Apple set to release Point of Sale(PoS) iPod add-on as a commercial product?
We reported on Twtter founder Jack Dorsey who is building an iPhone PoS system earlier today. It turns out he might have some competition from Apple itself.
iFoApple Store reports that Apple may release the POS-iPod system it developed for its Apple Stores as a product aimed at retailers.
Since the debut of the iPod POS , inquires have been coming from all directions, including from end-user small businesses, larger chains and system integrators. Until now, Apple’s response has been that the iPod POS is a proprietary product, unavailable for sale. But now, tipsters say, Apple retail executives have asked the retail store business specialists to collect contact information from anyone who inquires about the iPod touch system, apparently to create a database of potential customers if Apple decides to commercialize the product.
It isn't hard to see why. With the economics of scale Apple has brought the cost of an iPod touch - which is really a high quality handheld computer- down below $200 (Currently $181 at Amazon for you Xmas shoppers). Meanwhile, proprietary POS sale systems that commonly use the Windows CE/Mobile platform cost much more and are much bulkier and harder to use (because of the CE OS). Just ask any Apple employee.
Apple has been deluged with inquiries about the POS system, which is comprised of a sleek, custom-designed and manufactured shell that surrounds the iPod touch, and also incorporates a barcode scanner and magnetic stripe reader. The hardware links to custom-programmed software that streamlines the process of taking cash, credit or debit card payments for merchandise.
We still haven't seen what these devices look like (that is a mock-up above) or how well they work, but Apple might just have found another business for its iPod touch product.
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Comments (16)
Only Apple can commercialize a Piece Of Shit and make money out of it!
Call it the iPoop?
Did you drop your iPod, try to exchange it under warranty only to be sent back to your cave?
wow you people aren't very clever....at all.
The poster is saying piece of shit because of thats the much more common expression for the acronym POS.Even a 2 yr old can get it, but not apparently 9to5mac readers.
You people are clearly not the brightest in the bunch.
That is Apples business model:
1. Look for pieces of shit (that everybody else is okay with).
2. Fix it.
3. Profit.
Like the mp3-players, music stores, smartphones....or PoS...
I want one :)
If you've worked at retail or even shopped at Apple's own store, you've seen employees using Symbol's RFID handheld computer scanner. Here is a link if you don't know what it is:
http://www.motorola.com/Business/US-EN/Business+Product+and+Services/Bar...
Anyways, Symbol's RFID device is horrible. I work retail, and have to endure using this device. Almost every retailer uses them for logitstics purposes from: Target, BestBuy, Kmart, Menards, Old Navy, and even Apple. It freezes up way too often, always has trouble booting up, fragile, the touch-screen is super un-responsive, etc. And it costs ~$2,000 a piece! After reading this article, I'm not sure why Apple hasn't made the device capable of replacing Symbol's RFID for their Apple stores. It would just be like the POS-device for the iPod touch, where the iPod touch slides into a cradle that incorporates a scanner and anntenae for communicating with the network. The only thing missing is the software or application that would utilize the unit for logistics purposes.
Yup, as a former Apple Employee, we used to have a saying:
"Easy Pay is neither"...
They start using Touches for POS systems I may actually go back to work there.
There's even a photo of it in your own article!
:-)
Disapointing that 9to5 mac edited both their own article and your comment after you pointed out the link to Appleinsider (where they got the photo from)
Agreed. I knew I had seen that photo somewhere before.
As 9to5 have removed the link, here it is again:
http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/11/03/exclusive_look_at_apples_n...
Shame on you 9to5.
wonder what the battery life is like working with iPod POS?
there actually an extra battery in the cradle
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2009/11/ipod_touch_pos_system.html
iPod Touch POS is so freaking slick. Five times faster than those old bulky Easypays. It makes doing transactions fun. Seriously.
Sounds interesting.
I obviously haven't seen the complete Apple PoS offering, but what is described here is a beautiful input device, but what does it input into? PoS is SOOO much more than just the input device. Physically, there still needs to be a cash drawer, a receipt printer and, in some cases, customer display devices. Then there is the underlying software. PoS has to be abe to talk to the software that does Ordering, Receiving, Pricing, Discounting and Coupons, Special Orders and on and on and on. Consider Point of Sale Reorder - know how many are in stock, decrement on-hand count per sale, reorder on preset on-hand level. Simple enough idea, but the amount of data that it represents can be enormous. Think Wal-Mart's inventory, not the Apple Store's. And each of your wholesalers wants some special reorder method (you aren't Wal-Mart; They get to tell you how to do your reorders.) In cases where you are your own manufacturer, PoS even needs to talk to MRP and ERP applications.
Good news, there is no reason Apple and/or the Apple Open Source community can't address all of this. The only completely integrated solutions are proprietary or the offerings from NCR and IBM. Yes, there are a zillion on-top-of-Windows PoS products. None that I know of are complete solutions.
I hope it has a stylus. I was asked to sign for a purchase on one of these at an Apple store - with my finger. Yeah, it was illegible as hell.