The announcement intensifies an existing relationship with Kiosk Information Systems, which has supplied kiosk enclosures to HP in the past. HP will now offer more than 30 standard kiosk hardware designs, containing various devices from its desktop PC, thin client, display, and point of sale product lines, the company says.

Phillip Cutrone, manager of HP's North America commercial third-party solutions business, told our sister publication eWeek.com, "We have provided clients with customized kiosk solutions in the past on an ad-hoc basis. We're taking kiosks and making them available directly from HP for all customers."


HP kiosks will target (from left to right) check-in, financial, human resources, order entry, photo, retail, security, and ticketing markets
Whether they're based on WEPOS or are thin clients using Microsoft's RDP (remote desktop protocol), HP kiosks will be manageable using the same set of tools as any other HP devices, he added. "We manage our technology from PCs through the data center to the kiosks as one set of tools. The end-to-end technology expertise HP has lends itself to helping customers with their complex kiosk deployments."

In research cited by HP, Frost & Sullivan said the North America kiosk market -- currently dominated by IBM and NCR -- is expected to grow to approximately $828 million from $484 million over the next five years. Rufus Connell, the consulting firm's vice president of information and communication technology, told eWeek.com that HP may be able to distinguish itself in the kiosk marketplace.

Connel said, "The real problem with kiosks is you must manage their entire lifecycle. This is where HP can compete with an advantage, especially compared to smaller turnkey kiosk integrators."

While the standard hardware used in HP kiosks should make them compatible with any operating system, HP typically ships its point of sale systems with WEPOS or Windows XP Embedded. For more information, see the company's self-service kiosk solutions website, here.

To read the eWeek.com story mentioned above, go here.

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