Add SignStix To The Long List Of Android Options

January 30, 2015 by Dave Haynes

Here’s something I’m not sure I’ve seen in this sector before – a digital retail consultancy that built and markets its own Android-driven digital signage solution.

The company is Welcom Digital, based far from the big city high streets in little Harrogate, Yorkshire, north of Leeds. The firm has started marketing a product it calls SignStix, an Android HDMI stick that appears to heavily leverage web services and HTML5 to do its thing.

Owing a lot to the the agency side of Welcom’s business, the SignStix site is easily among the better ones I have seen in the broad digital signage ecosystem.

There’s some nice content creation tools here as well, and what appears to be a logical and very current approach to management and deployment, including doing what’s needed off tablets.

These little sticks, running Android, don’t tend to come out of the box with a management toolset that rivals a PC. So knowing what’s going on with them in the field can be tough. To Welcom’s credit, the company has worked a partnership with an M2M data specialist, Adey Electronics, which makes real-time diagnostics possible using the platform’s Director tool.

It also means content can be moved to the sticks and logs sent back using mobile data networks instead of setting up connectivity or borrowing on what’s available on site.

I’ve not had a demo, but I do like the notion of a retail consultancy keeping the signage software piece internal. It’s not going to be as robust (probably) as many established platforms, but they can control development direction and pricing, and fully know what the platform can and can’t do.