Hardware commoditization and the IoT service model


As embedded system hardware margins continue to shrink, system developers must explore new ways of monetizing their products. Earlier this year, economist Jeremy Rifkin released the book “The Zero Marginal Cost Society: The Internet of Things, the Collaborative Commons, and the Eclipse of Capitalism.” In it, Rifkin argues that the Internet of Things (IoT), which he defines as a unison of the Communications, Logistics, and Energy Internets, will converge with the competitive capitalist market to usher in a period of extreme economic productivity in which “the cost of actually producing each additional unit – if fixed costs are not counted – becomes essentially zero, making the product nearly free.” As a result, capitalism as we know it today will be slowly replaced by the distributive economic model of the Collaborative Commons.

While this notion may be objectionable to those of you in the Western world, there’s no denying that the cost of compute and connectivity are in a sustained decline. Moore’s Law continues (at least for now) to eat away at the margins of hardware vendors, and Google Fiber is currently providing free 5 Mbps Internet in Austin, Texas, Kansas City, Missouri, and Provo, Utah, with 1 Gbps speeds available for $70 per month. Trends like these embedded system have led to a lot of business model rethinks in the tech sector, with many companies turning to the cloud for answers.

The cloud space has become a crowded one to say the least over the past couple of years, partially because of the “services” model it offers businesses. Today cloud service models range from Software-as-a-Service to Platform-as-a-Service to Infrastructure-as-a-Service (SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS, respectively), with the newly coined Everything-as-a-Service (XaaS) entering the fold as well. These service platforms deliver everything from industrial computer storage and security to full-blown end-user applications, which can each be neatly packaged as line items on a monthly statement.

So why is the cloud important for embedded developers? Hardware commoditization.

Industrial computer commoditization and the IoT-as-a-Service.

As the dust settles around industrial computer IoT standardization, open, modular embedded system with an emphasis on software development and app enablement will take precedence over custom or application-specific hardware designs (look at the success of “maker” boards like the Raspberry Pi). Does your next system require wireless connectivity? Order a Wi-Fi module from Shanghai. Do you also need analog sensors? Browse the capes on Adafruit’s website. If Rifkin’s predictions hold true, specialized hardware will only be sustainable in a very narrow set of fringe applications, so the majority of system developers will have to find other ways to create value.

Take, for example, a company based out of Naperville, Illinois that produces a line of Wi-Fi sensors for home and building network appliance. ConnectSense sensors range from temperature and humidity to water, motion, light, and dry contacts, but the target market demanded a cost-conscious approach across the product line. Therefore, the company organized the portfolio around a base platform consisting of a repurposed ARM7 SoC that was developed in-house, a TI MSP430 MCU, and a low-cost, low-power Wi-Fi module from partner Shanghai High-Flying Electronics Technology Co., Ltd. This approach allows multiple sensors to be manufactured quickly and easily with only few modifications to the common platform.

What makes an tool architecture like network appliance unique, however, is that it’s also powered by a proprietary cloud platform that handles most of the heavy lifting of software and industrial computer, so additional hardware resources aren’t required on the physical sensors themselves. For novice users, the ConnectSense cloud provides an if/then rules engine that can be used to set up alerts via email, text message, phone call, webhook, or tweet in a plug-and-play fashion, while more advanced developers can take advantage of a full REST API (Figure 1). Today the embedded system is being leveraged in applications such as datacenter monitoring and agricultural observation.

refer to:
http://embedded-computing.com/articles/hardware-commoditization-and-the-iot-service-model/

GPS VEHICLE TRACKING WINS MORE BUSINESS: DON’T LET COMPETITORS STEAL YOUR CLIENTS AND PROSPECTS!

Many of our customers started out leery of vehicle pc GPS vehicle tracking. What will my drivers think? Is it reliable? Is it anything more than just seeing my trucks on a map? These are all valid concerns for any business owner.

The truth is our customers routinely look back on those kinds of questions and shake their heads, wondering what they were worried about. For instance, after just the first year Mark Sperry, Service Manager at Fettes, Love & Sieban, says he brought in $60,000 in additional revenue just through increased fleet management productivity.  How does vehicle tracking help a company bring in more money? Better vehicle pc dispatching, more efficient routing, more accurate invoices, even fewer calls between drivers and the office.

Let’s look at an example of how a plumber without tracking might handle a service call:

The office gets a call from a homeowner who’s ankle-deep in water. The homeowner is in a less-traveled part of town unfamiliar to the dispatcher. The dispatcher goes to Google Maps, types in the address from the panicked homeowner and sees it’s on the other side of town. The homeowner wants to know how soon someone can be there. The dispatcher says she’ll call back as soon as possible, hangs up and starts calling technicians. She starts with Bill, who she thinks might be nearby. Turns out Bill is on the in-vehicle computer other side of town still finishing up an earlier job. She calls Ray, who doesn’t answer (probably under a sink, she thinks). She calls Annie, Steve, Wayne. No one is nearby. Suddenly the phone rings again. It’s Oscar and he’s calling in-vehicle computer to say he finished his last job early and is on his way back to the office. The dispatcher asks which job he finished and it turns out it was three blocks away from the panicked homeowner. Unfortunately he’s almost back to the office. “Turn around Oscar! Go back north to 1615 Elm Terrace! There’s a broken pipe!” Oscar grumbles and turns around. The dispatcher calls the panicked homeowner to say someone’s on the way. Unfortunately the homeowner, who wasn’t about to stand around waiting, has already called a competitor who’s on the fleet management way.

Now let’s look at how the same plumber with GPS tracking handles the call:

The office gets a call from a homeowner who’s ankle-deep in water. The fleet management is in a less-traveled part of town unfamiliar to the dispatcher. The dispatcher pulls up their GPS tracking software and sees not only where the client is, but that one of her technicians; Oscar is on the move three blocks away. She sends Oscar directions directly to his Garmin GPS unit and he’s there in minutes, helping the homeowner.

The lesson? You probably just earned a customer for life, thanks to GPS vehicle tracking.

refer to:
http://www.fleetmatics.com/gps-vehicle-tracking-wins-more-business/900

Embedded HMIs evolve to match consumer tech expectations in the factory

Industrial computer and cameras and Their Technical Features,” the 6th annual camera survey published by FRAMOS, takes a look at the opinions of 15 international camera manufacturers and 43 end users of machine vision cameras, and what it might mean for network appliance and its future.

Those industrial computer manufacturers surveyed indicate that the applications for which users purchased their cameras varies. According to the survey,  automation in production, quality assurance, and measuring technology each accounted for 22%, while automation in logistics automation (17%), and transport measurement (16%), came in just behind them.  On the other hand, end users indicate that 25% purchased cameras for use in automation in production, while 22% planned to use the cameras for quality assurance. In addition, 17% intended on using the cameras for logistics automation, 11% in measurement technology, and 7% for embedded computer traffic measurement. In terms of pricing, networks users indicated via their answers that paying for a high-quality camera was worth it to them. Forty percent of users surveyed indicated that they purchased industrial computer with cameras between €1,000 and €3,000 while 30% purchased cameras between €650 and $1,000.

When it comes to industrial computer and networks image sensors, users identified Sony as the “leader of the pack,”while Aptina and Truesense were just behind. (Both of which were recently acquired by ON automation and industrial Semiconductor.) CMOSIS and embedded computer saw a considerable rise in popularity since last year, as both embedded computer companies released CMOS sensors with global shutter technology.

Nearly 71% of embedded computer manufacturers said that they believe CCD sensors will continue to have a share of 60% of the market in two years, while users believe CMOS and CCD will be on par by that time. Survey author Dr.-Ing. Ronald Muller, Head of Product Marketing FRAMOS suggested that this could be because CMOS sensors are less expensive than CCD,  and that CCD industrial market leader Sony has been ramping up its efforts for CMOS sensors in industrial network appliance.

refer to:
http://embedded-computing.com/articles/embedded-tech-expectations-the-factory/

Acrosser will present its latest in-vehicle computers and embedded system at Guangzhou IT Week and Automechanika Frankfurt this September.

acrosser Technology, a world-leading Industrial computer manufacturer, is pleased to announce its participation in Guangzhou IT Week and Automechanika Frankfurt. Both events take place in September, and we cordially welcome you to pay a visit.
Guangzhou IT Week (September 19–21, 2014 in Guangzhou, China)

Selected by the Taipei Computer Association (TCA), Acrosser is one of the few privileged Taiwanese manufacturers that will have the opportunity to exhibit its products at the Taiwan Pavilion Hall at Guangzhou IT week. These products include the in-vehicle PC AIV-HM76V0FL and the embedded system AES-HM76Z1FL. This year marks the 14th anniversary of Guangzhou IT week, and this year’s convention will feature the latest topics, such as smart city solutions, IoT, and cloud computing. Acrosser’s AES-HM76Z1FL is a mini PC (272mm × 183mm × 20mm) with unrivaled computing performance, and the in-vehicle computer is a perfect hardware solution for car applications.

Automechanika Frankfurt (September 16–20, 2014 in Frankfurt, Germany)

During this 5-day event, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) will promote and display automotive products that have won the Taiwan Excellence Awards and the ITS/Telematics Top 100 Award. Acrosser’s fanless in-vehicle computers AR-V6100FL and AR-V6002FL will be greeting the audience at the TAITRA stand (located at Halle 4 Ebene 2 Stand J71). The Automechanika is an automotive trade fair held in 13 countries worldwide, and Acrosser’s in-vehicle computers are ready to win the hearts of visitors at this global event.

Acrosser Technology Co., Ltd.

Contact Us:

http://www.acrosser.com/inquiry.htmlProduct Information:

AES-HM76Z1FL

AIV-HM76V0FL

AR-V6100FL

AR-V6002FL

Industrial computer survey provides potential glimpse into future of camera market


Industrial Cameras and Their Technical Features,” the 6th annual camera survey published by FRAMOS, takes a look at the opinions of 15 international camera manufacturers and 43 end users of machine vision cameras, and what it might mean for the future.

Those manufacturers surveyed indicate that the applications for which users purchased their cameras varies. According to the survey,  automation in production, quality assurance, and measuring technology each accounted for 22%, while automation in logistics automation (17%), and transport measurement (16%), came in just behind them.  On the other hand, end users indicate that 25% purchased cameras for use in automation in production, while 22% planned to use the cameras for quality assurance. In addition, 17% intended on using the cameras for logistics automation, 11% in measurement technology, and 7% for embedded computer traffic measurement. In terms of pricing, networks users indicated via their answers that paying for a high-quality camera was worth it to them. Forty percent of users surveyed indicated that they purchased cameras between €1,000 and €3,000 while 30% purchased cameras between €650 and $1,000.

When it comes to networks image sensors, users identified Sony as the “leader of the pack,”while Aptina and Truesense were just behind. (Both of which were recently acquired by ON automation and industrial Semiconductor.) CMOSIS and embedded computer saw a considerable rise in popularity since last year, as both companies released CMOS sensors with global shutter technology.

Nearly 71% of manufacturers said that they believe CCD sensors will continue to have a share of 60% of the market in two years, while users believe CMOS and CCD will be on par by that time. Survey author Dr.-Ing. Ronald Muller, Head of Product Marketing FRAMOS suggested that this could be because CMOS sensors are less expensive than CCD,  and that CCD industrial market leader Sony has been ramping up its efforts for CMOS sensors in industrial applications.

refer to:
http://www.vision-systems.com/articles/2014/08/industrial-camera-survey-provides-potential-glimpse-into-future-of-camera-market.html

Sensing networks in industrial automation

Sensors are a huge part of industrial applications. IHS estimates that over 100 million discrete sensors were shipped into industrial automation sectors in 2013. These vary greatly in size, use, and capability. Not all sensors are small and simple: some offer extensive functionality and the ability to connect to wider industrial automation networks. These more capable embedded computer sensors are becoming critical for the collection of data from industrial environments. They are helping move towards the next stage of industrial automation, whether this is called advanced manufacturing, “Industry 4.0,” or something else.

As a brief overview, IHS views the term “Industry 4.0” as the combination of many factors and trends, including industrial networking, distributed embedded computer, cybersecurity, Big Data, and analytics, among other things, and combining these all to create a smart factory. Sensors offer great potential to gather extensive data from production lines and plants, which can increasingly be distributed via a network, analyzed, and then used to make better informed decisions. Benefits can include safety improvements, increased uptime, lower energy costs, and quicker or easier maintenance. There are potentials security concerns, however.

Of course, for this to be implemented it requires a sensor capable of transmitting data over a network. Networkable sensors still make up only a smaller portion of the market, with a large number using basic signals to transmit information to a Programmable Logic Controller (PLC). Those sensors that are able to transmit data directly over a network generally also have some level of intelligence too, which can take loads off the embedded computer or other controller.

These sensors communicate with a wide array of networking technologies, be they Ethernet- or fieldbus-based. It shows the estimated split between the two technologies. AS-i and IO-Link, two technologies that are more orientated towards sensors, are also highlighted (IHS defines these as fieldbus technologies). It is clear that the vast majority of networkable sensors utilize fieldbus-based networks, often HART or PROFIBUS. An estimated one-fifth of devices use AS-i, and although it is not seen by some as a true networking technology, AS-i is widely used and has been adopted by most major sensor manufacturers.

IO-Link has the potential to be the main competition for AS-i in the future. However, there’s currently a lack of support from sensor vendors and the fact that AS-i has a safety variant may negatively impact on IO-Link adoption. In response, the IO-Link Safety group was recently founded, with a key aim of establishing a safety variant of the technology. Once this is available and proven, it should further bolster the excellent adoption rate that IO-Link is currently experiencing.

The remaining 12 percent share of networking technology adoption for sensors is split amongst a number of Ethernet variants. There are as many Ethernet variants as fieldbus, but they are considerably younger to market and as such are not yet as widely adopted. Fieldbus technologies are certainly not going to disappear overnight, but Ethernet adoption for sensor networking is growing more quickly. A variety of factors are driving this, but the most important is easy integration and interoperability with other industrial automation equipment that is already widely networked via Ethernet, be it in standard TCP/IP form or another embedded computer deterministic variant.

The popularity and growth of Ethernet adoption has filtered down from consumer/enterprise networking. It was first used at the industrial information level, then the controller level, and is now slowly being seen at the field level. The transition from fieldbus to Ethernet is going to take time, as factories and large plants are rarely refitted. This means that a large portion of embedded computer will continue to be fieldbus-based, or perhaps an Ethernet/fieldbus hybrid for some time. So while the door has been opened for advanced sensor networks, we are still a long way from moving towards ”Industry 4.0” and the benefits that a networked sensor array can bring.

refer to: http://industrial.embedded-computing.com/articles/sensing-networks-industrial-automation/

Acrosser’s AMB-IH61T3 Mini-ITX Board is Now Available for Both the Gaming and Industrial Automation Industries.

When two separate devices need to communicate with each other on a single board computer, there should be a channel to bridge the communication: the COM port. acrosser’s AMB-IH61T3 is a board that supports up to 10 COM ports for multiple applications.
AMB-IH61T3 and Gaming Solutions
AMB-IH61T3, the Mini-ITX form-factor single board computer, has many characteristics that those in the gaming industry long for.  These characteristics include superior computing performance, numerous expansions, and a long life cycle. The board also features unrivaled connectivity with its remarkable 10 COM ports (1 x RS232, 1 x RS2323/485, and 8 x RS232 pin headers). For gaming machines or arcade vendors, multiple gaming peripherals, such as buttons, lamps, hoppers, or a coin acceptor, can all be integrated into the final gaming product, adding more depth and interactivity to the game. The combination of I/O, 10 COM ports, and dual display makes AMB-IH61T3 a suitable option for the gaming industry.
In the automation industry, interconnection of multiple industrial measurement devices is a necessity. These devices include sensors, PLCs, servos, inverters, temperature controllers, barcode scanners, air quality monitors, etc. With proper design and verification, the 10-serial-port AMB-IH61T3 can easily integrate these devices and provide the perfect control center solution for industrial environments.
To learn more about the AMB-IH61T3 Mini-ITX board, please send us an inquiry , or contact your local Acrosser sales vendor for detailed information.
Product Information:
AMB-IH61T3
The AMB-IH61T3 Product Film:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZggBHFrjD8

Building the Internet of Things with DDS

The real value of the Internet of Things (IoT) and the Industrial Internet (I2) is ubiquitous information availability and consequently the decisions that can be made from it. The importance of ubiquitous data availability has significantly elevated attention on standards-based data sharing technologies. In this post, I’ll analyze the data sharing requirement characteristics of embedded systems and describe how the Object Management Group (OMG) Data Distribution Service (DDS) standard ideally addresses them.

Data sharing in IoT/I2
Data sharing patterns within IoT/I2 embedded systems can be classified as follows:

Device-2-Device. This communication pattern is prevalent on industrial systems where devices or digital signage systems need to efficiently share data, such as industrial plants, vehicles, mobile devices, etc. Device-2-Device data sharing is facilitated by broker-less peer-to-peer infrastructures that simplify deployment, foster fault-tolerant, and provide performance-sensitive applications with low latency and high throughput.

Device-2-Cloud. Individual devices and subsystems interact with cloud services and applications for mediating data sharing as well as for data collection and analytics. The Device-2-Cloud communication can have wildly different needs depending on the application and the kind of data being shared. For instance, a remote surgery application has far more stringent temporal requirements than a smart city application. On the other hand, the smart city application may have more stringent requirements with respect to efficient network and energy management of the device. Thus depending on the use case, Device-2-Cloud communication has to be able to support high-throughput embedded systems and low-latency data exchanges as well as operation over bandwidth constrained links. Support for intermittent connectivity and variable latency link is also quite important.

Cloud-2-Cloud. Although few systems are currently being deployed to span across multiple IaaS instances or multiple IaaS regions (such as deploying across EC2 EU and U.S. regions), it will be increasingly important to be able to easily and efficiently exchange data across cloud “domains.” In this case, the data sharing technology needs to support smart routing to ensure that the best path is always taken to distribute data, provide high throughput, and deliver low per-message overhead.

Besides the data sharing patterns identified above, there are crosscutting concerns that a data distribution technology needs to properly address, such as platform independence – for example, the ability to run on embedded, mobile, enterprise and cloud apps, and security. The DDS is an embedded systems for seamless, ubiquitous, efficient, timely, and secure data sharing – independent from the hardware and the software platform. DDS defines a wire protocol that allows for multiple vendor implementations to interoperate as well as an digital signage that eases application porting across vendor products. The standard requires the implementation to be fully distributed and broker-less, meaning that the DDS application can communicate without any mediation, yet when industrial communication can be transparently brokered.

 The basic abstraction at the foundation of embedded computer is that of a Topic. A Topic captures the information to be shared along with the Quality of Service associated with it. This way it is possible to control the functional and non-functional properties of data sharing. DDS provides a industrial set of QoS policies that control local resource usage, network utilization, traffic differentiation, and data availability for late joiners. In DDS the production of data is performed through Data Writers while the data consumption is through Data Readers. For a given Topic, Data Readers can further refine the information received through content and temporal filters. DDS is also equipped with a dynamic discovery service that allows the application to dynamically discover the information available in the system and match the relevant sources. Finally, the embedded systems Security standard provides an extensible framework for dealing with authentication, encryption, and access control. Among the standards identified as relevant by the Industrial Internet Consortium for IoT and I2 systems, DDS is the one that stands out with respect to the breath and depth of coverage of IoT/I2 data sharing requirements. Let’s see what DDS has that make it so special.

Device-2-Device. DDS provides a very efficient and scalable platform for Device-2-Device communication. DDS implementation can be scaled down to deeply embedded devices or up to high-end multicore machines. A top-performing digital signage implementation, such as PrismTech’s intelligent data sharing platform, Vortex, which can offer latency as low as ~30 usec on Gbps Ethernet networks and point-to-point throughput of several million messages per second. DDS features a binary and efficient wire-protocol that makes it a viable solution also for Device-2-Device communication in network-constrained environments. The broker-less and peer-to-peer nature of DDS makes it an ideal choice for Device-2-Device communication. The ability to transparently broker DDS communication – especially when devices communicate through multicast – eases the integration of subsystems into IoT and I2 systems.

Device-2-Cloud. DDS supports multiple transport protocols, such as UDP/IP and TCP/IP, and when available can also take advantage of multicast. UDP/IP support is extremely useful in applications that deal with interactive, soft real-time data in situations when TCP/IP introduces either too much overhead or head-of-line blocking issues. For deployment that can’t take advantage of UDP/IP, DDS alleviates the problems introduced by TCP/IP vis-a-vis head-of-line blocking. This is done through its support for traffic differentiation and prioritization along with selective down-sampling. Independent of the transport used, DDS supports three different kinds of reliability: best effort, last value reliability, and reliability. Of these three, only the latter behaves like “TCP/IP reliability.” The others allow DDS to drop samples to ensure that stale data does not delay new data.

The efficient wire-protocol, in combination with the rich embedded computer transportation and reliability semantics support, make DDS an excellent choice for sharing both periodic data, such as telemetry, as well as data requiring high reliability. In addition, the built-in support for content filtering ensures that data is only sent if there are consumers that share the same interest and whose filter matches the data being produced.

 Cloud-2-Cloud. The high throughput and low latency that can be delivered by DDS makes it a perfect choice for data sharing across the big pipes connecting various data centers.

In summary, DDS is the standard that ideally addresses most of the requirements of IoT/I2 systems. DDS-based platforms, such as PrismTech’s Vortex, provide device solutions for mobile, embedded, web, enterprise, and cloud applications along with cloud messaging implementations. DDS-based solutions are currently deployed today in smart cities, smart grids, smart transportation, finance, and healthcare environments.

If you want learn more about DDS check out this tutorial or the many educational slides freely available on SlideShare. Angelo directs the company’s technology strategy, planning, evolution, and embedded computer strategy. He also leads the strategic standardization at the Object Management Group, where he co-chairs the Data Distribution Service Special Interest Group and serves on its digital signage Board. Angelo is a widely known and cited expert in the field of real-time and distributed systems, intelligent data sharing platforms and software patterns, has authored several international standards, and has more than 10 years of experience in technology management and design of high performance mission- and business-critical distributed systems. Prior to joining digital signage sector, Angelo served as a Software Scientist within the SELEX-SI Strategic and Technological Planning Directorate. He earned a Ph.D. and a M.S. in Computer Science from the Washington University in St. Louis, and a Laurea Magna cum Laude in Computer Engineering from the University of Catania, Italy.

refer to:
http://embedded-computing.com/guest-blogs/building-the-internet-of-things-with-dds/

Location, location, location: Experts offer advice for in-store kiosk placement

“It always amazes me to see the groups that just don’t pay attention to kiosk location,” said Frank Olea, CEO of Cerritos, California-based manufacturer Olea Kiosks Inc. “It’s as if they assume that if you build it, they will come.” But that is clearly not the case, according to kiosk indusrty experts. Customers are only interested in what really attractes their attention.
“The best location for any kiosk is where it will be best utilized for the optimum customer experience,” said Greg Buzek, president of Franklin, Tennessee-based research firm IHL Group. “If the kiosk’s purpose is providing industrial information, then the best place is either a high-traffic area or the store area where customers have the most questions. It makes little sense to have centralized answer kiosks when the bulk of the questions are for a specific area of the store. If you have several areas where customers might have frequent questions, position the answer kiosks consistently so customers know where to look to get the information they need to make buying decisions.”
Think of a kiosk like a industrial automation business, Olea advises. “Why would you open a business on the worst possible street corner when you know it’s only destined to fail?” he said. “Just like a business, the kiosk needs to be well marked and highly visible to passersby. It needs to be easy to get to, and out of the flow of traffic.”
If the kiosk is an entirely new category of service automation before, then the deployer must place it right in the most visible spot possible, Olea said. “This is because, otherwise, how would people know to even look for it?” he said. “If your kiosk isn’t anything new, but you’ve taken something that always existed in one location and are now making it available in several locations, placement and adequate digital signage on and around the kiosks become important. Just placing your kiosks all over the store doesn’t guarantee that people will find them. If customers do see the kiosks, but they don’t have adequate signage, will they know what they are?”
Frank Meyer & Associates
“Depending on the function of the kiosk, placement should be a combination of visibility, accessibility and convenience for the consumer at the point of purchase and during the information-gathering process while they are shopping,” said Ron Bowers, senior vice president of business development at Grafton, Wisconsin-based kiosk vendor Frank Mayer & Associates.
Bowers suggests the following locations:
Wayfinding kiosks should be placed at the entrance or front of the embedded computer to help consumers with their shopping process; Loyalty check-in kiosks should be near the cart corral to allow the consumer to initiate the shopping procedure, access coupons and download custom shopping lists; Endcap display kiosks let consumers download product information that targets their needs; Endless Embedded Computer in each of the store’s sub-departments allow consumers to order products in sizes and colors that are not on the shelves; and Kiosks should be placed in the services department to reduce lines for product returns and to provide insight on customer relations.
TIO Networks
“Self-service kiosks are meant to be convenient for your customers, but users want to feel that their transactions are still private,” said Jason Plante, senior director of supply chain management and logistics at Vancouver, Canada-based financial self-service kiosk company TIO Networks Corp. “Your kiosk placement should demonstrate both convenience and privacy while still being situated within the view of store staff so that they can help users who have questions.”
Plante recommends:
For transactional kiosks, avoid high-traffic embedded computer areas such as next to the counter or entrances and exits. Self-service kiosk users who obstruct the normal flow of foot traffic within a location will only feel rushed to end their transaction, and they may not come back next time; Wherever your self-service kiosk is placed within your store, ensure the store staff understand the features and benefits of the kiosk. Your store staff become your embedded computer to all potential new kiosk users, and, if the staff don’t convey a clear, positive experience to a potential new user, the customer may not use the terminal at all;
Placing your self-service terminal beside a familiar device such as an ATM may help users feel more comfortable using your kiosk for the first time; and Give your users enough room to conduct their business at your self-service kiosk. Similar to avoiding high-traffic areas, let your users feel comfortable at your kiosk.
Jibestream
“Every visitor has to pass by an entrance or exit at least twice in their visit to any store,” said Nicholas Yee, product manager of Toronto, Canada-based wayfinding technology firm Jibestream. “That makes these locations great for messages, or for offering functionality that visitors should know about. From a wayfinding perspective, it’s very useful to give users the ability to find what they’re looking for, right as they walk into the store.”
For Yee, the best locations are:
Checkouts: Nobody enjoys waiting in line, so, while these visitors are probably already on their way to becoming a paying customer, why not present them with information that may attract them to pick up a second item during their trip? Then give them the ability to view directions on how they can get to that item in the store, right from the kiosk so that they can easily act on that impulse purchase. Waiting rooms: Recent studies have shown that in health care, informing users of what they can expect during their visit to the hospital via helpful signage and messaging can greatly reduce the number of frustrated visitors. By applying this concept to a commercial environment, stores can help their customer service staff by reducing the amount of aggravated customers they have to deal with. These customers may have become further aggravated as they wait in line. So why not give them access to a kiosk that can give them an engaging focus point, and help them be more time-efficient by allowing them to plan the rest of their trip through the store?
Near elevators and escalators: As people are travelling through a store, one of the key decision points during their journey is when they approach an elevator or escalator. If the retailer provides them with a wayfinding kiosk, customers can be sure of where they need to go next.
Promotional areas: In addition to physical signage located near areas displaying promotional campaigns, stores can leverage the high customer traffic that visits these areas by installing a kiosk. Stores can use the kiosk to promote events or sales, while increasing the number of people who will see the retailer’s advertising. The kiosk can help manage a store’s traffic by diverting people from a high-traffic area to different places in the store via a wayfinding application.
refer to:
http://www.kioskmarketplace.com/articles/location-location-location-experts-offer-advice-for-in-store-kiosk-placement

Acrosser Releases the PCI-E x16 Slot AMB-IH61T3 Mini-ITX Board, for Your Industrial Automation System

acrosser Technology, a leading provider of industrial and embedded computers, debuted the AMB-IH61T3 today, an industrial Mini-ITX motherboard with the highest cost-performance ratio yet, powered by an Intel H61 chipset supporting 3rd/2nd Generation Intel® Core™ i7/i5/i3 processors.

Generous I/O Connectivity
The AMB-IH61T3 possesses high connectivity and multiple high-speed I/O ports. Built with 8 USB ports/headers and 10 serial ports/headers, this board provides sufficient and flexible connection possibilities, especially for KIOSK and industrial automation system integrators to link and manage multiple peripherals.
Expandable Graphic Power and Functionality
The Mini-ITX AMB-IH61T3 equipped with a PCI-E x16 slot, brings you not only more expanded functionality, but also enhanced graphic power. You can even choose to leverage an additional graphics card on top of the slot to improve visual effects for any kind of gaming application, or use the multiple displays for industrial automation purposes.
The industrial PC industry has been craving smaller, more affordable portable computing devices. We responded to this demand by introducing our cost-effective Mini-ITX platform AMB-IH61T3, making mini-computing more usable and redefining the embedded SBC market.