With the blink of an eye

Touchscreens are a particularly popular form of interaction for digital signage and kiosk systems in public spaces. But contactless alternatives are in high demand, especially in times of COVID19. invidis tested contactless interaction with gaze control and artificial intelligence.

The concept of gaze control has established itself over the past years especially in enterprise projects. One of the leading solution providers for gaze control is Munich-based 4tiitoo, which offers with „NUIA Productivity+“ an established gaze control platform. The solution recognizes the user intention by means of eye tracking and artificial intelligence. Main use-case is the workplace NUIA optimizes work processes, making them more efficient and ergonomic, faster, and more natural.

Solutions such as NUIA significantly reduce the daily mouse usage. Employees can concentrate on their actual work with their hands, which increases productivity and improves quality. Even so-called mouse arm symptoms are reduced by virtual hands-free operation.

The technology is not yet very widespread as an alternative to touchscreens in digital signage applications. But pilot installations in automotive showrooms and in food retail have been very successful. Not only is gaze control perceived as innovative by consumers: It’s simply fun to use. Perfect for gamification – one of the trends at the point of sale.

At Euroshop 2020, invidis tested two interactive touchpoints as part of the Shared Spaces showcase. More than 1,000 visitors used the contactless digital signage touchpoints to digitally determine their sentiment. The Shared Spaces architects and designers of Kemmler Kemmler selected a few dozen mood photos for this purpose, which were each assigned to one of three mood categories. Users were shown three photos at a time. Visitors selected their favourite photo from the constantly changing images just with their eyes. Within 20 seconds, the NUIA platform was able to determine the user’s preferences based solely on eye movements. The majority of retailers and architects were enthusiastic about the application – a contactless WoW experience, especially in a time of a global pandemic.

The technology is exciting not only because it is robust and relatively inexpensive. It allows to collect subconscious preferences of customers. For example, an automotive brand gathered valuable information about preferred product features, price categories or trends such as performance versus sustainability. In fashion it is quite easy to collect insights about favourite colours and patterns or cuts that can be collected with platforms like NUIA. These unconscious preferences enable front line staff to provide much faster and more targeted sales process.