Source Technologies Joins Forces with Real Digital Media to Expand Functionality of Retail Kiosks

Combines price checking, digital signage into a single device.

New York (PRWEB) January 14, 2008 -- Source Technologies, a leading provider of integrated solutions for managing financial transactions and other secure business processes, and Real Digital Media, a leading provider of next-generation digital signage products for establishing point-of-purchase marketing, advertising and corporate communication networks, are joining forces. Through this partnership, a multi-functional, interactive kiosk that increases retailers' sales and marketing efforts will be made available. As the first of its kind, the kiosk will be exhibited at the National Retail Federation annual convention Jan. 13-16, 2008, in New York.

"Our partnership with Source Technologies will provide retailers with kiosks that offer greater functionality to reach customers with targeted information at the right place and the right time. Using these function-rich kiosks, retailers can expand their options from a self service only device (i.e. price checking) to a dynamic in-store marketing tool that has greater customer appeal," said Ken Goldberg, chief executive officer for Real Digital Media. "Through a single device, not only will customer demands for applications such as price disclosure be met, but when the kiosk is not in use by a customer, it will also serve as a marketing and advertising vehicle to positively impact customer shopping behavior."

This strategic partnership will involve the hardware integration of Source Technologies' interactive kiosk along with its price checking application with Real Digital Media's digital signage platform, NEOCAST®. The kiosks feature an open, Windows® Embedded operating system, allowing for multiple applications. With the NEOCAST® platform, the kiosks will transform into powerful, networked digital advertising, promotional and corporate communication networks.

"To remain competitive, retailers need a device that serves more than one function like price checking or product lookup," said William Bouverie, CEO of Source Technologies. "To maximize functionality, we have developed a kiosk that allows for multiple applications. With our Real Digital Media partnership, retailers can deploy a device that, between being utilized for other functions, operates as an electronic advertisement to increase its overall effectiveness and sales efforts."

Nikki Baird, managing partner, Retail Systems Research, adds, "Retail Media Networks ultimately are headed for interactive and personalized experiences in stores. Interactive media will become an important component if only to help boost the ability to measure response rates to in-store media. Not every ad or promotion will need to be interactive, but as other technologies are deployed in-store, a convergence between the roles different types of screens play will mean that companies looking at in-store media today will need to consider the role that interactivity may play in the future. For example, a kiosk may not be a 'kiosk' 100 percent of the time, but may very well become part of the retail media network when the kiosk is not in use."

Real Digital Media and Source Technologies will showcase the new kiosks in booth #779 at the NRF show.

About Real Digital Media
Real Digital Media (RDM) provides next generation digital signage products for establishing point-of-purchase marketing, advertising and corporate communication networks. The company's family of NEOCAST® digital signage products store, deliver and play content in a wide range of digital formats on a variety of display devices. With NEOCAST® players and software, customized content and programming can scale across entire narrowcast networks down to individual displays, providing ultimate flexibility in reaching customers with targeted messaging at the right place and the right time. For more information, visit www.realdigitalmedia.com.

About Source Technologies
Founded in 1986, Charlotte, N.C.-based Source Technologies is a leading provider of integrated solutions for managing intelligent self-service kiosks that automate customer financial and informational transactions and other secure business processes. In addition to its ground-breaking transactional and interactive families of kiosks and software for self-service and retail applications, Source Technologies offers specialized magnetic ink character recognition (MICR) printers, consumables and software for printing checks and other paper disbursements and secure document printers and software for printing time- and information-sensitive documents. Customers include nine of the top ten U.S. banks, 69 of the Fortune 100, and thousands of small and mid-sized companies. Source Technologies solutions have created more than $500 million in economic value for its customers in the last ten years. For more information, visit www.sourcetech.com.

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