Read more about Minicom Digital Signage future plans and new products announcements exclusively in the interview

Eli Sasson, President and CEO of Minicom Advanced Systems has just been interviewed @ Minicom KVM IT blog.

A bit more then six months after the Minicom’s split into two dedicated divisions – Digital Signage and KVM IT, it is explained how it came to that decision, as well as how the split was implemented. Also good to read is a “cautiously optimistic” prediction about both markets development – looking forward to the fast growth in 2010!

Minicom Digital Signage: Hi Jason. Welcome to the Minicom Digital Signage Blog.
Jason Cremins: My pleasure.

MDS: Please tell us a bit more about Remote Media.
JC: Remote Media are the UK company behind the signagelive web-based digital signage platform. We formed the company in 1994 as a software development company and delivered our first Digital Signage network for The Carphone Warehouse in 1997 across 100 UK stores.

MDS: How is signagelive different from any other solution on the market?
JC: signagelive is a ‘true’ Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solution enabling control and management of 1,000’s players from a standard web-browser anywhere in the world. In addition to Displays, signagelive can be configured to operate as a Screensaver or Desktop Alert for corporate communication and training applications.
In contrast, many Digital Signage companies have tried to adapt parts of their solution to be web-based but still rely on locally installed software to manage the network. Many others are offer commercial SaaS rental models but for solutions that still need to be installed onto dedicated servers in data centres with all the cost associated.
A major advantage of signagelive is that it is a very open and flexible platform enabling simple integration with hundreds of complimentary hardware devices, media sales platforms and content sources such as Sky, BBC, Screenfeed, Flickr and Google Picasa.
We continue to enhance and release regular free upgrades to signagelive which all active customers receive without any additional cost, ensuring that signagelive offers the best price/performance in the sector.

MDS: We are witnessing the trend of increasing digital signage solutions using Software as a Service (SaaS). If this is the present of digital signage content management, what is its future?
JC: The near future will see the adoption of wider reaching standards within the Digital Signage sector, such as MediaRSS from Yahoo enabling open standards for the distribution of rich media content. These standards will touch all areas of the industry from content syndication and media sales, upstream of signagelive, through to the playback of Media RSS content on devices from Mobile Phones to the latest Televisions. We are already seeing this trend gather pace with signagelive capable of being attached to a vast range of Media RSS devices that do not require the installation of our dedicated signagelive player client.
I also feel that standards for media content types and compliance reporting led by bodies such as OVAB and POPAI will become integral to all credible digital signage platforms.
From a technology perspective, user controlled content is a big trend that will continue and the concept of linear scheduled playlists of media content will be replaced by dynamic Media RSS content feeds that will instantly update devices as new content is added or changed.

MDS: Recently, Dave Haynes discussed about open source software. What is your opinion on this?
JC: Ultimately, there will be those that are prepared to roll up their sleeves and build a Digital Signage platform based around open source software, but for the majority they would rather contract with a company that can provide them with a fully supported platform so that they can concentrate on delivering the objectives of their Digital Signage Network and not have the worry of whether the technology works.

MDS: Which digital signage installation would you emphasize?
JC: With regards to showing the possibilities of Digital Signage and the move towards interactive and user controlled solutions, I would say the Estee Lauder Lab Series installation incorporating RFID is a great example. You can find images and further info on this project here.

MDS:  At ScreenExpo 2009, RemoteMedia and Minicom Digital Signage had a pretty eye-catching LIVE deployment of digital signage installation. This event is being perceived as the milestone for this year. Are you going to be present at some of the upcoming shows and expos?
JC: Yes, for sure. We are in the process of completing full support for the Minicom Vision range within signagelive and expect to demonstrate our combined solution at ScreenMedia Expo and ISE next year and possible several other shows across the world.

MDS: Compared with April, and time of ScreenMedia, what has changed in the digital signage market?
JC: The brakes have been released on projects that were on hold as the world decided whether the economy was going to continue to fall or stabilise. Now that the economy has (hopefully) bottomed out many of the large-scale deployments are now moving forward and we are seeing a strong increase in both enquiries and orders.

MDS: Where do you see the market in Q1 2010?
JC: Continued strong growth led by ever falling costs of technology and the introduction of new low-cost Media RSS capable products will move the uptake of Digital Signage to a new level. Established Internet based companies will enter the market as I firmly believe that Digital Signage will become an extension to the Internet for connectivity, user experience and most importantly advertising sales. We are already working on several projects where the always-on nature of signagelive enables us to integrate with the major website Ad platforms to serve rich media adverts and provide full compliance reporting.

MDS: What is the direction to which Remote Media is heading?
JC: As 100% of our business is conducted through Distributors and Strategic Partners we continue to expand across the world through establishing strong business relationships, We have spent considerable time developing our operational systems over the last 6 months to be entirely web-based’ from lead tracking to licence management and billing. By practicing what we preach regarding the power of Cloud Computing it has put us in great shape to scale the company incrementally without the need to bring on large numbers of administrative and operational staff.

MDS: Nice speaking with you Jason.
JC: Likewise.

Minicom Digital Signage: Rob, thank you for joining us.
Rob Gorrie: My pleasure.

MDS: How did you get involved in the Digital Signage (DS) industry?
RG: My family owns a Point-of-Purchase advertising and merchandising company, Gorrie Marketing, that was started in 1882 which deals in below the line, Point-of-Purchase for many of the major brands and retailers including Chrysler, RIM and Benjamin Moore. In 125 years you learn a thing or two about the below the line business and what really helps folks cross the finish line on the sales front across all industries. I grew up in the retail business and understand the ins and outs of retail and place based marketing very well. That being said, I didn’t join the family company as I’ve always been attracted to Digital and so, out of university, I started a Digital agency dealing with software development, online advertising, digital marketing, mobile marketing and more for major brands like LG, Sprint and Unilever.

My father and I have been talking about technology in retail environments and the advent of digital in retail becoming attractive for brands since 1995. In fact, my father started a “Pointcast at Retail” program in 1997 for convenience stores – long before most people even thought about it. After selling my Digital agency after almost 9 years, and starting to do some digital touchpoint consulting about 4 years ago, Digital OOH was a natural transition as I saw many of the same points of pain that affected online advertising in the Digital OOH marketplace, know the complexities of the retail/place based landscape as well as digital touch-point marketing and thought I may be able to assist brands and agencies with some of my experience, adoption and use. I know how effective this form of media can be so wanted to help extol its virtues.

MDS: What was your most successful advertising campaign?
RG: That’s a pretty open ended question as each industry and campaign has very different success benchmarks. If I had to choose 2, I’d have to say Samsung, which achieved some unheard of results. With our Samsung campaign we found out that they saw a 49% increase in unaided brand recall after using only Digital OOH. The other was the Obama campaign, which we just won a MediaPost award for and the agency related was quite effective at helping to reach their targets where they were having trouble with other mediums.

MDS: What issues does your blog cover that other blogs don’t cover?
RG: I try to stay fairly focused on the advertising, media and creative utilization side of the business, relating issues in media that affect how we may want to look at our own industry. I’m a big believer in the theory of “path-to-purchase” and “point-of-purchase, just like Nigel Hollis from Millward Brown and Andy Murray over at. Saatchi X I believe in surrounding consumers with unobtrusive media that they can take part in on their terms while they go about their day and handing off the opportunity to retail in a consistent manner. Much of this gets in to not only the media transaction opportunity but more importantly, how you use the medium and pull together elements of social media, retail media and mobile media that are true “solutions” for brands to take to market which in turn actually over-deliver on results or expectations and bring the medium to new creative heights.

Ultimately, I focus my blog on “what works” in Digital OOH and how brands and agencies should be using it to get the best results from their efforts.

MDS: What content is most effective for DS?
RG: If we’re talking about “advertising” content then I’d say 6 or 15 second spots using combined assets from both print and online. Content from TV can be used as well but sparingly, depending on the product or service. For under $5000, if you give raw assets to someone on a quick turnaround for Digital OOH, I’ve seen some amazing creative. Valspar recently had a quick job done out of just static assets, very cost-effectively – all print pieces – and it turned out so well that Euro out of Chicago called us and asked if they could run the content in all of the Lowe’s stores for their client. You can see it here.

It doesn’t have to cost a fortune to come and play in Digital OOH and everyone needs to understand that creative is never an issue and shouldn’t be a source of consternation. It can be handled quite easily, in my experience.

A lot of the digital content that exists can work really well for this arena and it’s part of the reason that more and more digital agencies are getting into the game – because they can repurpose this creatively in short cycles.

Ultimately, the BEST content is custom made for the medium, tells a story that is relevant to the path of the consumer or purchase point and can be slightly altered contextually depending on the environment. The medium is great for demonstrating new products or services, demonstrating features and benefits and requesting the customer to act on something. Samsung has just launched a great new campaign in this light.

Unfortunately, many in the creative community haven’t been really exposed to the Digital OOH medium and what you can do with it so it’s hard to find folks who want to jump into the space with a huge amount of experience in this capacity right now. There are some great companies out there like Show+Tell, Tronic, Artisan Complete and Alchemy, just to name a few, that can demo some great custom content in this light.

MDS: How effective are public measurement and monitoring systems? Which are the best and worst methods?
RG: This is a topic that can span so many different areas, companies and venue types it’s difficult to answer the topic with any level of brevity. Not only do you have various companies and methods at the audience measurement level – from traditional measurement companies and processes like Nielsen, Scarborough and Arbitron, to name a few.

You also have a new breed of auto-measurement that is quite fascinating from folks like Cognovision, TrueMedia and the like – and that’s just on audience measurement and quantification which is only a small part of today’s measurement needs!

We can also get into more qualitative measurement techniques like Brand Recall or Propensity to purchase studies, which are quite needed and teach you a whole new set of information that helps power longer term or “insight” based analysis, beyond the purely empirical.

You can also go beyond this to sales lift quantification through companies like DS-IQ or through control studies.

One thing people need to understand is that because this is a hybrid of below-the-line, which is generally a “selling” strategy and above-the-line, which is a number of things but ultimately a motivational strategy, it needs to be evaluated with an open mind and differently. There is no one “silver bullet” for measurement across all industries.

The medium has different strengths for different industries and campaign objectives and you need to choose what’s best for you and benchmark it at the s
tart to measure success in the form most appropriate to your goals.

This form of advertising is actually referred to as “Through the line” because it incorporates strategies and tactics of both areas. It’s hard to find people who have a lot of experience in both areas, which is part of what creates all the measurement confusion.

MDS: How important is a campaign strategy to the success of the advertising?
RG: Simple answer. If you don’t have one, don’t bother. That’s like me turning around and saying “how important is a deployment strategy on a 1000 location retail install”. You would never approach a job that way – campaign strategy is just as important here.

Understanding what you’re trying to accomplish and how Digital OOH can help and will fit into the creative strategy and campaign goals is crucial and this shouldn’t be as base as something like “of course advertising at pump top is good for automotive”. Yes, it may be, but that’s a tactical decision.

If you can get up higher to get true insights like Adcentricity can by being able to look at the entire mix and varying models to not only understand where your audience is, what is effective and what other tactics like mobile or social marketing or traditional is the campaign supporting and how can we integrate them, you’ll soon see very effective results out of innovative strategies that you derive.

You have to think beyond the transactional one-off of buying and be able to look top down to get the best results – this is the same in any medium with so many moving parts and opportunities.

MDS: What are the main components of a DS advertising strategy and how does it differ from regular advertising strategies?
RG: I related some of my thoughts on this earlier but I will add an extra note on this front that does tend to stall not only Digital OOH spending but both Internet advertising and Mobile advertising as well.

Stephen Randall from Locamoda first related the term “New Media Triad” to me last year. It’s a great way of describing the inner workings and integration points between Internet, which includes social media, Mobile, and Digital OOH. They’re all Internet connected mediums who rely in varying levels on each other to help create a larger “solution” which can then be used as a “digital” strategy inside a campaign – it’s very integrated and quite powerful. The three, working together, can really build new creative opportunities and really pull consumers into your plans.

Traditional advertising has obviously been around for a long time and a model has been created for all of the channels, be they Print, Radio or TV that works for the mediums they are. The difficulty all three new mediums face is that we as humans have the tendency to try and squeeze something new into an old box to try and make it fit. Unfortunately it just doesn’t always work and can stall innovation and adoption.

As Kim Dedeker, who heads up Global Consumer Insights at P&G said at an Advertising Research Foundation event, “research as we know it is on life support by 2012”. She feels we need a new way to look at evaluating media because the model that we’re using on a broad scale is 40 years old and the new realities of today’s media market just don’t fit. Is there an answer yet? No – and unfortunately there won’t be for many years – but if you approach the newer mediums based on their strengths and as a solution as opposed to a commodity, you can start to see the true value of each medium individually.

MDS: How is the recession affecting DS advertising? How are companies coping?
RG: This has proven quite interesting to me. There has been a huge uptick in interest and activity in the space since we all got hit with last September. All of the sudden we’ve seen greater interest in learning about the space. Much of this to date this year has been tire kicking as agency personnel learn about the space and acclimate but it’s pointing towards an upward trend in advertising dollars coming into the medium starting in August.

Some folks are having a very hard time through the depressed first half of the year, which is understandable and hopefully they will be able to weather the storm but the survivors will benefit from media spend in the back half of the year.

It’s also been interesting being in both the US and Canadian marketplaces as we get to see trends emerge in the business with Canada being a little further ahead in their adoption and consumption of the media and less economic issues there. I can say that our average sale in the Canadian marketplace is over 10 times larger this year than last year and customers are coming back 2, 3 and 4 times to buy more as they start to be able to evaluate their success benchmarks and like them. If that is any indication of what’s going to happen here, I see a lot of benefit to what’s going to happen in the next 2 years.

MDS: Rob, thank you for your time and valuable insights. It was a pleasure.
RG: Any time.

Minicom Digital Signage: How long has DailyDOOH been around for? How did it get started?
Adrian J Cotterill: DailyDOOH’s 2nd birthday is coming up in July. It started, pretty much by accident when it was suggested by some Dutch acquaintances of ours that we turn the email newsletter that we did at the time into a blog.
Our Head of R&D was on it straightaway and his team deployed WordPress in our rack at Telehouse – you can still get to and see our blog by its very original address http://aideycot.weareon.com – being as it was intended at the time my CEO blog for our business!!!!

MDS: At what does your website excel and what would you like to provide more of in the coming year?
AJC: Our mantra is “insight, knowledge and opinion”, we focus purely on the Digital Out of Home sector.  We like to think we help promote the industry AND to keep it honest!  With dozens of contributors and staff dotted around the world, and lots of language skills to boot, we aim to be the pre-eminent global news gatherer for the industry and as part of that we have just launched a sister site http://www.dailydooh.asia that focusses on Asia

MDS: What information is most important for industry watchers to know about?
AJC: That’s easy!!  It’s the information that people don’t know about!!!
Its easy for our so-called competitors to simply re-publish press releases from the industry but the key is to read between the lines and interpret what it means.   People in the industry want to know
what technology they should spend their money on AND what they shouldn’t send their money on, who to go into business with (i.. who will be around long term going forward), what shows to attend and what shows to avoid and even whom they should employ and who they shouldn’t!!

MDS: What information would you most like to see published about the industry but is currently unavailable?
AJC: A lot of the really important information is never released and so the key is knowing what is NOT being said.  We are privileged to work with many companies working on the next generation of technology and helping them bring that to market – unlike so called ‘market research reports’ that typically take technology that is public domain now and then predict future growth rates we are in a position to actually be on top of what trends are coming.  KNOWING what is coming in the future is the most important thing to know, not guessing or analysing numbers based on today’s technology that may not be important tomorrow.

MDS: What are your favorite Digital Signage related websites and/or books?
AJC: There is only one site we religously read and that is Bill Gerba’s blog Digital Signage News – http://digitalsignagenews.blogspot.com/

MDS: What major trends do you see in the DS market?
AJC: Two things briefly; screens won’t be screen shaped and very few of today’s top 10 digital signage vendors will have any relevance in the industry in a few year’s time

MDS: What new technologies do you like best?
AJC: The technology is actually not that important to our industry, although some people have made some big mistakes backing the wrong horse.  Having said that we are excited about what Adobe are doing with Flash and what Intel are doing on their chipsets with regard things like Audience Measurement – companies such as Tru-Media and Quividi have a very short life span unless they change the way the do automated audience measurement.

MDS: What technology is most important to have but is currently missing?
AJC: Guaranteed play out on screens.  Whilst ‘players’ are attached to screens, rather than the technology built in the biggest issue is the ‘players’ reporting successful playback but with the screens turned off!!!

MDS: How fast is the technology changing?
AJC: Up until recently surprisingly NOT fast at all. The likes of Scala who claim 20 years of heritage haven’t been innovating for 20 years and for them it has been more like 20 lots of 1 years experience.
With a number of new software companies (and networks building their own systems) embracing open standards, Web 2.0 and the new innovations from Adobe and the new technology from Intel we are going to see seismic changes in the technology used in our industry.

MDS: Which companies surprised you most last year both good and bad?
AJC:  We try to predict trends going forward and if we were really good at our jobs we wouldn’t be surprised!!!  Having said that Cisco were the biggest surprise and the biggest disappointment – they had a real  chance to change the industry and be a major player but just did not get it.

MDS: How badly has the industry been hit by the recession and who has been hit hardest?
AJC: We believe that the recession has been good for the industry, shaking out those with poorly thought out business models and those with weak management.  Whilst there has been some unfortunate collateral damage with nice guys who have failed we all know that great companies have been forged out of recession and we see nothing different this time around.

MDS: Do you foresee a recovery anytime soon?
AJC: Retail has been hit particularly badly but retail companies with strong brands have continued to innovate in both their window space and in store with concessions and branded fixtures.
We are seeing 20+ RFPs for big network rollouts in the US and we think the tide may have turned here.  Europe will take longer to catch up, with Germany perhaps hardest hit and may take the longest time to recover.
India may also take some time to get back on its feet though its turmoil has not only been the recession.

MDS: Thank you for joining us today, Adrian.
AJC: Thank you.

DSM: Hi Lars, thank you for joining us.
LIL: My pleasure.

DSM: Its been about a year now since your book came out. Why do think it was so successful?
LIL: At the time I started writing it there was almost nothing on digital signage, only a few reports. It is always an advantage being early when introducing new technologies. Also I know that many readers appreciate the illustrations and my way of visualizing complex technical concepts, making them simple.

DSM: A year later, looking back what would you have changed? What would you have added and what would you have left out?
LIL: I think there are several things that might be added to every chapter. But especially I might have added more examples when it comes to interactive applications including interactive signs and kiosks using touch screen terminals.

DSM: Hi Denis. Thanks for joining us.
DG: My pleasure.

DSM: Please tell us a bit about the French Digital Signage market. What’s it like?
DG: The French DS market has been strong over the past few years, mainly with regards to marketing and corporate networks (i.e. non third-party advertising networks). The industry, though, is very fragmented, with an estimated 500 companies working in the sector. The vast majority of these are yet to be profitable. The current economic situation should accelerate the rationalization of the market and determine which business models will prevail.

DSM: What is the status of third party advertising in France?
DG: France hosts, as well, some of the biggest DS networks in Europe such as La Française des Jeux (15000 screens), Futuramedia (over 4000 screens) and La Poste (over 2000 screens). Futuramedia and La Poste commercialize third-party advertising. La Française des Jeux currently doesn’t, but will begin to soon.

It is actually a trend we should see over the next months. Some large ad-based networks are due to be installed in retail and transport environments and with the help of audience metrics standards, the ad-based Digital Signage market is going to increase. Right now, we count more than 60 advertising companies working in the French Digital Signage market, but mainly on a local or regional basis.

SBG: A pleasure to be here.

DSM: Please tell us a little bit about the Portuguese Digital Signage.

SBG: This is a very young market which has experienced a lot of growth, especially in the past two years. In spite of the recession we expect more growth this year as well. One of the factors typifying the market is the need for distribution of sound and images over large distances. While we don’t have exact figures, the size of the market is somewhere around $10 million annually.

DSM: Tell us about some of the installations you have been involved with?

SBG: We deployed a relatively large system in the largest mall in Funchal, Portugal. Several players distribute different content to several different locations in the mall. We have players distributing content to the restaurant area, another to clothing stores, shoe stores, one for the parking lot and even one to the bathroom area. There are five players in all. The players are located in a central location. Via Minicom’s DS Optic Vision, content is sent remotely via optic wire to five separate computer closets located throughout the mall. In each closet a Minicom AVDS – Audio Video Distribution System is located. The AVDS distributes the content over CAT5 cable to screen clusters of between 8-16 screens at each location. The AVDS came in very handy as it can distribute both audio and video over the same CAT5 cable, significantly simplifying installation.

DSM: Interesting! Any other installations of interest to our readers?

SBG: We recently deployed two separate installations in Portugal’s largest public hospital.

In the first installation patients pass their National Insurance Health card through a machine to confirm their appointment, receive information about when and where it is taking place, pay for the appointment and receive an appointment number. This solution is done in conjunction with Mincom’s RS-232 serial signal extender.

After checking in, the patient goes to a waiting room where screens are installed. These screens display local news and also show what number patient is currently seeing the doctor. Each waiting room is equipped with four screens. Each cluster of four screens is fed content via one Mincom AVDS – Audio Video Distribution System.

The second installation is for hospital television. This internal television network displays information about the various hospital departments as well as emulates local television channel signals. For this installation one player and many AVDS broadcasters and splitters were employed. Distribution was done over CAT5 cabling.

Some studies have shown that consumers spend an average of anywhere between 1 and 10 minutes with interactive displays and that half or more consumers studied recalled 7 of 10 advertised brands unaided. Aided recall increased that recognition rate to more than 85 percent. Most important to marketers, nearly half of those who recalled an ad said they would be more likely to buy the product after seeing it. Further, 86 percent of consumers thought the displays were “entertaining and fun.”

An article in Adweek noted:

Established players in out-of-home, including Clear Channel Outdoor, CBS Outdoor formerly Viacom Outdoor), JCDecaux and Titan Worldwide, as well as newer, tech-based networks such as Reactrix, Ecast and Adspace, are bringing the latest technology to ads in shopping centers, transit hubs, even pubs. And while executives say they are just beginning to realize what the possibilities are, interactive outdoor technology could very well change the face of outdoor advertising in the not-too-distant future.

While accounting for a tiny fraction (less than 1 percent) of total out-of-home business, which is still dominated by old-fashioned roadside billboards and transit posters, interactive has designs on revolutionizing the sector, along with [the] swelling out-of-home subsegment: digital billboards….. While Europe and Asia, predictably, remain ahead of the U.S. in interactive executions, tech-driven outdoor appeals there are slowly becoming more visible. It’s interesting to note that spending on interactive out-of-home is not coming from outdoor budgets but rather interactive and TV allocations.

One of the major players in the market is EyeClick. We spoke with, EyeClick Founder & CEO, Ariel Almos, to learn more about the market in general and EyeClick in particular.

YL: Thank you for joining us.

AA: My pleasure.

YL: Tell us a little about EyeClick. What do you do?

AA: EyeClick offers a revolutionary platform for interactive media displays, using a unique technology to identify human gestures and interact with broadcasted content. EyeClick media systems provide a complete solution for advertisers, creative agencies, retail brands and space owners.

YL: What products do you offer?

AA: Our current line of products includes interactive floor projection displays, window displays, wall displays, and table-top displays. Using our state of the art technology and creative content, EyeClick’s platform enables creation, management, and monitoring of rich interactive digital content in multiple out-of-home locations such as malls, retail chain stores, museums, and other commercial locations.

YL: Where are interactive display solutions used?

AA: EyeClick products are typically used in retail locations such as a 24/7 shop window to bring more customers into the store and keep them there longer. They are also used at public events like trade shows, exhibitions and sales promotions to attract more visitors by creating a “wow effect”. Interactive solutions are likewise used for special purposes like in museums, lobbies, corporate headquarters and playgrounds to create visitor excitement and highlight innovations. And advertisers also use the technology as part of the digital out-of-home advertising industry, especially since it provides audience measurement.

YL: I understand one of your major customers is Samsung.

AA: Samsung Mobile Europe chose EyeClick’s interactive shop windows, EyeTouch™, to launch its latest mobile handset – Omnia™ – throughout Europe during 2008-2009. Nearly 50 interactive windows were installed across Europe in a variety of mobile stores to promote the new handset. Passersby were invited to interact with the shop window displays to explore the new handset and experience some of its key features presented with cutting edge graphics, animations, video, and sound, which reacted to their presence from a distance and invited them to approach the store front.

YL: What did EyeClick provide?

AA: EyeClick provided all the technology, creative content adaptation, installation, and support services for this complex deployment, including localization of the creative content into more than a dozen European languages, to suit all audiences.

YL: And what was the reaction?

AA: Passersby were surprised and excited to find the shop windows interactive and many spent considerable time interacting with the window displays and exploring the new handset’s features. Mobile shop managers reported increased footfall, an enhanced shopping experience, and increased sales of the Omnia™ handset – clear evidence of the effectiveness of EyeClick’s interactive shop window solution. Individual stores reported increased sales of between 15-50%.

YL: Who else have you sold to?

AA: Burger King installed an interactive playground area based on EyeStep™ with customized games for children. EyeClick was also chosen to provide interactive technology and creative content for the General Electric Imagination Center in China, throughout the Olympic Games. Our EyeTouch™ and EyeStep™ systems were integrated into the new Beatles Story Discovery Zone in Liverpool, England, combining both entertaining and informative elements. And Volvo looking to create a unique impact in a major exhibition in Beijing, designed two interactive displays with EyeClick, one on the booth wall and the other on a glass plate window, with which visitors, can interact while being exposed to Volvo’s products and culture.

YL: Fantastic! Well, thank you for talking with us.

AA: Any time.