2010 NRF Big Show Recap: Top News and Booth Demos
One of retail's largest IT trade show, the National Retail Federation (NRF) Big Show blew into New York City's Jacob K. Javitz Center from January 10-13, bringing along with it some of the industry's most innovative and cutting-edge technology offerings. Although NRF is primetime for retail technology vendors, hotel and restaurant operators shouldn't be fooled. Mixed in-between the many retail offerings, NRF attendees could find booth after booth of hospitality-applicable 
products. Hospitality Technology offers this recap of the top news and technology demonstrations to come out of last week's show.
HP Unveils Touch-enabled POS: The HP ap5000 All-in-One POS System features a self-contained combination of products that remove the guesswork for operators wanting to create a comprehensive POS hardware solution. The compact system maximizes work space and includes a central processing unit, touch-enabled display, magnetic stripe reader and either a two-line customer display or a 10.4-inch LCD customer display to enhance promotional activities.
Epson Says its Printers Come out On Top in Side-by-Side "Green" Product Comparison: In a side-by-side comparison, Epson's TM-T88IV and TM-H6000III printers, ranked highest in energy efficiency, consuming significantly less energy than same-class competitive models.
Cybera's Cloud-Based Security & Connectivity Tool Goes National: Now in general availability, Cybera's SECURE|LINK is a cloud-based tool that ensures a standardized security and compliance profile for branded organizations. SECURE|LINK benefits merchants by directly integrating comprehensive security services with broadband access. SECURE|LINK includes firewall, intrusion detection, encryption, two-factor authentication, logging and reporting to support customer PCI initiatives.Wavelink Unveils Latest Version of Enterprise Mobility Management Software: Wavelink's Avalanche 5.0 provides a vendor-agnostic management solution for the wireless enterprise with newly added capabilities such as device location mapping, security compliance tools and a new Web-based console.
Harrah's Dips its Toe into Interactive Digital Signage: Harrah's will pilot an interactive digital signage solution that features touch capabilities to foster the delivery of services directly to customers, reduce perceived wait times, and share up-to-date schedules and news, where and when customers need them most.
2010 Star Micronics Printer Releases to Focus on Mobility, "Green" Features and More: Throughout the first half of 2010, Star Micronics will release several new printer solutions including the ECO POS printer, a solution designed and manufactured with significant paper, packaging and power-saving features.
NCR Boasts New POS Printer Can Save Restaurants $2,300 a Year per Site
Based on a sample NCR Business Impact Model, NCR estimates that its RealPOS Receipt Label Printer can save restaurant operators more than $2,300 a year per site through reduced material costs
Epson and Star Micronics were not the only hospitality vendors to put their best "green" foot forward last week. In fact, there were multiple vendors on hand offering environmentally friendly products and solutions in the Expo's Green Pavilion. EnoTech Controls, Inc. highlighted its flagship product, ConnectedEMS, a building management and control system which can be configured to monitor multiple building conditions. By combining modular hardware with flexible software, ConnectedEMS systems are able to offer control solutions that were previously unavailable -- all while allowing building managers Web access to control, manage, and view their equipment. Verisae showcased its Sustainability Resource Planning (SRP), a platform approach that is designed to cover the core functions of sustainability, including environmental, energy and asset management. SRP enables users to see how much energy and water they are using at each of their locations, as well as the amount of waste and emissions that are being produced -- in real-time.
Meanwhile in another corner of the exhibit floor, representatives from Buxton explained how organizations including CiCi's Pizza, Harrah's and PF Chang's are leveraging their customer analytics solutions to identify large concentrations of core customers for marketing purposes and more.
And for those looking for advanced mobility solutions, representatives from Global Bay Mobile Technologies showcased their Global Bay Mobile Platform, an enterprise class platform that enables mobility by managing the mobile user interface, local storage data, the synchronization of data and application updates, and the integration to back-end systems.
Industry Outlook 2010: Hotel & Restaurant Trends for the Year Ahead