The uptapped opportunities in digital signage

Savvy systems integrators are now moving from their comfort zones supplying networking and desktop services and into the emerging market for digital shingles, says Andrew Upshon.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ last count of businesses, there were some 220,000 retailers, clubs, accommodation, café and hospitality providers and 28,000 gyms, casinos, hairdressing and beauty salons in Australia.

Upshon, who leads Ingram Micro’s digital signs and pro audio-visual division, says businesses such as these are the core addressable market for digital signs.

Retail employs more than 1.2 million people (10.5 percent of the population) and turned over $278.9 billion last year, a rise of 5.2 percent on the year before. Increased consumer and business confidence and a change in customer expectations is leading to PC, display, and software and services sales growing at a greater clip than traditional PC reselling, Upshon says. 

Intel’s smaller, more robust ‘Next Unit of Computing’ (NUC) pint-sized PC form factor is propelling digital signs into the mainstream. 

“There’s a lot of opportunity for resellers with NUC; go to any shopping centre or café and you’ll see digital signs,” Upshon says.

“The great thing about digital signage is that you can have multiple messages all at the one time. You could have an advert, weather, news headlines, feeds from social media and a blog, so you have lots of different messaging. And you can then change it very quickly.”

Intel also leads with its integrated digital sign software that Upshon says includes many features new. Among them is a Minority Report video analytics capability that knows how long someone looks at the sign, their age and other key points to determine an ad’s effectiveness.

“The software is easy to navigate and scalable whether you have one screen or 1,000,” Upshon says. “And for the first time, advertisers can know who is stopping and reading their ads.”

The Intel software is provided as a service through the cloud, with media reticulated to onsite NUCs behind the screens. Upshon says resellers can now provide their customers with content creation and management alongside traditional networking and wireless services.

Intel Australia national sales manager VR Rajkumar says that although there were small form factors five years ago, it took Moore’s Law for the devices to be useful and affordable for mainstream use. “The NUC uses a system on a chip, an embedded motherboard; it has a small chassis and no moving parts so it lends itself well to signage and security applications.”