Intel Corp., Microsoft Corp. and NEC Corp. on Thursday announced that the companies will enter into a strategic relationship to provide an integrated digital signage offering for the global market, including Japan. This collaboration will result in an optimized digital signage platform that addresses the retail and digital signage market segment’s need for streamlined, reliable, interactive, intelligent and high performance solution with minimal cost of lifecycle management.

In January 2010, Intel and Microsoft announceda strategic relationship to develop and promote a validated platform for intelligent digital signage applications. NEC will integrate solutions and services including content management and media distribution with the digital signage platform based on the Intel Core i5/i7 processor running Windows Embedded Standard 7. The companies have discussed collaboration in the areas of hardware, software, system integration and services.

NEC’s joining this alliance will further promote the concept of intelligent digital signage and embody next generation digital signage products. This includes a strategic cloud computing collaboration, which is intended to eventually increase alignment between NEC, Intel and Microsoft.

“This alliance is about innovating and collaborating in the growing the global digital signage market to drive additional benefits to our joint customers. NEC will empower the products and services to provide innovative digital signage solutions by leveraging our solution, expertise, experience in deployment, product technologies and power to cultivate the global market with Intel and Microsoft,” said Masaru Takaishi, General Manager of carrier and media service solutions division at NEC. 

The main emphasis of this proposed collaboration is as follows:

• NEC will enrich its product portfolio by adding a newly developed controller module and display specialized for digital signage based on the Open Pluggable Specification (OPS),Intel’s initiative to standardize the design and development of digital signs.
• The collaboration utilizes Microsoft’s latest Windows 7 technology innovations through Windows Embedded Standard 7. These include Windows Presentation Foundation, Windows Touch and Windows Flip 3D navigation for multi-gesture touch interfaces and context-aware applications.
• NEC will enhance its audience measurement solutions by increasing accuracy of its state of the art age and gender recognition technology. The use of business intelligence maintained in Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 database software provides more flexibility to create visual analysis of collected data.
• New remote management functions by Intel Active Management technology such as power management and software upgrading of displays and controllers. Besides, new efficient system to provide online controller management, OS updating, software updating, asset management and others by operating the management software.

“Interactive and intuitive digital signage that leverages cloud based services presents a tremendous opportunity for retailers to greatly enhance the customer experience. By taking advantage of innovations being developed by technology leaders, OEMs can produce more streamlined and reliable digital signage solutions that will drive in-store sales through targeted, personal and effective customer connections,” said Greg Buzek, president of IHL Group consulting company.

Tags: Intel, NEC, Microsoft, Windows, Core