Digital Signage Market Projected to Approach $4.5 Billion in 2016

The digital signage market is showing no sign of slowing down. In fact, a recent study released by ABI Research (News - Alert) indicated that the global market for digital signage – which includes displays, media players, software, and installation/maintenance costs – will grow from nearly $1.3 billion in 2010 to almost $4.5 billion in 2016.

“Digital signs have a more compelling impact than some forms of traditional media,” Larry Fisher, practice director, Automotive, Energy and Emerging Technologies at ABI, said in a statement. “Digital signage has redefined the model for out-of-home advertising through the deployment of signs at malls, airports, and banks, among others; signs that deliver content in real time, or content that has already been stored and scheduled for delivery at the most appropriate time.”

The study, entitled “Digital Signage Market and Business Case Analysis,” examines the market for digital signage globally and by major geographic region from 2010 through 2016.

One trend that was highlighted was that the majority of digital signage installations currently are IP-based, which evidences the evolution from static advertising to digital signage. Nowadays, each media player requires connection to a remote content management server. This connection can be wired or wireless and, in some cases, is made through a cellular network, according to the report.

“A continual stream of fresh and relevant content is what separates a successful digital signage project from one that is boring and stale,” said Fisher. “Relevant could mean timely or localized, customized to the time of day or the demographics of the audience watching the screen, but deployers must consider content from the outset of a project.”

Digital signs are becoming so ubiquitous that they are spanning all types of venues. Moreover, the cost of deployment is steadily declining, which gives companies considering digital signage good reason to view this channel as an excellent opportunity to expand messaging to customers and potential customers, the report states.

In other digital signage news, Emerson Network Power (News - Alert) offers a Digital Signage Solution with its Avocent (News - Alert) technology, designed to quickly and easily provide transmission of live and recorded HD video and audio to multiple displays such as plasma, LCD and kiosk stations. Giant Stadium is just one place where Avocent digital signage technologies have been used.

“With the Giant Stadium configuration, we have multiple displays and the broadcast engineer or the controller of that display can put up at any time a relevant message for all or a subset of those displays,” Paul Nashawaty, director of product marketing for Avocent Products and Services, told TMCnet.

“We have high quality content delivery systems so that we don’t have latency or pixilation problems,” he added. “We don’t have a remote connection, we actually have a physical connection, and high definition digital ties into the quality of the transport mechanism that we have in place.”