Now that IS Cool!

This week at Australia's Photo Marketing Association 2009 Exhibition, held in Sydney, Fujifilm launched a range of new products that are keeping them at the forefront of digital retail technology. It’s no longer just photo, with Fujifilm showcasing Lifeware downloadable application software and funky e-wrap vinyl skins, which turn mobile phones, iPods, PDAs and laptops into individual fashion statements.

Fujifilm also showcased self service music downloads which brings to the customer a virtual digital music store with around 1 million tracks. Customers can sample tracks and load their own compilation album to a range of personal digital devices.

All of these offerings are presented to the user through a range of kiosks designed and manufactured for Fujifilm by NeoProducts.

The newest of these kiosks is the multi-application NXT. The NXT kiosk is now offered with an optional back-lit face, which changes colour depending on the application that is being accessed. This has prompted more than one reaction along the lines: "Now that IS cool!

3 July 2009

Blog | Securing Australia's Borders

Launching today, Sydney International Airport joins other Australian Airports in applying leading edge self service technology to improve Australian Border Security: SmartGates. As well as improving security, this system reduces the pressure on immigration staff and makes life easier for the weary traveller. Increasingly, the expansion in the number of international travellers, coupled with the need for ever more sophisticated screening processes has meant that border security must innovate to manage higher throughput in a challenging environment.

The Australian Customs Service has embraced this challenge and is now a world leader in automating border security.

Australian Smart Passport holders can now self check through customs and immigration by scanning their passport and interactively answer entry questions at one of the 80 Smartgate kiosks. The traveller then proceeds to one of the automated gates where a biometric recognition system verifies their status and allows them entry.

The Smartgate kiosks were designed by Neo for Sagem, who deliver the complete system. So now one of the first things that a traveller entering Australia sees is a kiosk from NeoProducts.

Lindsay Frost

30 June 2009

Blog | eBook Kiosks

The release of two new e-readers (the Cool-er and the BeBook) is another sign that, in spite of some author’s opposition, e-books are gaining ground on printed books. Most readers will, I'm sure, still buy hardback and paperback books. It’s nice to collect your favourite author’s titles, or to browse the stunning pictures in many large format books. And it’s true that the books on your shelves say something about you. But it’s also easy to see the advantages of an e-book. For example, an e-reader is great to take on holiday or on trains and planes. And think of all those trees you’d be saving!

So, how should book retailers react to e-books? They could ignore them and run the risk of going the way of many music retailers, who have been swamped by the digital music revolution. Or they could follow the example of Australian book seller Dymocks. They have installed kiosks from NeoProducts.

Initially, the kiosks will be used to market Dymocks’ on-line digital catalogue. However, in the near future, customers will be able to use the kiosks to download over 120,000 e-book titles and more than 30,000 audio-book titles, to a wide variety of digital devices.

For retailers, the technology brims with new opportunities. It means that out-of-stock or previously uncommercial titles can now be sold, and the pressures on floor-space alleviated. Even more traditional consumers will find they’ve not been forgotten. In future, it will be possible for titles to be ordered via the kiosks and printed-off in-store - either in whole, or in part.

Gary Rowing-Parker

19 June 2009