Dutch Wholesaler Fills New Customer Experience Center With 46 Flat Panels

August 27, 2021 by Dave Haynes

The Dutch wholesaler Technische Unie has lit up a new 450 sq. m. interactive experience center that uses 46 large flat panel displays to inform and inspire industry partners.

The Eindhoven company has been around since 1880 and works with more than 700 suppliers worldwide, with 280,000 SKUs associated with technical installation materials for housing, utility, industry, government, healthcare, and retail.

PPDS – aka Philips – supplied the displays:

In order to be and remain competitive, more and more industrial companies are switching to smart techniques and smart factories, and Technische Unie wanted to create a venue equipped to educate and inspire its industry partners on ways to run their businesses smarter, while also providing a space for customers to learn about and more easily discover the latest offers from the hundreds of available suppliers.

To achieve its vision and ambitions, Technische Unie partnered with nearby integration specialist, Hugo Janzen AV Projecten B.V, and PPDS, for a complete AV solution, with 46 connected Philips Q-Line UHD displays (ranging between 43”-65”) installed to bring the futuristic venue to life. This includes a spectacular vertically mounted, multi-screen display, designed to greet visitors as they enter a space that will also be used for events and training.

To maintain the desired, fully immersive visual experience, custom brackets connecting each display together were used for a harmonious finish.

Examples of products, services and solutions offered by Technische Unie and its partners are positioned throughout the Inspiration Centre, including within dedicated exhibition bays and experience booths, mocked up to mirror real life scenarios and environments. Philips displays are strategically mounted to the walls, providing comprehensive product details and interactive imagery at every turn, ensuring visitors remain informed at all times for more detailed and knowledge-based decision making.

Video content is controlled and managed through an intuitive PIXILAB BLOCKS system, which enables staff to make quick and easy updates in full HD or 4K using tablets connected to the network.

With Philips Q-Line’s FailOver technology, screens in the Inspiration Centre will always remain alive and active, never blank, switching automatically between primary and secondary inputs, ensuring that content keeps playing even if the primary source goes down.

“From the moment they walk in, visitors are immersed into a visually spectacular scene of activity, with each display providing not only a wow factor, but a valuable resource for information – whether that’s finding new products, ways to work smarter or to play a part in looking after our planet,” says Roeland Scholten, Sales Director for Benelux at PPDS.

Interesting to see there are end-users still opting for LCD for video wall projects, regardless of any issues around bezels. The cost delta is closing, but LCD remains the more cost effective option.