulingam told Digital Commerce 360. He called this overall modernization approach “AI-Ready Enterprise Architecture.”

Batteries Plus is No. 956 in the Top 2000 Database. The market research tool ranks North America’s largest online retailers by annual ecommerce sales.

How Batteries Plus became ‘AI-ready’

Batteries Plus was trying to future-proof its technology stack, Jambulingam said. It didn’t know at the time that it would be enabling the newest wave of AI tools, including agents. That was the result of finding ways to improve its infrastructure.

“The world is changing. Retail is changing even faster,” Jambulingam told Digital Commerce 360. “The tools — it used to be yearly updates or upgrades at one point and [has] become quarterly. Now it’s almost weekly, daily, there are a number of things. We at least try to be optimized. We cannot be everywhere.”

As part of this transformation, Batteries Plus said, it enhanced capabilities across various areas within its business. Those include:

• Ecommerce
• Point-of-sale (POS)
• Payments
• Product information management (PIM)
• Enterprise search
• Partner integrations

These improvements, in addition to transitioning to a cloud-native infrastructure, served different outcomes, Jambulingam said. They strengthened Batteries Plus’ system reliability while building a foundational data layer. That foundation gave the retailer’s AI systems the structured context they need to deliver accurate, reliable results, according to Batteries Plus.

Among its successes since upgrading its systems, Batteries Plus said it has reduced failed searches by 25%. It also achieved a 35%-40% customer inquiry containment rate. That refers to the percentage of customer service interactions that automated self-service channels (which include AI chatbots and voice agents) resolve without escalating to a human associate.

“This modernization work was not just about upgrading systems,” Jambulingam said. “It was about building what I call a knowledge-centric architecture. Rather than just managing raw data, we invested in structured, contextual, semantically rich information that gives AI systems the ability to reason accurately. The PIM transformation, data platform investments, and integration work created this knowledge foundation, which is now central to our Enterprise AI strategy.”

How is Batteries Plus using AI across its enterprise?

There are six key ways Batteries Plus is using AI across its more than 800 retail locations and ecommerce site, Jambulingam said.

1. AI-powered voice agent.
   Batteries Plus has integrated its voice agent with store phone systems to assist customers with product discovery, service scheduling, and intelligent call routing, with multi-language support. The AI hands off to store associates when needed, keeping humans in the loop for complex situations, Jambulingam said.
2. Intelligent product discovery.
   The AI-driven search platform helps Batteries Plus’ store associates navigate complex product compatibility scenarios and improve sales conversions, Jambulingam said.
3. Store call analytics.
   This AI-powered analysis of customer-store call interactions helps to capture patterns, intent, sentiment and outcomes, Jambulingam said. Together, they improve store operations and service quality.
4. AI assistant for store operations.
   The conversational AI assistant supports store associates with operational knowledge, product guidance, troubleshooting and multilingual support. That improves daily productivity and reduces dependency on manual support channels, Jambulingam said. This is meaningful because the majority of Batteries Plus’ online orders are for buy online, pick up in store (BOPIPS).
5. Commercial AI agents.
   Agentic AI capabilities support Batteries Plus’ commercial sales operations, including outreach and proactively addressing customer churn, Jambulingam said. These agents autonomously identify high-potential leads and schedule appointments for sales associates, he added. That allows the sales team to spend more time on quality conversations, relationship building, and complex deals.
6. Agentic Commerce.
   Batteries Plus has actively placed its focus on bringing AI-powered agentic capabilities to its ecommerce experience, Jambulingam said. It is using AI and large language models (LLMs) to create more intelligent, personalized customer interactions.

“This is about bringing the in-store expert experience to digital channels, serving customers where they are, at a time when consumers are increasingly open to AI-assisted purchasing decisions,” Jambulingam told Digital Commerce 360.

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