Pol Rosset discusses the challenges facing the digital signage industry and the key role of AI, content, and personalization.

The digital signage industry is entering a new phase shaped by artificial intelligence, personalization, and the convergence of content, data, and analytics.

In this interview, Pol Rosset Morera, CEO and Co-founder of WindowSight, shares his perspective on the technologies that will shape the future of the industry, the growing importance of content as a key differentiator, and the challenges that manufacturers, integrators, and platforms must address to create increasingly relevant, dynamic, and sustainable experiences.

Which technologies will generate sustainable business opportunities in digital signage over the next three years, and which do you consider overrated?

Personalization is one of the most significant opportunities in digital signage today, and artificial intelligence is the technology that will make it truly scalable. The ability to adapt content based on the time of year, the client's context, and the audience present at any given moment is transformative, and we are only at the beginning of that shift.

That said, the technologies that will generate lasting value are those that provide continuity, not just an initial impact. For too long, the industry has focused capital and attention on CAPEX: hardware, infrastructure, and initial deployment. It is becoming increasingly clear that the real value lies in what happens afterward: the experience, the message, and the relevance of what appears on screen day after day.

Content management systems (CMS) are multiplying precisely because the demand for content is growing at the same pace as the number of screens being deployed. In my view, the overrated assumption is that better hardware or a more sophisticated CMS will be the differentiator. The sustainable opportunity belongs to those who solve the content challenge intelligently, continuously, and at scale.

How is WindowSight evolving its strategy to differentiate beyond hardware or CMS platforms?

Our starting point is the recognition that hardware and CMS platforms are converging toward competitive parity. The differentiating value between them is shrinking, and clients are aware of it. What remains largely unresolved is what happens after installation is completed: after the integrator has delivered the project, after the launch event, and after everyone has moved on to the next initiative.

That post-installation period is precisely where WindowSight operates. The months following deployment are when clients begin to understand whether their investment has truly been worthwhile. If the content experience does not match the quality of the infrastructure, the entire project delivers less value than expected, regardless of how well it was executed.

We position ourselves as an amplifier for hardware manufacturers and CMS platforms, not as a competitor. Our role is to help them sell more, reach more customers, and improve retention by placing content at the center of the value proposition rather than treating it as a secondary element.

Is the integration channel prepared for the convergence of AV, IT, data, and analytics, or does a significant gap still exist?

The technology required to enable this convergence already exists to a large extent. The gap is not technical; it is cultural and strategic.

Content continues to be treated as a secondary consideration in many digital signage projects when it should actually be the foundation of the strategy. Before deciding on infrastructure, displays, or platforms, it is essential to determine what message you want to communicate, to whom, and in what context. Closing this gap requires as much education as technology. The integration channel needs to evolve from an installation-focused mindset to one centered on continuous experiences. That shift is still underway, but it forms the foundation for everything else the industry is trying to build.

How does sustainability influence your decisions?

WindowSight does not manufacture hardware or manage physical installations, so our sustainability perspective is necessarily different. What we address directly is the issue of screen operating time and energy consumption, and we believe the industry needs a more honest, data-driven conversation about this topic.Modern televisions, both professional and consumer-grade, are far more energy efficient than they were a decade ago. Running a screen for eight hours a day in the EU costs approximately four to eight euros per month in electricity, comparable to using a conventional oven for one hour. No one hesitates to bake a pizza, yet extended screen usage is often perceived as wasteful.

As more countries transition toward renewable energy sources, that calculation changes even further. The marginal energy cost of keeping a screen active becomes increasingly insignificant when the energy is clean. Our position is that if the experience delivered by that screen genuinely improves a space—reducing stress in a waiting room, enriching a workplace environment, or creating a moment of calm in a hospital corridor—then the energy consumed is justified. The sustainability conversation in digital signage should focus on the value delivered per watt consumed, not simply on turning screens off.

How do you balance creativity, automation, and ease of management?

Our approach is based on the premise that no single product serves every industry, client, or use case. Rather than attempting to build a universal solution, we integrate our platform into existing CMS ecosystems, adapting to the specific context of the clients those platforms serve.

Automation is essential to achieving this at scale. The goal is to give customers the ability to create dynamic and contextually relevant experiences without requiring them to become content experts themselves. Guided simplicity—curated choices rather than unlimited complexity—is what people actually use.

A clear example: a clinic owner may have a strong personal preference for abstract art. However, evidence consistently shows that abstract imagery increases anxiety in high-stress waiting environments, whereas nature photography has a measurable calming effect across diverse audiences. Part of our role is to embed that knowledge into the product so clients benefit from it without having to seek it out themselves. When people are presented with too many options and no guidance, they tend to disengage. Good automation removes friction; good curation removes uncertainty.

What real opportunities do you see emerging from the convergence of retail media, DOOH, and traditional digital signage?

The convergence of retail media, DOOH, and digital signage is creating a significant structural opportunity: screens that were once considered static communication tools are becoming dynamic, data-driven media surfaces. The value of those screens no longer lies solely in visibility, but in relevance.

The real opportunity lies in the layer between the screen and the audience: the ability to deliver content that responds to context in real time. For manufacturers and technology platforms, this means that hardware and software infrastructure will increasingly be evaluated based on the quality and intelligence of the experiences they enable, rather than solely on their technical specifications.

WindowSight sits at that intersection. As advertising budgets increasingly flow toward environments with integrated screens—retail, hospitality, healthcare, and corporate spaces—platforms capable of delivering curated, licensed, and contextually appropriate content at scale will become essential infrastructure for this ecosystem. This convergence is not merely a trend to observe; it is the business model we are building toward.

What will a truly competitive digital signage platform look like in 2030, and which capabilities are already essential today?

By 2030, operators will no longer be the ones deciding what appears on screen. That role will belong to algorithms powered by artificial intelligence, sensors, and real-time data, capable of responding to who is present in the space, the season, the temperature, or even what is happening in the world that day. Human operators will define the parameters and objectives; the system will handle execution.

This shift has direct implications for content: it is impossible to build an adaptive, context-aware platform without access to a sufficiently broad, well-organized, and properly licensed content library for every environment and use case. Creating bespoke content for every possible scenario is not viable. What is needed is a large editorially curated collection supported by a rights framework that enables frictionless deployment across sectors such as healthcare, retail, hospitality, and corporate environments.

The platforms that will lead the market in 2030 are those already solving this challenge today. The essential capabilities are not futuristic: intelligent content personalization, scalable licensing, and infrastructure capable of connecting contextual signals to on-screen content. The direction of technology is clear. The question is who will build a content layer with the depth and rigor required to make that vision a reality.