Verified
Target
Scaling- Retail
- ~415,000 employees
- Store Companion in ~2,000 stores
- ChatGPT Enterprise to ~18,000
- Chief AI officer since Aug 2026
Target deploys AI mostly through tools its own technology teams build, led by Store Companion, a generative AI assistant on store handhelds in nearly 2,000 stores since Aug 2024, while OpenAI's ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to about 18,000 employees by Nov 2025. Target credits its AI-driven personalization engine with billions of dollars in incremental sales (Mar 2026) and sells through ChatGPT, Google Gemini and Microsoft Copilot. Chandhu Nair became Target's first chief AI officer in Aug 2026, reporting to Chief Information and Product Officer Prat Vemana.
corporate.target.comTheir approach to AI
- The platform
- Target's own teams built Store Companion (2024), Target Trend Brain (2025) and an internal AI platform with a retrieval grounding service, while corporate teams use ChatGPT Enterprise bought from OpenAI (Nov 2025).
- The models
- OpenAI is the only model provider Target names, through ChatGPT Enterprise; Prat Vemana calls Target's approach model-agnostic, and Target has not said which models run Store Companion, Trend Brain, Gift Finder or Ask Target.
- The reach
- Store Companion reached store team members in all of Target's nearly 2,000 stores by Aug 2024, and ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to about 18,000 employees by Nov 2025, according to Fortune.
- The catch
- Target publishes no technology budget, AI cost or active-user count, and its India president said in May 2026 that AI providers' move to usage-based pricing is forcing Target to re-evaluate its AI tool strategy.
Snapshot
- Employees
- ~415,000
- Jan 31, 2026 (2025 Form 10-K); more than 2,000 stores and 60 supply chain facilities
- Technology budget
- Not disclosed
- 2026 capex about $5B, with supply chain and technology spending rising; technology including AI is part of a $1B operating reinvestment
- AI/ML headcount
- Not disclosed
- No AI count; about 40% of Target's technology workforce is in Bengaluru (Reuters, May 2026)
- Who owns AI
- Prat Vemana, CIPO
- CIPO since Feb 2025; Chief AI Officer Chandhu Nair reports to him since Aug 24, 2026
- Platform
- In-house tools plus ChatGPT Enterprise
- Store Companion, Target Trend Brain and an internal AI platform with a grounding service
- Models
- OpenAI; others not disclosed
- ChatGPT Enterprise for corporate teams; Vemana says Target will be able to switch models under ThinkTank quickly (Oct 2025)
- Reach
- ~2,000 stores
- Store Companion chainwide since Aug 2024; ChatGPT Enterprise rolled out to about 18,000 employees (Nov 2025)
- Use cases
- Count not published
- Personalization, search, store support, merchandising, marketing, forecasting, seller vetting and agentic commerce
Key findings
Target credited its AI-driven personalization engine, powered by the Target Circle loyalty program, with billions of dollars in incremental sales in Mar 2026, a year after Cara Sylvester said AI-powered search, recommendation and substitution algorithms had produced hundreds of millions of dollars in incremental sales in A/B tests.
Store Companion, a generative AI chatbot Target's in-house technology team took from testing to planned rollout in about six months, reached store team members in nearly 2,000 stores by Aug 2024, and Target had rolled out OpenAI's ChatGPT Enterprise to about 18,000 employees by Nov 2025, according to Fortune.
Target named Chandhu Nair, previously senior vice president of stores, data, AI and innovation at Lowe's, its first chief AI officer from Aug 24, 2026; Nair reports to Chief Information and Product Officer Prat Vemana, according to a Target email to CIO Dive.
Target reported a 2,000% rise in traffic from AI platforms in Q1 2026 and says it is the first mass retailer with shopping on Google AI Mode and Gemini, Microsoft Copilot and OpenAI's ChatGPT, where its app launched in beta in Nov 2025.
Target is raising spending on technology, including AI, in 2026 as part of a $1 billion operating reinvestment that CFO Jim Lee called an ongoing step-up, while Target India president Andrea Zimmerman said in May 2026 that usage-based AI pricing is forcing Target to re-evaluate its AI tool strategy.
Where Target sits
- Stage
- Scaling
Target sits at Scaling: Store Companion, a generative AI assistant Target built, has run on store team members' handhelds in nearly 2,000 stores since Aug 2024, ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to about 18,000 employees by Nov 2025, AI runs in production in personalization, search, forecasting, merchandising, marketing and agentic customer service, and Chief Information and Product Officer Prat Vemana owns Target's technology, with Chief AI Officer Chandhu Nair reporting to him since Aug 2026. Target falls short of Embedded because it has published no weekly or active usage figures for its AI tools and has reported returns for two digital use cases, not AI's financial effect across the company.
How the stages are defined - Ownership
- Prat Vemana, EVP and Chief Information and Product Officer; Chief AI Officer Chandhu Nair reports to him (Aug 2026)
- Platform
- Hybrid: In-house tools on an internal AI platform; ChatGPT Enterprise bought
- Models
- OpenAI in ChatGPT Enterprise; models behind in-house tools not disclosed
- Hosting
- ChatGPT Enterprise hosted by OpenAI; own data centers, store edge, Google Cloud and Azure (2022); in-house model hosting not disclosed
- Reach
- Store Companion in nearly 2,000 stores; ChatGPT Enterprise to ~18,000 (Nov 2025)
How they deploy
Build the tools, buy the general assistant
Target's in-house technology team built Store Companion from real store questions and process documents in 2024, and Target's engineers have since built Target Trend Brain for merchants, GRAM for accessory recommendations and an LLM retrieval system for campaign forecasting on an internal AI platform. For general corporate work, Target bought ChatGPT Enterprise from OpenAI, which had been rolled out to about 18,000 employees by Nov 2025, and an OpenAI team trained Target staff. Prat Vemana called technology an amplifier of talent in Oct 2025 and said the work is about scaling talent, not replacing it.
Technology as one of four priorities
Michael Fiddelke, CEO since Feb 2026, made accelerating technology one of Target's four priorities, alongside merchandising, the guest experience, and the team and communities. Target's Mar 2026 plan commits to accelerating technology and AI to deepen personalization and engagement, and Fiddelke told investors that technology should save store team members time on tasks such as unloading trucks so they can spend it serving guests.
Selling through outside AI platforms
Target calls its approach to agentic commerce conversational curation: shopping inside other companies' AI assistants. Target launched its app in ChatGPT in beta in Nov 2025, helped Google and others develop the Universal Commerce Protocol for checkout in AI Mode and Gemini (Jan 2026), and joined Microsoft's Copilot Checkout as a launch partner for loyalty experiences (Jun 2026). Michael Fiddelke said in Mar 2026 that Target is a ways away from understanding the economics of these partnerships and is focused on being where consumers shop.
Speed and efficiency through an acceleration office
Target created an enterprise acceleration office in May 2025, led by Michael Fiddelke as COO, to remove friction, speed decisions and embrace technology and AI beyond what Target was already deploying, with a priority on more efficient and cost-effective ways to work. Fiddelke said in Aug 2025 that Target was evaluating every technology initiative for its return and realigning resources to the most mission-critical ones.
Outcomes first under a chief AI officer
Target appointed Chandhu Nair as its first chief AI officer in Aug 2026 to bring greater focus and coordination to AI across the enterprise. Nair said Target should use AI to build on its stores, merchandising and team rather than create a separate AI strategy, and that success will be measured by Target's growth, the guest experience and the team's work, not by how much AI Target deploys.
Intentional use as AI pricing shifts
Andrea Zimmerman, president of Target in India, told Reuters in May 2026 that Target is focused on intentional use and integration of AI rather than deploying it everywhere, and that AI providers' shift from subscriptions to usage-based pricing is forcing Target to re-evaluate its strategy. Zimmerman said AI pricing is discussed in Target's senior technology leadership and architecture forums.
- Deployment model
- Target runs AI through Target Tech, the organization Chief Information and Product Officer Prat Vemana leads, which covers cybersecurity, data platforms, data science, infrastructure, product engineering, enterprise product teams and user experience. Target adopted a product operating model in the 18 months before Oct 2025, pairing product, technology and UX teams with the business groups that use each tool; Store Companion, for example, was built by Target's in-house technology team from store teams' real questions and process documents. Since Aug 24, 2026, Chief AI Officer Chandhu Nair coordinates AI across the enterprise and, like Senior Vice President of UX Purvi Shah, reports to Vemana. About 40% of Target's technology workforce sits in Bengaluru, in a Target in India center of about 5,600 people (Reuters, May 2026).
- Model providers
- OpenAI is the only model provider Target names. Teams across Target use ChatGPT Enterprise, which Target says is designed for use with its proprietary data (Nov 2025), and Target sells through its own app inside ChatGPT. Prat Vemana describes Target's approach as model-agnostic and said in Oct 2025 that Target will be able to switch models quickly under ThinkTank, its internal environment for testing ideas. Target has not named the models behind Store Companion, Target Trend Brain, Gift Finder, Ask Target or the large language models described on its engineering blog, and Target's 2025 Form 10-K says portions of its technology infrastructure, including certain generative AI services, depend on third parties. Google and Microsoft work with Target on agentic checkout in Gemini, AI Mode and Copilot; Target has not described either as a model supplier for its own tools.
- Data and infrastructure
- Target runs a hybrid multi-cloud: enterprise data centers, edge computing in every store and distribution center, and public cloud on Google Cloud (including Google Kubernetes Engine) and Microsoft Azure, after earlier moves through AWS and IBM Cloud, all managed through its homegrown Target Application Platform (Target Tech, 2022). Target's enterprise data centers hold data-sensitive workloads such as its unified guest data platform. Target's engineering blog describes an internal AI platform and an in-house AI grounding service that indexes embeddings for retrieval (Apr 2026), and an Inventory Ledger that processes up to 360,000 inventory transactions a second and takes in AI inferences of unknown out-of-stocks (Oct 2023). ChatGPT Enterprise is a service hosted by OpenAI; Target has not disclosed which clouds or data centers run the models behind its in-house AI tools.
Platforms and internal tools
Store CompanionChainwide by Aug 2024
Store Companion is a generative AI chatbot Target designed for store team members' handheld devices, answering process questions such as how to restart a register in a power outage, coaching new and seasonal hires and supporting store operations. Target's in-house technology team trained it on real store questions and process documents, piloted it in about 400 stores and rolled it out to nearly 2,000 stores by Aug 2024; Prat Vemana still listed it among Target's GenAI tools in Oct 2025.
- Users
- Store team members in nearly 2,000 stores (Aug 2024)
Target Trend BrainBy Oct 2025
Target Trend Brain is Target's GenAI-powered internal trend intelligence and creative platform, which captures color, material, style and product details and applies consumer research and Target's brand principles to help merchants and designers spot emerging trends and predict future ones.
ChatGPT EnterpriseBy Nov 2025
ChatGPT Enterprise is OpenAI's workplace assistant, which teams across Target use to work faster and simplify workflows; Target says the product is designed for use with the retailer's proprietary data. Fortune reported in Nov 2025 that ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to about 18,000 Target employees and that 4,300 employees had attended ChatGPT training sessions led by an OpenAI team.
- Users
- Rolled out to about 18,000 employees (Nov 2025)
- Models
- OpenAI
Internal AI platform and grounding serviceBy Apr 2026
Target's engineering teams build on an internal AI platform that includes an in-house grounding service, where embeddings of company data are indexed so large language models can retrieve and rank them, as in Target's campaign forecasting system.
Target app in ChatGPTNov 2025 (beta)
The Target app in ChatGPT lets shoppers ask for ideas, build multi-item baskets including fresh food and choose Drive Up, Order Pickup or shipping, and by Jun 2026 shoppers could link their Target Circle accounts. Target's technology, UX and product teams took the app from idea to launch within weeks, according to Brad Thompson.
- Models
- OpenAI ChatGPT
Gift Finder and Ask TargetHoliday 2024; Ask Target Oct 2026 (beta)
Target's GenAI-powered Gift Finder, first offered for holiday 2024, suggests gifts from details about the recipient or occasion and became conversational for holiday 2025. Ask Target, an AI-powered shopping assistant on Target.com and the Target app, entered beta in Oct 2026 to help guests find ideas and narrow choices.
Agent Assist, ThinkTank and JOYBy Oct 2025
Prat Vemana listed Agent Assist, which helps Target teams serve guests, ThinkTank, which software developers use to collaborate and test ideas, and JOY, a chatbot that answers vendor and supplier questions, among Target's internal GenAI tools in Oct 2025. Vemana told Retail Dive that Target will be able to switch the models under ThinkTank quickly; Target has not said how widely the tools are used.
Vendors and partners
OpenAI2025
ChatGPT Enterprise for corporate teams; agentic commerce partner through the Target app in ChatGPT · Target launched its app in ChatGPT in beta in Nov 2025, building on the apps in ChatGPT experience OpenAI previewed in early Oct 2025, and an OpenAI team ran ChatGPT training sessions for 4,300 Target employees (Fortune, Nov 2025).
Google2026 (agentic commerce)
Agentic commerce partner in AI Mode and Gemini; public cloud (Google Cloud, including Google Kubernetes Engine) · Target helped develop the Universal Commerce Protocol, an open standard for agentic checkout Google announced in Jan 2026, and shoppers can buy from Target in Google AI Mode and the Gemini app with Google Pay (Jun 2026).
Microsoft
Copilot Checkout launch partner for loyalty experiences; public cloud (Azure) for enterprise services · Target Circle members who link accounts in Copilot Checkout get member discounts and free shipping (Jun 2026); Target Tech said in 2022 that it runs enterprise services on Azure.
Leadership
AI, data and platform leaders
Executives
Board
AI org map
Central technology organization under the Chief Information and Product Officer, with a chief AI officer reporting to it and product teams paired with each business
Target runs technology as one organization, Target Tech, under Prat Vemana, an executive vice president on the leadership team who is responsible for cybersecurity, data platforms, data science, infrastructure, product engineering and user experience. Target added a chief AI officer, Chandhu Nair, on Aug 24, 2026 at senior vice president level and moved Purvi Shah into a senior vice president of UX role at the same time; both report to Vemana. The business groups that own Target's main AI use cases, digital, marketing and loyalty, merchandising, and stores and supply chain, are run by members of Michael Fiddelke's leadership team.
Target has not disclosed how many people work on AI. Target Tech, Prat Vemana's organization, holds cybersecurity, data platforms, data science, infrastructure, product engineering, enterprise product teams and user experience, and more than 4,000 Target engineers worked on its cloud modernization, according to a 2022 Target Tech post. Target in India employs about 5,600 people across merchandising, digital, stores and supply chain and holds about 40% of Target's technology workforce (Reuters, May 2026). Target's engineering blog credits its AI work to teams including data science, product recommendations, offer personalization, computer vision and the ML platform team, and Target set up a chief AI officer role in Aug 2026 to coordinate AI across the enterprise.
Reporting lines
Chief Executive Officer
Target Tech (technology and product)
Prat Vemana, Chief Information and Product Officer
Cybersecurity, data platforms, data science, infrastructure, product engineering, enterprise product teams and UX; the line to the CEO is inferred from leadership team membership, not published
Chief AI Office
Chandhu Nair, SVP and Chief AI Officer
Created Aug 2026 to coordinate AI across the enterprise; Target told CIO Dive that Nair reports to Prat Vemana
User Experience
Purvi Shah, SVP of UX
Target told CIO Dive that Shah reports to Prat Vemana (Aug 2026)
Digital and Revenue
Sarah Travis, Chief Digital and Revenue Officer
Digital business and social commerce; owner of shopping through AI platforms
Marketing and Guest Experience
Mark Weinstein, Chief Marketing and Guest Experience Officer
Marketing, brand, loyalty, guest experience, Roundel and Target Plus since Sep 14, 2026; reports directly to the CEO
Merchandising
Cara Sylvester, Chief Merchandising Officer
Users of Target Trend Brain and AI-enabled consumer insights
Operations
Lisa Roath, Chief Operating Officer
Stores, supply chain and fulfillment, where Store Companion and AI demand forecasting run
Stores
Adrienne Costanzo, Chief Stores Officer
More than 350,000 store team members; reporting line inferred from the COO's remit, not published
Target in India
Andrea Zimmerman, President
About 5,600 people in Bengaluru, about 40% of Target's technology workforce (Reuters, May 2026); reporting line not published
Target's leadership page lists Prat Vemana, Sarah Travis, Mark Weinstein, Cara Sylvester, Lisa Roath and Adrienne Costanzo as members of the leadership team but does not publish an org chart. Target says Mark Weinstein reports directly to Michael Fiddelke, and Target told CIO Dive in Aug 2026 that Chandhu Nair and Purvi Shah report to Prat Vemana. Sarah Travis's published remit (digital, Roundel, Target Plus) overlaps with the Roundel and Target Plus oversight Target gave Mark Weinstein in Sep 2026.
Named people
Use cases
Target has not published a count of its AI use cases; its executives and engineers have described AI in personalization, search and recommendations, store support, merchandising trend tools, marketing, demand forecasting and inventory, marketplace seller vetting, customer service, vendor support, cybersecurity and shopping through outside AI platforms. Target has reported a business return for two digital use cases: billions of dollars in incremental sales from the AI-driven personalization engine behind Target Circle offers (Mar 2026), and hundreds of millions of dollars in incremental sales in A/B tests from AI-powered search, recommendation and substitution algorithms (Mar 2025). Target reports no firm-level return on AI and no return for Store Companion, ChatGPT Enterprise, Target Trend Brain or its forecasting tools.
| Use case | Area | Status | ROI |
|---|---|---|---|
| Personalized Target Circle offers Target's AI-driven personalization engine, powered by Target Circle loyalty data, sends members targeted offers and rewards; a TargetRun model on the Target Tech blog predicts shopping trips so offers arrive at the right time (May 2026). | Digital and loyalty | In production | Billions of dollars in incremental sales from the AI-driven personalization engine (Mar 2026) |
| Search, recommendations and substitutions Target uses AI-powered algorithms for product recommendations, search and substitutions. Target rebuilt its search and recommendations engine in the year to Oct 2025 to read intent, trends and availability in real time, and has run GRAM, an LLM-based related-accessory model for Home, in production since Apr 2025. | Digital | In production | AI algorithms: hundreds of millions of dollars in incremental sales in A/B tests (Mar 2025)Source |
| Adaptive page layouts Target built an AI system that uses contextual bandits to reorder recommendation carousels on product pages for each guest, tested on product pages reached from search engines and social media; Target Tech estimated a $50 million lift in attributable demand against a static layout in that test (Apr 2026). | Digital | Pilot | |
| GenAI product pages and Guided Search Target uses generative AI to summarize guest reviews and enrich product descriptions and titles, with more than 100,000 pages planned by the end of summer 2024, and to power Guided Search, which answers conversational queries such as a summer party with curated results. | Digital | In production | |
| AI features in the Target app Target added AI-powered Review Insights, which groups reviews into themes (Jun 2026), and Photo Search, which finds products from a photo (Aug 2026), alongside AI-driven Buy Again and Continue Shopping features; Target says the features drive add-to-cart activity but has published no sales figure. | Digital | In production | |
| Gift Finder, List Scanner and Ask Target Target's GenAI-powered Gift Finder suggests gifts from details about the recipient, List Scanner turns handwritten shopping lists into cart items, and Ask Target, an AI shopping assistant, entered beta on Target.com and the app in Oct 2026; Cara Sylvester said it was too early to know Ask Target's effect on basket size. | Digital | In production | |
| AI-powered wish lists Target added AI-powered teacher and college wish lists and more personalized app home screen content for back-to-school 2026. | Digital | In production | |
| Shopping in ChatGPT, Gemini and Copilot Target sells through its app in ChatGPT, through Google AI Mode and Gemini on the Universal Commerce Protocol, and through Microsoft Copilot Checkout, with Target Circle account linking and the guest making the purchase decision. | Digital | In production | |
| Store Companion Store Companion is a generative AI chatbot on store team members' handhelds that answers process questions, coaches new and seasonal hires and supports store operations in nearly 2,000 stores. | Stores | In production | |
| Agent Assist Agent Assist is a GenAI tool that Prat Vemana said helps Target teams serve guests; Target has not described where it runs or how it works. | Stores and guest service | In production | |
| Agentic AI for service requests and IT workflows Target has deployed several agentic AI use cases, with early focus on handling customer service requests and IT workflows, Fortune reported from an interview with Prat Vemana (Nov 2025). | Customer service and IT | In production | |
| Target Plus seller vetting agents Target uses AI agents to analyze every applicant to its Target Plus marketplace and summarize online information about them for marketplace analysts, according to Prat Vemana (Oct 2025). | Marketplace | In production | |
| Target Trend Brain and AI consumer insights Target Trend Brain uses GenAI to capture color, material, style and product details so merchants and designers can react to trends and predict new ones, alongside tools that give merchants real-time AI-enabled consumer insights. | Merchandising | In production | |
| Synthetic audiences Target's synthetic audiences are AI models that simulate consumer populations so marketing and design teams can preview how groups would respond to campaigns and products before launch. | Marketing | In production | |
| Campaign performance forecasting Target's offer personalization team uses semantic retrieval and a large language model to find and rank similar past campaigns, which feed the models that forecast how a new campaign will perform. | Marketing | In production | |
| Demand forecasting and inventory management Target is modernizing the systems that forecast, order and position inventory with machine learning and AI-powered tools, which covered about 40% of the assortment in Mar 2025; Target rolled out its demand forecasting engine across categories in 2025 (Retail Dive, Oct 2025) and is rolling out a data science-led inventory management system across its stores (Fortune, Nov 2025). | Supply chain | In production | |
| Out-of-stock detection Target uses an ensemble of AI models to infer unknown out-of-stocks and feed corrections to its Inventory Ledger, and uses AI to spot items running low earlier so store leaders can act hour by hour (Oct 2025). | Supply chain and stores | In production | |
| AI agents Prat Vemana said in Oct 2025 that Target is expanding its use of AI agents across merchandising, inventory and digital marketing. | Merchandising, inventory and marketing | Announced | |
| ChatGPT Enterprise Teams across Target use OpenAI's ChatGPT Enterprise in daily workflows, with training and hands-on experimentation; it had been rolled out to about 18,000 employees by Nov 2025. | Corporate | In production | |
| ThinkTank for developers Target's software developers use ThinkTank, an internal GenAI tool, to collaborate and test new ideas, and Prat Vemana said Target will be able to switch the models under it quickly (Oct 2025). | Technology | In production | |
| JOY vendor chatbot JOY is a chatbot Target deployed to help vendors and suppliers get answers faster. | Vendor partners | In production | |
| AI in cyber defense Target's cybersecurity teams use AI to strengthen defenses before threats emerge, according to Prat Vemana (Oct 2025). | Cybersecurity | In production |
Adoption
Target spread AI in layers: machine learning in demand forecasting, inventory planning, clearance markdowns and recommendations for several years before 2023, generative AI on product pages, in search and in Store Companion in 2024, licenses and ChatGPT Enterprise for corporate teams in 2025, and shopping through outside AI platforms from Nov 2025. Store Companion went from a pilot in about 400 stores in Jun 2024 to nearly 2,000 stores by Aug 2024 and was used more than 50,000 times in its first weeks chainwide. Target deployed more than 10,000 new AI licenses between May and Aug 2025, and Fortune reported in Nov 2025 that ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to about 18,000 employees, with 4,300 attending training led by an OpenAI team. Target has not published active or weekly user counts for any internal AI tool, and Target India president Andrea Zimmerman said in May 2026 that Target aims for intentional use of AI rather than deploying it everywhere, and that usage-based pricing is forcing a re-evaluation of its strategy.
By the numbers
Rollout, first pilot to today
Oct 2023
Target Tech said Target had used machine learning for several years in demand forecasting, inventory planning, markdowns and recommendations, and described an ensemble of AI models that infers unknown out-of-stocks for its Inventory Ledger.
Jun 2024
Target announced Store Companion, a GenAI chatbot for store team members piloted in about 400 stores, along with GenAI product pages and Guided Search, and said an internal GenAI tool for headquarters staff would follow.
Aug 2024
Michael Fiddelke said Store Companion had rolled out chainwide and team members had used it more than 50,000 times.
Feb 2025
Prat Vemana became Chief Information and Product Officer, responsible for all of Target's technology, including data science and AI.
Mar 2025
Target said AI-powered inventory tools covered about 40% of its assortment, Store Companion answered hundreds of thousands of questions in 2024, and AI-powered search and recommendation algorithms had produced hundreds of millions of dollars in incremental sales.
May 2025
Target created an enterprise acceleration office under Michael Fiddelke to embrace technology and AI beyond what it was already deploying.
Aug 2025
Michael Fiddelke said Target had deployed more than 10,000 new AI licenses since May 2025, with more to come.
Oct 2025
Prat Vemana said Target was expanding AI agents across merchandising, inventory and digital marketing and named Target Trend Brain, Agent Assist, ThinkTank and JOY among its GenAI tools.
Nov 2025
Target said teams across the company use ChatGPT Enterprise and launched its app in ChatGPT in beta; Fortune reported that ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to about 18,000 employees.
Jun 2026
Target said it was the first mass retailer with shopping on three AI platforms: Google AI Mode and Gemini, Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT.
Aug 2026
Chandhu Nair joined Target as its first chief AI officer, reporting to Prat Vemana.
Economics & controls
Spend and ROI
Technology budget
Target does not publish a technology budget. Jim Lee said in Mar 2026 that Target expects capital expenditures of about $5 billion in 2026, up more than $1 billion, with spending on supply chain and technology rising while most of it goes to new stores and remodels. Target is also reinvesting $1 billion into its 2026 profit and loss, including hundreds of millions of dollars for store labor and training and higher spending on brand marketing and technology including AI, which Lee said is an ongoing step-up, not a one-time cost.
What AI itself costs
Target has disclosed no AI-specific spending, license cost or model usage cost. Target India president Andrea Zimmerman told Reuters in May 2026 that AI providers' move from subscriptions to usage-based pricing is forcing Target to re-evaluate its strategy. Target's 2025 Form 10-K says portions of its technology infrastructure, including certain generative AI services, depend on third parties.
Reported ROI
Target reports no firm-level return on AI. Cara Sylvester said in Mar 2025 that improved AI-powered algorithms for recommendations, search and substitutions had produced hundreds of millions of dollars in incremental sales in A/B tests, and in Mar 2026 that Target's AI-driven personalization engine, powered by Target Circle, generates billions of dollars in incremental sales. Michael Fiddelke said in Mar 2026 that Target is a ways away from understanding the economics of selling through AI platforms.
Productivity markers
Michael Fiddelke said in Aug 2025 that AI and other tools let Target's teams build and update forecasts more accurately in less time. Target said in Nov 2025 that on-shelf availability of its top 5,000 items rose more than 150 basis points, crediting machine learning inventory tools together with process improvements, so the gain is not separated by cause. Target Tech said in Apr 2026 that its LLM-based campaign forecasting returned an acceptable match for every campaign tested, removing manual search and correction.
Headcount
Target had about 415,000 team members on Jan 31, 2026. Target eliminated about 1,800 headquarters roles, about 8% of its headquarters footprint, in a restructuring Michael Fiddelke described in Nov 2025 as removing layers, not cutting costs, and Jim Lee said Target will save about $200 million in 2026 from that reduction and field team changes. Target has not tied those cuts to AI; its 2025 Form 10-K describes a transformation begun in 2025 to increase role clarity, use technology including AI and data in decisions, and reduce costs, and says advances in automation and AI will continue to change the skills its workforce needs.
Governance and risk
Responsible use and data
Target said in Jun 2024 that it is committed to the safe and responsible use of generative AI, and built Store Companion from its own store questions and process documents. Target says the ChatGPT Enterprise service its teams use is designed for use with Target's proprietary data (Nov 2025). Target has not published a set of responsible AI principles.
Board and legal oversight
Target's Audit & Risk Committee has primary oversight of information security, cybersecurity and data privacy, and management, including the Chief Information and Product Officer and the chief information security officer, reports to that committee or the full board. Target's 2025 Form 10-K names no separate board committee for AI. Grant McGee, chief legal and compliance officer since May 2026, said his legal, compliance and government affairs teams help Target enable AI and emerging technologies.
Disclosed risks
Target's 2025 Form 10-K warns that generative AI raises emerging ethical issues, that its brand could suffer if its use of generative or agentic AI becomes controversial or is ineffective, that it depends on third parties for certain generative AI services, and that attackers are using AI. The 10-K also lists competitors' AI capabilities and shoppers' use of third-party AI channels as competitive risks.
Controls on agents and model output
Target's engineering teams add human-in-the-loop review with merchants to GRAM accessory recommendations (Jul 2025) and a validation layer to its LLM campaign forecasting because large language models can hallucinate (Apr 2026). In shopping through ChatGPT, Gemini and Copilot, Target says the guest controls the purchase decision (Jun 2026). Target's updated terms, reported by Newsweek in Apr 2026, treat purchases made by an agentic commerce agent as authorized by the guest and say Target does not guarantee an agent will act exactly as intended; Target said its AI tools complete purchases only at the guest's direction.
Measuring outcomes and cost
Chandhu Nair said in Aug 2026 that Target will judge AI by its effect on growth, the guest experience and the team, not by how much AI it deploys. Michael Fiddelke said in Aug 2025 that Target was evaluating every technology initiative to find those with the highest return and realigning resources accordingly, and Andrea Zimmerman said in May 2026 that AI pricing is discussed in Target's senior technology leadership forums.
Recent signals
Oct 21, 2026
Target launched Ask Target, an AI-powered shopping assistant in beta on Target.com and the Target app, among new AI shopping features for the 2026 holidays.
Oct 14, 2026
Target said myDay, the store operations app used by more than 350,000 team members, will add AI-enabled insights to help store leaders make decisions.
Sep 14, 2026
Target named Mark Weinstein, Hilton's former global chief marketing officer, chief marketing and guest experience officer reporting to Michael Fiddelke, with oversight of loyalty, Roundel and Target Plus.
Sep 8, 2026
Target described AI-powered app features including Photo Search (launched Aug 2026), Review Insights (Jun 2026), Buy Again and Continue Shopping.
Aug 19, 2026
Michael Fiddelke said Target's digital traffic from external AI platforms is growing more than 3.5 times as fast as the industry's, and Cara Sylvester described new AI-powered teacher and college wish lists.
Aug 11, 2026
Target named Chandhu Nair, a Lowe's senior vice president of stores, data, AI and innovation, its first chief AI officer effective Aug 24, 2026, and moved Purvi Shah into a senior vice president of UX role; both report to Prat Vemana.
Jun 18, 2026
Target reported that AI-driven traffic to its sites rose 2,000% in Q1 2026 and said it was the first mass retailer with shopping on Google AI Mode and Gemini, Microsoft Copilot and ChatGPT.
May 25, 2026
Target India president Andrea Zimmerman told Reuters that AI providers' move to usage-based pricing is forcing Target to re-evaluate its AI tool strategy as it pushes deeper AI adoption.
May 20, 2026
Lisa Roath said Target is working to use AI to improve demand forecasting and reduce the volatility behind out-of-stocks.
Apr 8, 2026
Newsweek reported that Target's updated terms treat purchases made by an agentic commerce agent as authorized by the guest; Target said its AI tools complete purchases only at the guest's direction.
Mar 3, 2026
Target told investors it will step up spending on technology including AI as part of a $1 billion operating reinvestment in 2026, and Cara Sylvester said its AI-driven personalization engine generates billions of dollars in incremental sales.
Feb 2, 2026
Michael Fiddelke, in his first week as Target's CEO, set accelerating technology as one of four priorities for the company.
Jan 11, 2026
Google announced the Universal Commerce Protocol for agentic checkout, developed with Target, Walmart, Shopify, Etsy and Wayfair.
Nov 26, 2025
Fortune reported, in an interview with Prat Vemana, that ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to about 18,000 Target employees and that Target had deployed several agentic AI use cases, starting with customer service requests and IT workflows.
Nov 19, 2025
Target announced its app in ChatGPT, launching in beta the following week, and said teams across the company use ChatGPT Enterprise; on its earnings call the same day Target described Target Trend Brain and AI synthetic audiences.
Quick answers
- How does Target deploy AI?
- Target deploys AI mostly through tools its own technology teams build, led by Store Companion, a generative AI assistant on store handhelds in nearly 2,000 stores since Aug 2024, while OpenAI's ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to about 18,000 employees by Nov 2025. Target credits its AI-driven personalization engine with billions of dollars in incremental sales (Mar 2026) and sells through ChatGPT, Google Gemini and Microsoft Copilot. Chandhu Nair became Target's first chief AI officer in Aug 2026, reporting to Chief Information and Product Officer Prat Vemana.
- What does Target use AI for?
- Target has not published a count of its AI use cases; its executives and engineers have described AI in personalization, search and recommendations, store support, merchandising trend tools, marketing, demand forecasting and inventory, marketplace seller vetting, customer service, vendor support, cybersecurity and shopping through outside AI platforms. Target has reported a business return for two digital use cases: billions of dollars in incremental sales from the AI-driven personalization engine behind Target Circle offers (Mar 2026), and hundreds of millions of dollars in incremental sales in A/B tests from AI-powered search, recommendation and substitution algorithms (Mar 2025). Target reports no firm-level return on AI and no return for Store Companion, ChatGPT Enterprise, Target Trend Brain or its forecasting tools.
- Who leads AI at Target?
- AI at Target is led by Prat Vemana (Executive Vice President and Chief Information and Product Officer); Chandhu Nair (Senior Vice President and Chief AI Officer); Purvi Shah (Senior Vice President of UX). Ownership of AI on the org chart: Prat Vemana, EVP and Chief Information and Product Officer; Chief AI Officer Chandhu Nair reports to him (Aug 2026).
- What AI platform does Target use?
- Target's own teams built Store Companion (2024), Target Trend Brain (2025) and an internal AI platform with a retrieval grounding service, while corporate teams use ChatGPT Enterprise bought from OpenAI (Nov 2025).
- Which AI models does Target use?
- OpenAI is the only model provider Target names, through ChatGPT Enterprise; Prat Vemana calls Target's approach model-agnostic, and Target has not said which models run Store Companion, Trend Brain, Gift Finder or Ask Target.
- How many Target employees use AI?
- Store Companion reached store team members in all of Target's nearly 2,000 stores by Aug 2024, and ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to about 18,000 employees by Nov 2025, according to Fortune.
- How far has AI spread at Target?
- Target sits at Scaling: Store Companion, a generative AI assistant Target built, has run on store team members' handhelds in nearly 2,000 stores since Aug 2024, ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to about 18,000 employees by Nov 2025, AI runs in production in personalization, search, forecasting, merchandising, marketing and agentic customer service, and Chief Information and Product Officer Prat Vemana owns Target's technology, with Chief AI Officer Chandhu Nair reporting to him since Aug 2026. Target falls short of Embedded because it has published no weekly or active usage figures for its AI tools and has reported returns for two digital use cases, not AI's financial effect across the company.
Open questions
- How large are Chief AI Officer Chandhu Nair's team and budget, and how does his remit divide with Prat Vemana's Target Tech organization, to which he reports?
- Which models power Store Companion, Target Trend Brain, Gift Finder and Ask Target, and in which clouds or data centers do they run?
- How many Target employees actively use Store Companion and ChatGPT Enterprise each week, beyond the about 18,000 employees ChatGPT Enterprise had been rolled out to by Nov 2025?
- How much does Target spend on technology and on AI specifically, what share of the $1 billion 2026 operating step-up goes to technology and AI, and how will usage-based pricing change how widely Target provides AI tools?
- How does Target measure the billions of dollars in incremental sales it credits to AI personalization, and does that figure overlap with the earlier hundreds of millions from search and recommendation algorithms?
- What business return do Store Companion, ChatGPT Enterprise, Target Trend Brain, synthetic audiences and the AI demand forecasting tools deliver, given that Target has published none?
- What do the agentic AI use cases in customer service, IT and Target Plus seller vetting handle, and what do they save?
- How much does Target sell through ChatGPT, Gemini and Copilot, and what do those sales cost Target compared with its own app and website?
- Has Target tied any headcount change, including the 1,800 headquarters roles cut in 2025, to AI?
- Does Target have written responsible AI principles or a management committee that approves AI models and agents?
Sources
Target
- Leadership team
- Prat Vemana, Chief Information and Product Officer, biography
- Mark Weinstein, Chief Marketing and Guest Experience Officer, biography
- Target strengthens AI and UX capabilities: Chandhu Nair and Purvi Shah (Aug 11, 2026)
- Target names Mark Weinstein chief marketing and guest experience officer (Sep 14, 2026)
- Meet Grant McGee, chief legal and compliance officer (May 28, 2026)
- Fact sheet: how Target is shaping shopping in conversational AI (Jun 18, 2026)
- Target's new AI-powered shopping features (Sep 8, 2026)
- Target to launch a conversational, curated shopping experience in ChatGPT (Nov 19, 2025)
- Meet the Target app in ChatGPT (Nov 25, 2025)
- Target launches new AI-powered features for holiday shopping (Nov 12, 2025)
- Target makes it easier to discover holiday gifts, with Ask Target (Oct 21, 2026)
- Tech at Target: Q&A with Prat Vemana (Oct 16, 2025)
- Target to roll out GenAI technology to store team members chainwide (Jun 20, 2024)
- Proxima digital twin in Target's supply chain (Aug 13, 2026)
- Smarter tools for store teams: myDay (Oct 14, 2026)
- Target's strategic plan for 2026 and beyond (Mar 3, 2026)
- A message from CEO Michael Fiddelke (Feb 2, 2026)
Filings and investor materials
- 2025 Form 10-K, Item 1: Business
- 2025 Form 10-K: executive officers
- 2025 Form 10-K, Item 1A: Risk factors
- 2025 Form 10-K, Item 1C: Cybersecurity
- Q2 2026 earnings call transcript (Aug 19, 2026)
- Q1 2026 earnings call transcript (May 20, 2026)
- 2026 Financial Community Meeting and Q4 2025 call transcript (Mar 3, 2026)
- Q3 2025 earnings call transcript (Nov 19, 2025)
- Q2 2025 earnings call transcript (Aug 20, 2025)
- Q1 2025 earnings call transcript (May 21, 2025)
- 2025 Financial Community Meeting and Q4 2024 call transcript (Mar 4, 2025)
- Q2 2024 earnings call transcript (Aug 21, 2024)
Target Tech engineering blog
- Scaling marketing campaign forecasting with generative AI (Apr 9, 2026)
- Optimizing page layouts with bandits (Apr 9, 2026)
- TargetRun: AI-powered trip prediction for timely offers (May 6, 2026)
- Improving accessory recommendations with LLMs (Jul 1, 2025)
- Solving for product availability with AI (Oct 24, 2023)
- Target's cloud journey (Oct 21, 2022)
- The journey to a hybrid multi-cloud (Feb 17, 2022)
News
- Fortune: how Target's top tech leader says the retailer is adapting to AI (Nov 26, 2025)
- Retail Dive: a look at Target's approach to generative AI (Oct 16, 2025)
- CIO Dive: Target taps Lowe's executive as first chief AI officer (Aug 11, 2026)
- Digital Commerce 360: Target appoints its first chief AI officer (Aug 12, 2026)
- Reuters: Target pushes deeper AI adoption, reviews usage-based pricing (May 25, 2026)
- Newsweek: Target updates AI shopping assistant terms (Apr 8, 2026)
- PYMNTS: Google debuts Universal Commerce Protocol (Jan 11, 2026)
- Business Insider: Target shoppers get an AI shopping assistant for the holidays (Oct 21, 2026)
- Retail Dive: Kohl's tech chief exits (Apr 3, 2025)
Data confidence
- Confirmed
- Stated in a primary or reputable public source.
- Estimated
- Derived or approximated from public reporting.
- Unconfirmed
- Reported, but not yet corroborated.
Target profile · Enterprise AI diffusion report by Imagine · facts checked against their sources on Nov 1, 2026
