Faster Kiosk Printers

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By Annette Tarlton, Marketing Director EMEA, Star Micronics

As the European kiosk market continues to grow apace, international POS printer manufacturer Star Micronics continues to extend its portfolio of kiosk printers to meet an ever-widening range of applications and environments.

From packaged printers through to open frame models, Star Micronics offers a solution to meet even the most demanding of environments.

Star Micronics has, over many years, developed significant expertise and experience within the retail sector, offering tailored printing solutions for major retailers, including Harrods of Knightsbridge, London. Leading the industry in terms of product design, Star has built a strong position in the marketplace which, in more recent years, has been reinforced through the development of printers offering a number of truly unique features coupled with renowned high performance and reliability. This has recently been demonstrated in the development of the TSP100 futurePRNT series, offering the retailer a highly sophisticated point-of-sale printer with a range of effective marketing tools.
 
It is precisely this expertise and advanced technology that Star Micronics has transferred to the kiosk industry, providing kiosk manufacturers with an extensive range of proven and unique printing solutions. Recognising this, a growing number of major companies, including Vodafone, Avery Weigh-Tronix and, most recently, Bluechip Computer AG, are currently deploying Star printers in their kiosks.

Bluechip Computer AG is a solutions provider for photo kiosk products and associated services. As one of the most important development partners and the main hardware component supplier to the front-end division of AgfaPhoto GmbH, Bluechip Computer AG has been building its experience in this segment since 2001.

Bluechip Computer AG developed, manufactured and marketed, in conjunction with AgfaPhoto, the Agfa Image Box, an all in one PC solution complete with touch screen. These devices are used in specialised shops as digital order stations for all storage media and digital cameras. In May 2005, Bluechip Computer AG added the self-service photo print solution PhotoKiosk to its portfolio – a complete photo printing solution that can be installed as a self-service terminal in a wide range of locations. The self-service kiosk enables users to print photos from their mobile phones or digital cameras simply and inexpensively, in standard, index card, greetings card or collage formats. Alternatively, they can be burnt to CD.

To date, Bluechip Computer AG has manufactured 110 kiosks, the majority of which are being installed in Marktkauf stores in a project that began in early 2007. The kiosk comprises a 15" touch screen, together with an input unit for digital media, a photo printer and a receipt printer. For the latter, Bluechip Computer AG selected the TSP600 thermal receipt printer from Star Micronics. The TSP600 was chosen for its long-term reliability, high-speed performance, two-colour output and ‘Drop-in & Print’ paper loading design.
Bluechip required a printer that offered high quality performance and reliability – the TSP600 from Star Micronics met all the necessary criteria and has proved to be the perfect solution, reflecting the ease of use and flexibility associated with packaged printers. Star’s commitment to product design means that users can also benefit from a range of unique marketing tools that enable the production of coupons and vouchers. The most recent packaged printer launched by Star Micronics with such tools is the TSP700II.

Building on the success of the TSP700, the TSP700II truly succeeds its predecessor by combining high speed with superior functionality. A highly sophisticated printer, the TSP700II is capable of printing at a remarkable 250mm/second, making it the fastest single station printer available today. With improved head design and a print resolution of 203dpi, this printer offers exceptional print quality. In addition, to facilitate the easy ‘Drop-In’ installation of the printer into a kiosk, a vertical operation kit is included as standard, which includes a vertical roller, paper support pads and a paper low sensor designed specifically for vertical use.

To further enhance the unique features of the TSP700II and build on the software marketing function currently available with the TSP700, Star has incorporated a number of software tools from its futurePRNT series. These allow users to complement their existing software with graphic management and coupon/text processing tools, as well as providing a number of more technical tools to facilitate integration.

We feel that this latest addition to the Star portfolio further highlights our marriage of expertise across the retail and kiosk industries.