Pivoting, Interactive Digital Street Signs Now For Sale In Europe

January 18, 2017 by Dave Haynes

I saw this thing in Amsterdam at ISE 2016, and the French company couldn’t give me much in the way of detail on how much or where it would be available – other than North American NOT being a planned marketplace.

A year on, France’s Charvet Digital Media appears to have refined its digital street sign to a point that it is now for sale.

The company defines iGirouette as a “device made up of a mast with two rotating arrows, each of which can rotate 360 degrees. Each arrow is fitted with LED screens on both sides. iGirouette is connected to the internet (either via a GMS chip or directly via a network cable) and is remotely controlled via an online platform.”

The unit can:

• display real-time information about events;
• give directions for tours and tourists;
• calculate journey time to a given destination, while recommending the most suitable mode of transport.

Target applications are things like pedestrian-only high streets in city centres, convention centres, events centres (ie arenas) and, I assume, shopping malls.

I liked this thing when I saw it – the company had a booth and one or two units sprinkled around the ISE trade halls. They’re visually interesting and working with a smartphone app, the units can pair with individual users – so if you walk up to one, it can pivot and point the way to a landmark or something truly important, like a place that has Guinness on tap.

Making the assumption these things aren’t cheap, I’d imagine potential buyers are going to be a little jumpy about putting them outside among humans. You just know a group of drunk 19-year-olds wobbling out of a bar at 2 AM would be enchanted by the idea of hanging off these things, or messing with them in some way.

Inside, in a more controlled environment, the units’ survival stats would go way up.

Charvet is a digital display manufacturer focused on connected LED-based digital media solutions, with 10,000+ units (not these) in the field. No price, that I could find, for units.

If the sign looks a bit familiar, a NYC  company designed something similar. I wrote about it four years ago. Here’s a vid. The agency behind it doesn’t make clear whether this is an idea or a product.