ETOBICOKE, Ontario — Rise Vision Inc., provider of a Web-based content management system for the control of digital signage networks, announced that Villanova University has expanded its on-campus use of the Rise Display Network to create a fully networked, campus-wide information system.

Villanova uses the Rise Display Network digital signage content management system on 15 LCD screens campus-wide, with plans to add another 30 screens. In addition to displaying information about campus events, schedules, and emergency notifications, Villanova also sells advertising to local merchants that accept the school’s Wildcard debit card.

Villanova has a reputation for high-tech leadership, earning recognition from PC Magazine and Princeton Review as one of the top 20 “Most Wired Colleges in the Nation.” It was an early adopter of digital signage by installing an LCD display in its Business School’s Applied Finance Lab. Villanova has added 14 screens in other buildings to create a fully networked, campus-wide information system.

“We wanted to introduce a better method for disseminating information throughout the University,” said Michael Hoffberg, digital signage project manager for Villanova’s University Information Technologies, Strategic Planning department. “The Rise Display Network offers us an elegant, eye-catching and affordable way to convey up-to-date information — events, special activities, schedules, and emergency notifications — to students, staff and faculty.”

The Rise Display Network gives University administrators complete control over the composition and timing of all content. Distributing information via digital signage enables the University to limit paper postings, and is intended to cut down on the volume of emails sent to the Villanova community. “There’s a big payoff,” says Hoffberg. “It’s an effective, low-maintenance system that does not impact heavily on our limited staffing resources.”

Each member of the Villanova community, including teachers, students and staff, uses the Wildcard identification card to enter and check out books from the library and use campus resources such as vending machines, dorm laundry facilities and the bookstore. The Wildcard can also be used as a debit card that is accepted at a growing number of off-campus vendors including retail stores, restaurants, and fast-food chains. The Wildcard Office is now selling advertising on its Rise Display Network-powered signage to local merchants that accept the Wildcard.

“Villanova is an example of how digital signage can be a cost-effective and attractive way to communicate up-to-date information to a broad number of people without littering the campus with paper signs,” said Ron Levac, president, Rise Vision. “By partnering with local merchants, the University has extended its value to the entire campus community.”

The Rise Display Network is a Web-based, Software-as-a-Service content management system operated by Rise Vision. Subscriptions include access to live content such as news headlines, local weather, sports scores, and stock ticker updates. Users incorporate this live content with their own information, including movies, graphics and text, and publish it directly to their network of digital signs.
Contacts:

Digital Signage Software, Software-as-a-Service

Digital signage seems to be everywhere these days with live data streaming from screens in banks, airports and shopping malls. The business of installing and maintain these systems and supplying the content used to be pretty specialized. Not anymore. Plug-and-play technology, falling prices, and browser-based access to content information and system information have put this market within the reach of the average VAR.

Seeking to sign up a broad swath of those VARs, Rise Vision, a developer of Web-based content management for digital signage, has launched a two-pronged attack on the market.

The vendor has created a program that enables a reseller to become a private network operator (PNO) of its Software-as-a-Service Rise Display Network (RDN) service. In addition, Rise Vision has teamed with distributor Ingram Micro to offer a digital signage bundled solution to resellers.

Researcher Frost & Sullivan has forecast that the worldwide digital signage systems market will grow from $313.9 million in revenues in 2006 to more than $1 billion in 2012 at a compound annual growth rate of more than 20 percent.

The market has reached a tipping point that will encourage more channel partners to enter the market, said Ryan Cahoy, vice president of Rise Vision, Etobicoke, Ontario. “The complexity of the technology and the number of moving parts used to scare off everybody except the most focused of resellers,” he said. “Now, the technology is simpler and often comes with a web-based interface. Plus, prices are dropping. Digital signage has become a technology that most VARs can come to grips with very quickly.”

Cahoy said Rise Vision’s PNO program was designed to make it as easy and cost-effective as possible for resellers to sell their own branded solution and to drive sales. “The branding capabilities allow resellers to spec out custom solutions and offer lower bids,” he said.

Key features of the program are volume subscription discounts and a customizable log-in page. Subscriptions include access to live content such as news headlines, local weather, sports scores, and stock ticker updates. Users can incorporate the content into their own information such as including movies, graphics and text, and publish it directly to their network of digital signs.

The program’s log-in page enables resellers to promote branding, cross-selling, and event messages to users each time they access their digital signage networks.

The other prong of Rise Vision’s marketing push, its bundle deal with Ingram Micro, offers resellers a discounted digital signage package. The deal provides all of the key components resellers need to install a digital signage solution with discounts of between $1,100 and $1,200 from each manufacturer’s suggested retail price.

The solution includes the RSN; LCD displays from the Samsung DX Series, including 40-inch or 46-inch screens; Peerless Universal Tilt Wall mounts to secure the screens to the customer’s wall; and the AOpen digital media player to drive the display.
Contacts:

Digital Signage Software