MSI’s ODM Services for a POS system, Japan

Customer’s Background

Our SI customer provides POS systems to a well-known convenience store chain in Japan. This SI is a renowned Japanese trading company with 40 years of experience and partnerships with 53,000 stores. They offer comprehensive solutions for retail customers, from software and hardware development to post-installation management, providing one-stop support for convenience stores, including IT consulting, solution implementation and deployment, and store system operation and maintenance. The end customer is a famous chain of convenience stores in Japan.

Challenge

Japan faces a severe labor shortage. Currently, a significant proportion of convenience store staff are foreigners and senior citizens, necessitating the provision of easy-to-operate POS machines. Additionally, the POS system must maximize functionality within the limited counter space through a simple design.

Solution

The space-saving design of the POS terminal is suitable for physical retail stores with face-to-face cashier counters. The vertical display design and optimized applications not only reduce installation space but also shorten training time due to the user interface being similar to tablets and smartphones. To further save space, we combined the display bar and system control unit, allowing for the installation of receipt printers, payment terminals, barcode scanners, and donation boxes, saving up to 54% of installation space. From a POS perspective, installing as many display devices as possible reduces the counter area originally used for cashier processing. Multilingual support for foreign tourists became necessary, requiring more information on customer screens. Therefore, based on the design of vertically set widescreens, we developed an arm-type display design with a small installation area that fully utilizes space and makes the counter more spacious. The barcode handheld scanner is designed with an embedded base cover to avoid clutter on the counter. Additionally, we optimized the application design to accommodate automatic change machines, eliminating physical buttons and adopting full touch operation to enhance operability and speed up business processes.

Results

The POS cash register with an automatic change machine allows anyone to operate it accurately in a short time! It is easy to use even for foreigners and the elderly, eliminating the hassle of checking payments and change, reducing the burden on cashiers. Since cash cannot be brought in or taken out, it also leads to a reduction in robberies.