Here Are The 2019 Digital Signage Awards Winners

February 11, 2019 by Dave Haynes

The globally-based Digital Signage Awards were handed out last week in Amsterdam, with about 120 nominees and guests attending the awards reception and dinner at an old theatre right in the old city’s central district.

The awards are done in association with Sixteen:Nine, and happen because of sponsors like TRISON, BBV, Mvix, NanoLumens and Gable.

The big winners were Moment Factory (Canada) and Publicis Sapient (US).

Winners and High Commendations, By Category

Workplace Communications

Finalists
BT for BT Live
Nanolumens for the Chicago Ion Center
Signet for Ebay’s Main Street in a Box
TRISON for the Inditex Group’s corporate buildings
Valotalive for Neste and for futurice
YCD Multimedia for Amazon’s Understory at The Spheres.

Winner – YCD Multimedia for Amazon’s Understory at The Spheres
The Spheres is the latest addition to Amazon’s downtown Seattle headquarters. The innovative building offers employees a work environment that’s more like a rainforest than an office. To properly explain this groundbreaking new building, Amazon set out to establish a free, public visitor center at The Spheres, called Understory and assembled an accomplished team of local Seattle companies to design the exhibit space.

Healthcare and Education

Finalists
Nanolumens for Georgia State University and for the other for the University of Nevada, Las Vegas
Publicis Sapient for Sanford Health
Reflect for their PatientPoint Interact exam room program.

Winner – Publicis Sapient
In a patient thoroughfare at the heart of the Sanford Health campus, Publicis Sapient used a hanging light-sculpture, two-floor displays and responsive technology to turn a doctor’s appointment into a disarming first encounter with genetic medicine, titled Imagenetics. The biometric data triggers an on-screen visualization, which is reflected in the twinkling animations of the light sculpture overhead.

Hotels, Resorts and Restaurants

Finalists
Beaver Group for Chipotle digital signage project
Linney for McDonald’s UK & Ireland
PARTTEAM & OEMKIOSKS for their self-service kiosks for restaurants and food services Publicis Sapient for Holland America Line’s Explorations Central

High Commendation – Linney

Winner – Publicis Sapient
Explorations Central is a shipboard interactive space that celebrates the power of travel to enrich our lives. Brought to life by Publicis Sapient, guests discover the tastes, traditions, and events that have shaped the destinations on their itinerary, share highlights from their own world travels and learn more about the ship they are on. The program is expanding to include every ship in the Holland America Line fleet.

Digital-Out-Of-Home Advertising

Finalists
Billboard Video Group for their Smart City intelligent digital signage platform
Cineplex Digital Media for Bank of Montreal
Gable for Simon Property Group
ProntoTV with JC Decaux for Oslo Central Station, Norway
Tractor Outdoor with Ayuda for their TapOff campaign in South Africa.

High Commendation – Gable

Winner – Billboard Video Group
Almaty, Kazakhstan announced an ambitious five-year plan to modernise the city’s transportation infrastructure as part of its ‘Smart City’ project and BBV responded with a cutting-edge, integrated network of 50 intelligent DOOH media boards installed at traffic hotspots throughout the city. The complete intelligent Digital Signage platform opened a new avenue for advertisers, enabling the project to be delivered at no public cost.

Large Retail

Finalists
Entwined for Supercheap, Australia
Kocsistem for Fiat, Turkey
Moment Factory for Plan B Media and CentralWorld, Thailand
Pixel Inspiration for Selfridges, UK
Publicis Sapient for T-Mobile, USA
Reflect Systems for Levi Strauss, USA
SignageLive for Iceland Food, UK
TRISON for Zara in Milan, Italy.

High Commendation – Moment Factory

Winner – Publicis Sapient
T-Mobile pushed the boundaries of wireless retail across multiple stores – all with unique screens, and architecture. Publicis Sapient immersed themselves in every level of detail to drive design, installation, and the ongoing delivery of large-format videos, custom LED content, and interactive and reactive experiences. These stores attract the best sales associates, while creating the best-branded experience for T-Mobile’s customers.

Small Business / Local Retail

Finalists
Publicis Sapient for Nutella
Sansi North America for their SNA Displays Art Deco demo room
ScreenCloud for their low cost access to digital signage
VIF Tele for the Life Harvesting project for IGA Du-chemin in Montreal

Winner – VIF Tele
The “Life Harvesting – Fresh from the Roof” programme consists of showing and selling organic vegetables grown on the roof of the store. VIF Tele installed a digital kiosk allowing customers to choose and order vegetables they can see growing, live. The solution for this innovative project was implemented at local level, in a single grocery store, but it attracted national attention.

Public Venues

Finalists
ESI Design for the canopy display at 900 North Michigan
Moment Factory with Plan B Media for CentralWorld, Thailand
Nanolumens for Charlotte Douglas Airport, USA
NECSUM Technology for Intu and for Torrecardenas, both in Spain
Publicis Sapient for the Thomas Cole National Historic Site, USA
Revel Media Group for Hale Center Theatre, USA
SiliconCore Technolgy for Melbourne Airport T2, Australia
teamLab for MORI building Digital Art Musem, Japan
TRISON for Merlin Properties and the Arenas shopping centre

High Commendations – Museums  – Publicis Sapient

High Commendations – Retail – NECSUM Technology for Torrecardenas shopping centre

Winners

Source: Changi Airport Group

Public Venues – Transport – Moment Factory for Terminal 4 project for Changi Airport Group
Singapore’s Changi Airport Group commissioned major new experiential media features to enhance and entertain at different stages of the passenger journey. From optical illusions to cinematic storytelling, the architectural media features transform even the least appreciated traveller moments into surprises of delight and discovery. Building on their reputation for creating signature media environments, Moment Factory’s installations at Changi Airport push ambient entertainment in new and meaningful directions.

Public Venues – Museums – teamLab Borderless, Japan
In the MORI Building DIGITAL ART MUSEUM teamLab Borderless is a group of artworks that form one borderless world. Artworks move out of the rooms freely, form connections and relationships with people, communicate with other works, influence and sometimes intermingle with each other. In a vast complex, three-dimensional 10,000 square meter space, 520 computers and 470 projectors create a completely new world, not seen before.

Public Venues – Retail – TRISON for Arenas shopping centre
In 2018, property owner, Merlin Properties, approved a concept from TRISON that turns a visit to the Arenas shopping center into an unforgettable experience by integrating the space with visual technology through 7 large screens installed at strategic points. The most prominent screen is an interactive 64-metre long circular screen in the pit of the former bullring, which synchronizes with another 62-metre screen over the bullring terrace.

Technical Achievement – IAdea
The IAdea XDS-1078/1088 combines: 10-inch high-brightness touch screen, built-in zero-gap wall mount, Power-over-Ethernet for friendly installation, RFID/NFC reader for personal ID, and a ruggedized version of Google Android that works perfectly many enterprise-grade Content Management Systems. The product has won contracts around the globe, with record-breaking shipments in 2018.

Creative Execution – Marketing & Communications

Finalists
Nanolumens for Charlotte Douglas Airport
Responsive Spaces for Delacon, Austria
Signet for IBM and for the Palo Alto Network Trivia game
Stingray Business for Uncle Tetsu

High Commendation – Nanolumens

Winner – Responsive Spaces
Austrian company Delacon is a pioneer and market leader in phytogenic animal feed additives with powerful links to nature itself. The company remains true to nature and is open to new ideas – a philosophy encapsulated in the visual image of the dandelion seed head and vividly executed by Responsive Spaces. Visitors can interact with screens in the most natural way possible: by blowing the seeds off a dandelion, just like in nature.

Display and/or Player Technology

Finalists
InfiLED for the Roger Waters tour
Peerless-AV’s Xtreme High Bright Outdoor display
ProntoTV for the Prisjakt price comparison project
Sharp Electronics for the Yanmar Evo // Center
TRISON for their technical work on the Arenas shopping centre

High Commendation – infiLED

Winner – TRISON for the Arenas de Barcelona shopping mall
In 2018, Merlin Properties, the company owning the Arenas centre, commissioned TRISON to make the shopping centre a digitized landmark icon on Barcelona’s retail scene. TRISON’s solution integrates the space with visual technology through 7 big screens installed at strategic points around the centre. Together they offer visitors an immersive experience where the interplay of technology, architecture and audio-visual content creates a new dimension.

Innovation – Management & Related Software

Finalists
RMG Networks’ Korbyt platform
Tripleplay’s Digital Media Platform
Userful Cloud remote video wall management

Winner – RMG Networks
RMG set out with a mission to create the next-generation digital experience platform to target the entire omni-channel digital experience. This new platform, called Korbyt, not only has amazing digital signage features but also provides seamless personal digital experiences to employees and customers across text, voice, intranet, email, Slack, Skype, Twillio, mobile, tablet and desktop.

Overall Solutions – High Profile Site

Finalists
Luna Park for re-making a Sydney icon
Pixel Inspiration for Halifax Bank, London
Prendi for Harbord Diggers interactive wall, also in Sydney
Synect for the Greater Orlando Airport Authority

Winner – Pixel Inspiration for Halifax Bank
In June 2018, Halifax Bank opened the doors of their largest, digital-focussed flagship branch on New Oxford Street, London. It is split over three floors and includes a raft of digital solutions supplied, installed and managed by Pixel Inspiration. The bank’s aim was to create a space for people to not only do their everyday banking but engage with meaningful, cutting-edge technology, be able meet with colleagues and contacts, as well as to unwind.

Overall Solutions – Multi Venue Rollout

Finalists
Billboard Video for its SmartCity DOOH platform, Almaty, Kazakhstan
Esprit Digital for Westfield malls network rollout, USA
Gable for Simon Property Group, USA
Linney for McDonald’s UK & Ireland
Zytronic for ebebek click to bricks concept, Turkey

High Commendation – Billboard Video

Winner – Linney
Linney developed a fully tailored solution for McDonald’s UK & Ireland to manage the end-to-end process for in-store digital signage and customer experience. The solution is now live in over 1,300 restaurants across over 10,000 screens. Devices range from menu boards and touchscreen noticeboards, through to Drive Thru screens and interactive children’s table games. The technology enhances customer experience, and does so in creative, surprising and enticing ways.

Grand Prix (Best In Show)
Billboard Video Group, Kazakhstan
IAdea, Taiwan
Linney, UK
Moment Factory, Canada
Pixel Inspiration, UK
Publicis Sapient, USA
teamLab, Japan
TRISON, Spain

Winner – Moment Factory, Changi

Outstanding Individual – Chris Riegel, CEO, Stratacache

There were nominations for this last one, and up to me to come up with a selection. Riegel was a pretty obvious choice, given the scale and diversity he has added to his vertical group of companies in the past couple of years, as well as the reach.

These awards were pretty small a couple of years ago, but since that time paired with 16:9 to add much more awareness and participation. I was very happy with the big jump in entries in 2018 and their quality. I was also really happy with the breadth of judges who volunteered time to review the entries.

The evening also looked great and had genuine polish to it, all the way down to a pro presenter and great venue. food was good, too.

These awards are most definitely not pay to play. You don’t win because you are a sponsor, or by buying a table at the awards dinner. The judges have no visibility on the commercial side of the business for the UK company that developed and runs this.

As with any awards program that is growing, some categories got more entries than others, and there are some winners here that maybe in a richer field of nominees would have been in tough. But maybe not. As is always the case, a company cannot win unless it enters – so I would encourage many more companies to spend the minimal time and money to put together submissions.

Awards are a great thing – for companies of any size. I spoke with one guy who had already called back to the office, back home, and reported how his staff were over-the-moon happy.

The awards submissions for the 2020 event will open up this summer.

Congratulations to the winners, and thank you to the judges and organizers.