Smart Vending & Automated Retail

The retailers, vending operators as well as businesses in various industries have been always seeking ways to increase revenue stream, to enhance profitability, to optimize their operating costs, and to maximize their return on investment (ROI) of their operations, retail outlets, restaurants, vending machines as well as any other business and industrial operations. They are also looking for solutions to minimize missed revenue opportunities for their existing operation such as not able to operate round-the-clock, insufficient stocks for sale, unexpected machine breakdowns, etc. As in most businesses, human-dependency is one of the trickiest problems ought to be solved and mitigated from time to time. Besides, the retailers also demand improved efficiency and lower cost of their operations amidst the challenges in the current market situations.

From the consumers’ perspective, the ever-demanding consumers nowadays look for a better user experience that is fast, convenient and personalized. They also demand greater flexibility and choices in payment options to complete their purchases. On the other side, consumer brands are demanding improved merchandising trend and big data analytics. They are also in the constant appetite for innovative ways for brand engagement with their consumers.

Our extensive experience in automation and Internet of Things (IOT) has been synergized to develop and create a smart vending and automated retail platform that empowers smart vending machines, smart fridges, smart locker cabinets, coffee vending machine, food ordering kiosks and various types of unattended and automated retail equipment with a wide range of smart vending and unattended retail capabilities, smart vending API, vending mobile apps and backend cloud vending remote manageability and services.

Silkron® Smart Vending and Automated Retail platform, collectively known as Vendron platform, comprises of 5 pillar components:

Vendron® software, a plugin-based cross-platform smart vending software at the machine-side
Vendron® Cloud, a smart vending remote manageability cloud service
Vendron® Platform API, for third-party integration and scalability on smart retail and automated retail platform
Vendron® Go, mobile app for the smart retail experience at the consumer’s fingertips
Vendron® Op, mobile app for the smart vending operation at the operator's fingertips on the move

It enables the smart vending machines, interactive self-service ordering kiosks and all other automated and unattended retail equipment to be empowered with and capable of the following smart vending features and functionalities for the most of unattended retail experiences.

Smart Vending Machine Interactive Screen

Video Analytics & Facial Recognition

With video analytics, the smart vending machine plays ads and promotes products based on the viewer's demographics such as gender and age group. When customers approach the smart vending machine or self-ordering payment kiosk, Vendron's video analytics function can also make recommendations based on their demographics of gender and age groups, or what they just purchased, for cross-selling purposes. At the end of the days, it has also collected large data that are mapped to the anonymous genders, age groups, user emotions, and so on for other value-added analytics.

Digital Signage

The adoption of digital signage will generate a new source of advertising income for vending operators, leveraging on the high-traffic location of the smart vending machines, interactive self-service kiosks, and automated retail equipment. Targeted ads can be displayed based on the locations, sales history as well as the user's demographics of the smart vending machines, touch screen vending machines and food ordering kiosks.

Cash / Cashless / Mobile Payment / e-Wallet / Reward Points

Accepting both cash and cashless payment such as debit/credit cards, mobile payment, e-Wallet, internet payment, and so on will provide convenience to the customers and indirectly promote more sales, besides encouraging the sales of higher value items. It also provides the freedom of choice to the vending operators to make use of the unattended payment gateways that are most favorable in terms of transaction costs.

Multimedia and Contactless Interactivity

Multimedia interactivity with a large touch display on touch screen vending machines will attract more attention and will be very appealing to potential customers of unattended retail, thus increase sales of the products. Consumers with hygienic concerns can also interact with the smart vending machines in contactless and touchless ways.

Machine-agnostic & Hardware Independent

Vendron smart vending software platform is machine-agnostic, meaning that it can be used across all different vending machines made by different manufacturers. This puts the freedom of choices onto the hands of the vending operators and retailers to find the vending machines and retail automation that fit their desired requirements, budget, quality expectation, products to sell, locations to deploy, and so on. It also allows them to manage all different vending machines and unmanned retail on the same platform with a single login. This is crucial especially when the operator would like to expand their business to achieve higher revenue growth to sell more different types of products and to explore more different types of locations.

Machine-agnostic Vendron Smart Vending Platform

Remote Manageability & Telemetry

Over the internet, whether via the 3G, 4G or the fastest 5G network, Vendron Cloud provides the remote manageability and telemetry of the intelligent vending machines and food ordering kiosks. Software updates and content management for digital signage, interactive screen content, and themes can be accomplished remotely and securely for any number of smart vending machines, touch screen vending machines, smart fridges, smart locker cabinets, self-ordering payment kiosks and various types of retail automation. It allows the vending operators and retailers to remotely manage the large fleet of their vending machines from anywhere, monitor the live sales and stock status, manage and update the product pricing, photos, and details, upload and schedule the video signage content to play on the vending kiosks and view the actual play logs, smart kitting and route planning for stock replenishment, various comprehensive reporting and data analytics and so on.

Smart Vending & Automated Retail Ecosystem

Vendron smart vending & automated retail platform creates an ecosystem for the smart vending and unattended retail operating environment and connects each partner in the value chain. It enables the participation of various ecosystem partners in the operation, to interact with each other on the same platform. Vendron smart vending ecosystem builds value for all parties in a given market by engaging more consumers, simplifying operating processes, and enable unlimited scalability, flexibilities, and possibilities in smart retail and automated retail environment. It also encapsulates the multiverse of functionalities to fulfill the needs of various perspectives. Through various different channels, the ecosystem partners from vending machine manufacturers, landlords (the owner of the locations where the vending machines are deployed), restock personnel, service team, retailers, advertisers to consumers interact, operate and access with different roles and access rights, to a multitude of diverse functionalities including various unattended payments and identifications, social media, interactive content, advertisement and all variety of existing and new functions in the future.

Smart Vending Ecosystems supporting payments, identity, interactive contents, social medias, biometrics and face ID

Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Smart Vending and Unmanned Retail

Vendron platform incorporated AI technology to push the smart vending and unattended retail to the next level, to provide more intuitive, personalized, and highly intelligent vending experience and unmanned retail functionality. From round-the-clock operations of a smart vending machine, Vendron platform leverages big data analysis that results in more effective sales strategies, higher productivity and lower operation cost, higher profit margin, and so on. Moreover, cutting-edge technology in Vendron platform also enables more different applications, such as facial recognition that elevates the user experience, dispense control and verification, or age, gender, and emotion detection for a product recommendation, targeted ads, and audience analysis.

Omni-channel Retail Experience

Vendron platform provides the customers with a seamless shopping experience from the vending machines, automated retail equipment, and brick-and-mortar outlets, Offline to Online (O2O) via mobile interaction via Vendron Go mobile apps where the consumers can purchase and collect later at the smart vending machines, unattended retail outlets and automated shops. Marketing and promotion capabilities integrated on Vendron platform elevates the consumer experience around the unattended and automated retail while giving the edge of flexibility to the retailers and vending operators to maximize their profitability.

Smart vending technologies have been also deployed into various machines, use cases and applications to serve the needs of various industries: