Kiosks/TouchScreens/Interactive

Vision’s Freespace (Room Calendar Display System) Gets PoE and Improved Hardware

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Vision Freespace

At ISE 2017, Vision’s Freespace – recently shortlisted for an InAVate Technology 2017 award-- will move to new LG hardware which hides cables more effectively, and adds Power over Ethernet (PoE) so only one cable needs to be run.

Freespace is a room calendar display and booking system. It simplifies room reservations and eliminates double-booking confusion. Put Freespace outside each meeting room to show who has reserved the room and when.

Employees can walk up to any Freespace tablet in their building, find out which room isfree and book it. Book it. Walk to it.

While putting a meeting room calendar on a display outside each meeting room, Freespace can also logs into your existing calendar system (Outlook, Google Apps, etc). The Freespace app comes pre-installed on hardware and all setup is done on the calendar system server – no special software, no licenses, no  learning curve, no complexity.

Freespace works natively with your existing system.  Two hardware options: 10.1″ tablet or dongle if you prefer to show your content on a bigger display. For 2017, the new LG device is designed for digital signage and features a 10” touch-screen and runs Android. Freespace shows the calendar for a meeting room with the normal pinch and swipe functionality users are used to.

Vision’s managing director Stuart Lockhart says: “We’re rolling out ongoing improvements to Freespace, and this hardware upgrade will make it easier to install with a more professional finish. It makes Freespace the most flexible and cost-effective room booking system available.”

Selling for SSP GBP 914 / EUR 1014 / AUD 1477

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NEC's Interactive Displays with up to 12 Touch Points

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NEC ShadowSense

NEC Display Solutions Europe advances its ShadowSense technology display range by adding true multi-touch support for up to 12 simultaneous touch points.

The additional points make touch technology experiences much more responsive, adding scope for greater productivity and collaboration. The new touch line-up includes NEC’s MultiSync E series, P series and Ultra High Definition (XUHD) large format displays in sizes from 40-inch up to 98-inch.

The additional real-time touch points benefit mainly industries that rely on displays for creative, intuitive and collaborative working. These displays with ShadowSense touch technology have the ability to track 10 or 12 touch points and understand each different point of interaction, providing unparalleled performance and accuracy.

Daniela Dexheimer, Product Manager Solutions at NEC Display Solutions Europe comments: “We know that interaction with displays and information has increasingly become touch focused, whether in a retail, education or business environment. This trend is the driving force behind innovation and intelligence in touch technology, ensuring these experiences are seamless and add the productivity benefits that users and businesses seek. By adding more real-touch points the displays are more responsive than ever.”

Depending on the size these displays can be used in scenarios such as interactive retail signage and infotainment, way-finding and self-service kiosk applications. In corporate and learning environments, they can be used effectively with groups, for example as interactive whiteboards.

The displays’ intuitive behavior automatically detects and switches between interactions like finger swipes, stylus writing and erasing, while working with multi-touch applications. Plus, the displays filter out misleading interactions, avoiding ghost touches even in high ambient light operations.

Go NEC’s Meeting and Conferencing Solutions

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Edbak Shows New Totems & Info Kiosks at DSS Europe

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Edbak at DSS Europe

European maker of digital signage display mounts, stands, trolleys, totems and kiosks, Edbak joined this year’s Digital Signage Summit Europe 2016.

At the DSS 2016, co-owners invidis consulting and ISE presented the most important topics, trends and drivers in the digital signage industry to an audience which includes DACH’s top leaders.

Edbak showed a full range of products necessary for most digital signage installations: info kiosks, totems, tablet stands, trolleys, video wall mounts and more.

Edbak VX100

“We are very pleased to attend,” notes Gregory Bak, international sales director. “It gives Edbak the opportunity to show our range of quality products made in Europe. Particularly we want users and installers to be aware that our info kiosks, totems and tablet stands can also incorporate their company logo.”

The range of Edbak products provides the “building blocks” of digital signage installations, according to the company executive--the products that professional installers need to complete a sale.

Bak continues, “You’ll see Edbak kit if you pass through the Warsaw Chopin Airport or the European Parliament, for example). Because of its location in Central Europe, Edbak offers a viable European alternative to Asian & American suppliers.”

“Edbak products are competitively-priced yet European quality: the company has ISO9001 certification (by TUV Rheinland). Many Edbak products also have TUV product safety certification unlike others in the market.”

Edbak says it is constantly innovating (and points to their award-winning Best of Show pop-out large multi-screen video wall mount, VWPOP95-P).

“Unlike importers, Edbak is a true manufacturer and therefore can offer the services of an in- house R&D department to design bespoke solutions (using Autodesk Inventor and Solidworks 3D designing software). We even have an in-house testing laboratory with CMM machines,” adds Bak.

Go NanoLumens

What’s Digital Instore in 2016

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Andrew Candler

by Andrew Candler, Managing Director, The Creative Engine

At the start of this year, Deloitte predicted a series of changes to the way consumers shop, both online and in person. Highlighting the need for retailers to act more like media companies, its post, Retail Trends 2016, foresaw the continued blurring of real-world and digital shopping, and an expectation from customers that the process of making a purchase should be an ‘event’, rather than just a transaction.

They were prescient words. It’s a long time since high street stores have only had to compete with their neighbours. Consumers are changing the way they shop, increasingly treating bricks-and-mortar outlets as showrooms before heading home to spend online. This isn’t a new phenomenon, and it even has a name – showrooming – but shops are wising up to it, and employing cutting-edge digital equipment to encourage those hesitant shoppers to buy.

What’s changing?

Big-name retail is playing a game of ‘if you can’t beat them, join them’. The Creative Engine is working with premier high street names like John Lewis and Currys PC World to deploy interactive displays that directly target tech-savvy shoppers with their hero products. The idea is to give them a tactile experience that only ‘real’ shops can provide, married to the rich, screen-based content they’re used to when browsing online. We call it Retail Theatre, but it goes far beyond simply wowing the customer’s wallet out of their pocket.

Done right, Retail Theatre helps the customer understand what they’re buying, builds their trust in the retailer and lets them experience a product before they take it home. There are many ways to achieve this, from simple tablet-based catalogues on a store shelf, to interactive gondolas that simulate a product’s day-to-day use.

Retail Theatre on the shop floor

So, how does it work? Every implementation will be unique, as it’s tailored to the store, the product and its customers, but two of the most successful approaches are Interactive Kiosks and what we like to call Lift and Learn.

The Kiosk can be as simple as a locked-down tablet, running through sales messages and animations while offering intuitive interaction for the shopper. It’s perfectly suited to information you’d otherwise print in a catalogue and is quick and easy to implement thanks to its low footprint and hardware overheads. The retailer can be involved in its implementation as little or as much as they like, either providing their own content or tasking The Creative Engine with the designing and delivery of retail-effective media.

John Lewis Partnership Demo Kiosk

For smaller outlets, the Kiosk is an effective first step in battling showrooming, through which they can promote – and sell – a wider range of products than their floor space would permit.

Lift and Learn

Lift and Learn takes this concept further, combining dedicated hardware with bespoke software to bring a store’s products to life. This is useful for the customer, who can test a product before they commit to buying it. Gaining hands-on experience immediately makes technical items feel less intimidating and more familiar, and helps the customer evaluate how they might use them day to day. Try doing that with products that are wired down or displayed in boxes.

The set-up replaces regular store shelves with an in-store destination to learn about a range of products: multiple displays hooked up to integrated stands that give the products greater prominence and draw the customer over. Picking up a product triggers the displays to present product information in greater detail than a brochure or static product paper ticket, while the customer performs their own on-site evaluation of the product. It can also advise on useful accessories, like memory cards for cameras or cables for TVs and audio systems, not only to drive an extra sale but to send the customer home with everything they need to get started straightaway. It reminds them that the store has their interests at heart, and a desire to sell a complete solution that works straight out of the box.

All customer interactions are recorded and transmitted to our metrics platform. Retailers and Brands can log in and view the most popular products customers have interacted with by store and region. The Creative Engine can then measure the effectiveness of the content and use it as the basis for future improvements to the display and its content.

Instore digital and shop-floor staff

While Lift and Learn and Interactive Kiosks are geared towards promoting specific products, they can help the customer understand their position in the broader product landscape by demonstrating alternative models or solutions for their needs.

They also complement existing in-store staff, rather than replacing them. While many customers prefer a hands-off approach and the option to explore and choose on their own terms, instore Retail Theatre provides an additional touch point for store colleagues to engage and build a relationship with the shopper.

Tactile, meaningful experiences like this are something that the web, with all of its tutorials and unboxing videos, simply cannot beat. Neither can the web give a retailer much more than a blunt hit count on which to base future marketing and stocking decisions. Like Lift and Learn, Interactive Kiosks collect metrics that directly aid the store’s decision-making, on the basis of which they can roll out a range of products that’s of most interest to its target audience.

Why is this important?

From the shopper’s perspective, Retail Theatre takes a lot of the pain out of making a purchase. It presents them with curated, relevant content, and saves them from searching through spec sheets, reviews and comparison tables – or the need to read online manuals to find out whether a product will do what they need it to. In a reversal of recent trends, it means that shopping in person can actually take less time than online overall, by reducing the potential to make a wrong purchase along with the hassle of online returns, refunds and restocking charges.

What Lift and Learn and Interactive Kiosks have proved is that stores can compete with the web – but they have to do it on the web’s terms. Customers have unlimited choice, and this can lead to unlimited, often confusing decisions. Retail Theatre offers clarity, not just for the retailer, but for the customer themselves, so the tide is turning. Dynamic content and comprehensive digital experiences are making shopping in store, in many cases, a more convenient, simpler solution than going online.

Andy Candler is Managing Director at The Creative Engine, a digital media agency that specialises in three main areas: Digital Retail (from animated screens to fully interactive digital systems), Learning (bespoke eLearning with a difference focusing on immersiveness and engagement), and Promotions (interactive experiences that help you find the right product or service).

The Creative Engine has been producing digital solutions since 1987, making it the first UK company to help sell clients’ products and services via digital marketing.

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Bosch Experience Zone: Europe-wide Rollout

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Bosch Experience Zone

An interactive column used in the shop-in-shop solution Bosch Experience Zone is being launched across Europe in DIY superstores in Germany, Belgium, France, Norway and Austria.

The interactive column is controlled via the kompas digital signage software solution from dimedis (who is also responsible for the design of the terminals).

In the role as general contractor for the project and working with local partners, Dimedis is setting up Bosch Experience Zone at locations in Turkey.

By the end of 2016 more than 50 locations will have implemented the innovative shop concept, and another 100 will follow. The interactive column of the Bosch Experience Zone also convinced the jury of the viscom Digital Signage Best Practice Awards 2015, winning the first prize in the category "Retail Signage".

The Bosch Experience Zone is an innovative shop-in-shop project for DIY superstores. Its main objective is to create a brand island in which the customers receive information and inspiration and are able to try out products in a practice-oriented environment.

The Bosch Experience Zone adopts a holistic approach and integrates interactive digital signage into modern shopfitting. As an eye-catcher in the Experience Zone, the terminal boosts customer loyalty and encourages customers to make purchases and interact using a touchscreen. Besides providing value-added in the form of information, the terminal also moves the Bosch products to the forefront of the customers' interest.

With 23 languages available, the user interface can be used flexibly around the world, the information gathered can be printed out and taken away, and information can be transmitted to a smartphone using the QR code. Besides having a sophisticated search function, it can also be used to create favorites lists and to scan products directly at the information terminal.

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