January 2010 - Protouch

Protouch Kiosks To Sell Armoury Square Tribute Stones

Posted on 14th January 2010 by Tom Quarry

Several Xen X5 order and payment kiosks are to make their way to the Armoury store at the Emirates Stadium.

The kiosks will be one of the ways in which supporters can buy a stone at Armoury Square which is the new Arsenal landmark that pays tribute to the club's greatest players and its fans with personalised engraved stones set in to the ground around benches. Located in front of Emirates Stadium, the square is a place where the fans will be side by side with the legends like Dennis Bergkamp, Charlie George and Ian Wright.

Each kiosk is kitted out with a touch screen, chip and pin, a receipt printer and a full body laminate and is linked up to the Armoury Square website. Fans can choose a stone, personalise it with their own message, process the order and pay at the kiosk. Their personalised stones will then become part of a permanent place in Arsenal F.C. history, creating a lasting, attractive feature that will define Arsenal football club and the fans that support it.

The kiosks are helping to create sales in preparation for the completion of the first phase of Armoury Square in Spring 2010 and will then continue to run while the square is developed further.

Common environments that benefit from touch screens?

Posted on 12th January 2010 by Tom Quarry

We know all about how touch screen kiosks, once a novelty reserved for high-end museum exhibits, are rapidly becoming an ultra-popular addition to public settings, educational areas, and businesses. Offering easily accessible information in a compact form, touch screen PCs are being embraced by business owners looking to provide easy access, restaurants looking for a foolproof ordering system, and museums requiring a simple solution for exhibit information.

These seven settings demand quick informational access, which is reason no.1 for their success with touch screen monitors. From heavy industry to education providers, with more and more people seeing the value of touch screen technology, expect to see more touch screens kiosks in the following locations:

Educational and Training Organisations

When it comes to education, the name of the game is quick and easy access to information. In the early 1990s, computing – and later the internet – revolutionised education. Access to data became quick, simple, and inexpensive. Now there's a new revolution going on. Offering simple access for disabled students, attention-grabbing displays for young children, and accessible information for elderly users, touch screen displays are quickly becoming the most popular means of communicating digital information for educators.

Museums
Touch screens have historically been popular in museum displays. Their ability to convey large amounts of information quickly and easily has made them a fantastic alternative to the traditional mouse-and-keyboard style PC display. Offering durability, simple access, and slick aesthetics, touch screen displays are highly popular with museums and public exhibitions.

Industry
Touch screens offer more than just simple access to information. The very design of a mouse and keyboard makes them highly exposed to potential damage or wear. A touch screen, however, is significantly more durable, able to function even when exposed to dirt and grime. This durability makes touch screens a worthwhile investment for industrial settings and potentially unclean areas.

Restaurants and Retail

Using a keyboard and mouse for thousands of transactions a day is hardly efficient. In a busy restaurant, the last thing any employee

needs is a cumbersome billing and payment interface. Touch screen digital signage allows employees to input and process payments significantly more quickly than a standard PC interface.

Travel Information and Public Transport

From airports to bus stations, touch screens are quickly becoming the norm for transport related transactions and processes. Printing and processing tickets is made simple with an automated machine display, lowering operating costs for public transportation services. Airports are also benefiting from the use of touch screen machines, which are lowering staffing needs in customs and immigration, and allowing airlines to simplify the check-in process.

Business

With a simple addition from a touch screen kiosk manufacturer, a business presentation can be supercharged and made significantly more effective. The most effective presentations demand two things – simplicity and control – and a touch screen display gives business presenters both.

Medical Settings

With the medical world demanding clean and quick access to information on demand, touch screens are quickly finding a large new audience. From operating theatres to patient booking rooms, the medical industry is embracing touch screens as a sanitary, ultra-efficient alternative to traditional PC displays.

Self Service Checkouts Set For Another Bumper Year

Posted on 5th January 2010 by Tom Quarry

Love them or hate them, you'll be seeing even more self-service checkouts in 2010 after NCR, the American technology company behind 80% of the UK’s self-service checkouts, predicted a 50% increase in UK sales of the self-service scanning machines that have become a feature of stores nationwide

Customers have been fairly torn on the issue; some get sick of the 'unexpected item in bagging area' message and prefer communicating with people, whereas a growing number are getting self-service-savvy, whizzing through the kiosk lanes and are waving goodbye to busy staffed checkouts. In total, 7,000 machines have been installed in supermarkets since their introduction in 2002, expected to more than double to 15,000 in the next three years, according to Retail Banking Knowledge.

According to Elton Birden, the managing director of NCR in Britain: “Self-service checkouts will revolutionise retail in the same way that self-service supermarkets did 60 years ago. It’s going to be a combination of existing customers rolling out and new users. It’s still a small percentage of the overall checkout.”