Vending Machine Challenge
(Bending Mashin Charengu)
by Nikos Michalakis

1. Introduction:

We wish to address two aspects of vending machine design. The first is the paying system and, thus the role of the machine in the market. The second is the interface and interaction with the customer.

Vending machines today have several problems that we wish to solve. First, they are digitally isolated. This limits the role of the vending machine in the market to that of a simple device where people pay and receive a food or a drink product. Vending machines currently cannot reach an Internet market, employ dynamic pricing, or networking with other machines or companies in order to increase sales possibilities and strategies. Also we expect vending machine purchase to increasingly replace more traditional meals. We believe we can expand vending by introducing both personal and corporate electronically enabled gift giving.

Furthermore, vending machines have very unnatural interfaces. People are sometimes confused by the existing button interfaces or don't always have the correct coins or bills for a drink or a candy bar. Also people cannot see the nutrition facts or produce details until after they purchase the item. When vending machines provide a meal replacement, cost increases and coins become inadequate for the transaction. For this reason, we are exploring new ways to interact with the machines and to place them in the growing Internet market. In the future, a vending machine would not need to receive coins for people to buy low cost items. It also could have an intuitive interface without buttons. A customer would be able to use a cell phone or a PDA to identify and authenticate himself easily to the machine and to charge his purchase to his credit card account. He could either be charged or use gift certificates loaded into his PDA or cell phone. The machine could employ a digital ID and a voice, graphical, or tangible interface.

2. Exploring a new paying system:

2.1 Key ideas: gift giving, gift certificates, buy whenever and wherever, online shopping, discounts, networked vending machines.

2.2 Network enabled paying: use mobile devices (cell phones, PDAs), credit cards, bar-codes, speedpasses (RFid), voice. Once the corresponding interfaces are built, the customer would be able use them to pay.

2.3 Gift giving: a user could win a gift that he would retrieve from any vending machine after identification and authentication. Gifts could be either personal (friend to friend) or corporate (For example Amazon.com, instead of a discount, could offer a free candy bar).

2.3.1 Personal gifts: a customer could receive gift certificates from others using printouts or mobile device communication (IR gift through a cell phone). Security issues arise.

2.3.2 Corporate gifts: a company, especially online, could offer free gifts to customers when they buy products. Business to business markets.

2.4 Use discount-deference: Each machine could be capable of "bargaining" with the customer. For example, when the customer's selection is unavailable, the machine could offer another product that is in stock, or defer the customer to the closest machine that has the desired product, in each case offering a small discount.

3. Exploring new interfaces:

3.1. Use the vending machine glass as an output device - most likely a semitransparent display - where we could see information about the product such as nutrition facts or price, or, alternatively advertisements etc. At the same time we would see the products behind the glass. We could also use the glass as an input device for selecting products. It would be touch sensitive, so the user can select the desired product by touching the part of the glass in front of the product. The touch interface would be combined with a cursor or other graphical indicator to facilitate selection.

3.2 Use speech input for a more natural interface. Some things are easier to speak about than to point to using graphical displays. We would like the machine to offer this option to the user. The machine would be able to identify certain commands in intentional speech such as "Get me the bar with the least amount of calories", or "Get me a meal".

3.3 Use communication with mobile devices (cell phones and PDAs) for identification and authentication (digital ID) of the user in case of gift certificates. This also could be used as a means for retrieving information about products from the machine. Data (gifts, product information, passes) could be transmitted from the machine to the cell phone or PDA. The mobile device could also be used for payment or as an option selection device.

3.4 Use RFid tags/speedpass as a payment method and for identification. Assume credit account set up.

3.5 Use bar-codes for payment. Several options exist for distributing bar codes: from website to printer, from website to mobile device, from mobile device to mobile device. The bar code could be printed on paper or displayed on the cell phone or PDA, then scanned by the vending machine.

3.6 Use entertainment.

3.6.1 IR gun shooting to win candy bars.

3.6.2 MP3 music playing.

3.6.3 Personal preferences customizing (i.e. colors, ads, music).

3.6.4 Animated characters talking and dancing.

3.6.5 Smell experience.

3.6.6 Goldberg type of "guts" for the machine.

4. Model of Internet-Vending-Person:


4.1 Internet network, servers, online companies, online stores, advertisements, banking

4.2 vending machine = food, drinks, small gifts, displays, entertainment, tickets, company (M&M, Mars, Coca Cola)

4.3 person= byer, gift recipient, cash, credit card, PDA, gift certificate, digital ID

4.4 Direct connections:

1. Person TO vending machine
ex. Speedpass to pay for a snickers bar.

2. Vending machine TO person
ex. M&M characters to entertain.

3. Vending machine TO Internet
Ex. Sending data to M&M.

4. Internet TO vending machine
Companies send advertisements.

5. Person TO Internet
Customer uses PDA to send a gift certificate.

6. Internet TO person.
Customer uses PDA to load his gift certificate.

4.5 Indirect connections:

1. Person AND Internet THROUGH vending machine
Ex. Vending machine as a sensor of consumption.

2. Person AND vending machine THROUGH Internet
Ex. Buy a gift for a friend from the web and it is sent on his mobile device.

3. Vending machine AND Internet THROUGH person

. . . back