It's been many years that the technological progress in the vending machine industry has been slow, and snail-ly slow as opposed to the advancement in all aspects of life. You still see many vending machines around you operating in the ways that are not much different than 10 or 20 years ago. ATM machines, for example, has been going through vast changes and improvements since its inception.
However, this situation for vending machine industry is changing now. Next few years will witness the unprecedented vast leap in vending industry in terms of technology deployment and improvement. With the falling price of new technology such as touch display, wireless connectivity, camera and so on, the adoption rate of these technology which will make up the concept of Smart Vending will increase drastically in the next few years to come.
Smart Vending is a concept that encapsulates the application and integration of multimedia interactivity, cash and cashless payment, digital signage, video analytics, telemetry and cloud-based remote manageability as well as other emerging technology with the objectives to enhance the user experience of the vending machines and the effectiveness of the operation from the perspective of the vending machine operators. The vending operators always seeks to improve the effectiveness of their operation with their vending machines with the end in mind of lowering their operation cost thus increasing their profitability.
Users at the vending machines, while looking to buy what they want to buy from the vending machine, are also expecting something other than just inserting coins and pressing a selection button. They have been pampered with various convenient and interactive web and mobile applications, devices and gadgets such as smart phones, smart TV, and smart "many things". Yes, the user expectation on everything has been raised. Anything that is not on par with this expectation is deemed as outdated and lame. The users are addicted to cool stuffs and fun. The users or rather the crowd, are the kings nowadays. Pleasing user experience is no longer an additional luxury, but a basic requirement for all consumer-facing applications, products and services.
Running a business is always challenging since the days of barter system. Running a vending business is even more challenging in the current era.The trend of the retail business is going automatic and self-service direction. Vending machine is already on this track since many decades ago. With the availability of Smart Vending technologies, vending machine operation should be no longer regarded as selling merchandises on automated cabinets that accept money and dispense products automatically. There are more to be offered and more to make from the same estate. The possibilities and opportunities are great and beyond limitation.
For fast time-to-market deployment of Smart Vending, Silkron provides all-round product and solutions: https://www.silkron.com/smart_vending
