From Keywords to Concepts: A Late Interaction Approach to Semantic Product Search on IKEA.com
Amritpal Singh Gill, Sannikumar Patel, Péter Varga, Patrick Miller, Sakis Athanasiadis · 2025
Modern e-commerce platforms require search engines that go beyond simple keyword matching to accurately capture customer intent. Traditional keyword-based retrieval struggles with complex, multi-attribute queries, potentially leading to suboptimal results and poor customer experience. To address these challenges, we introduce a late interaction-based semantic search engine designed for IKEA product search. This approach significantly improves retrieval quality while maintaining low latency, ensuring a more effective and seamless search experience for customers.