Overview
GGM Gastro International supplies commercial kitchen equipment to hotels, restaurants and catering businesses across Europe. The company is based in Ochtrup, Germany. Its headquarters is a busy campus with multiple meeting rooms and a large customer showroom.
One small problem was costing everyone time. Nobody could tell which meeting rooms were actually free.
GGM Gastro solved it with ProDVX APPC-10SFN touch panels running connectSignage software. Ten inch displays now sit outside every meeting room. Green means free. Red means busy. Staff book a room on the panel itself or straight from Outlook.
The same system was then extended into the showroom. Customers can now see which advisor is available before they walk over.
This deployment took place in Europe. AVD distributes ProDVX across Australia and New Zealand, so integrators here can build the same solution for their own clients.
The Challenge: Rooms That Were Booked but Empty
GGM Gastro runs a large headquarters with meeting rooms spread across the site. Bookings lived in Microsoft 365. The rooms themselves told you nothing.
Staff had one way to check a room. Walk to it and look inside. That created problems every day.
- Ghost bookings blocked real work. Rooms were reserved and then never used. The calendar said busy. The room sat empty for an hour.
- Meetings ran without warning. Other rooms were in use with nothing booked, so people walked in on live conversations.
- Staff wasted time in the hallways. Finding a free space meant checking several rooms in person, often more than once a day.
- Double bookings caused friction. Two teams would arrive for the same room and one had to give it up.
- The showroom had the same gap. Customers had no way to tell which advisor was free and which one was already with a client.
GGM Gastro needed the booking data to be visible at the door. It also needed a fit that would not damage the building or require an electrician at every room.
The Solution: ProDVX APPC-10SFN Panels with connectSignage
The company chose the ProDVX APPC-10SFN, a 10.1 inch Android panel PC built for continuous commercial use. Each panel runs connectSignage, a cloud based platform that handles the content and the calendar logic.
connectSignage syncs with Microsoft 365 and Outlook. The panel outside each room shows live status, the current meeting title and the next booking. The LED bar around the edge of the APPC-10SFN carries the status colour, so you can read a room from down the corridor.
Products Deployed
| Component | Specification | Why It Mattered Here |
|---|---|---|
| ProDVX APPC-10SFN | 10.1 inch direct bonded IPS touch display, 1280 x 800, 450 cd/m², RockChip RK3568 quad core, Android 13, 4GB RAM, 16GB eMMC | Compact enough for a door frame. Bright enough to read in a lit corridor. Built for 24/7 operation rather than occasional use. |
| Full surround LED bar | Full RGB, individually controlled | Turns each panel into a status light. Green for free, red for occupied, readable at a glance from a distance. |
| Power over Ethernet | IEEE 802.3at (PoE+) | One cable carries power and data. No power outlet needed at each door and no electrical work per room. |
| Nano Tape mounting | Adhesive mount, VESA 75 also supported | Panels went up without drilling. Nothing permanent was done to the walls or door frames. |
| Fanless design | Passive cooling, 600 g, 240.9 x 159.7 x 24.4 mm | Silent outside meeting rooms. No moving parts to fail or service. |
| connectSignage | Cloud dashboard, Microsoft 365 and Outlook sync | Central control of every panel. Bookings stay in the calendar system staff already use. |
How It Works Day to Day
- Check the room. Staff read the panel as they walk past. The colour tells them the answer before they get close.
- Book on the spot. A free room can be claimed with a tap on the panel itself.
- Or book from Outlook. Reservations made in the calendar appear on the panel straight away.
- See what is next. The panel shows the current meeting and the following booking, so people know when the room frees up.
- Manage it centrally. The connectSignage dashboard controls every panel from one place, with no site visit required.
One System, a Second Use Case
Once the meeting rooms were working, GGM Gastro applied the same hardware and software to its showroom. Panels there show whether a customer advisor is available or already with a client.
The technical setup did not change. Only the content did. That is the useful part for integrators. One platform covered an internal efficiency problem and a customer facing service problem.
Key Outcomes and Results
- Room status is visible at a glance. Staff no longer walk the building to find a free space.
- Double bookings dropped sharply. Live status at the door removed most of the clashes.
- Ghost reservations were cleared. Rooms blocked by unused bookings came back into circulation.
- The same rooms carry more meetings. Better visibility raised how much use each space gets.
- Fewer interruptions. People can see a meeting is running before they open the door.
- Better showroom service. Customers can see advisor availability without asking anyone.
- Installation left no marks. PoE and adhesive mounting meant no drilling and no new power runs.
“With the new digital meeting room solution, we have significantly improved the way we organise our meeting spaces. Room occupancy is now visible at a glance, booking rooms has become much easier, and our meeting rooms are used far more efficiently today.”
Dennis Krüssel, Digitalisation Project Lead, GGM Gastro International
Why ProDVX for Meeting Room and Workplace Displays
Room booking panels look simple. They are one of the harder deployments to get right, because the hardware has to run every hour of every day in a public part of the building. Consumer tablets do not last in that role.
- Built for always on use. ProDVX Android panel PCs are engineered for continuous commercial operation, not intermittent consumer use.
- PoE keeps installs cheap. One cable per panel means no power outlet at each door. That is a large saving across a floor of meeting rooms.
- Status lighting that people actually notice. The full surround LED bar turns the panel into a signal you can read from the other end of a corridor.
- Mounting flexibility. VESA 75 for permanent installs, adhesive mounting for leased or heritage sites where drilling is a problem.
- Open Android platform. The panels work with a wide range of room booking and signage software, so you are free to choose the platform that suits the client.
- Silent and serviceable. Fanless cooling means no noise outside a meeting room and no moving parts to replace.
- NFC built in. The APPC-10SFN includes an integrated NFC reader, which opens up staff card tap-in for sites that want it later.
Partner With AVD
AVD is an authorised distributor of ProDVX in Australia and New Zealand. If you are quoting a room booking, wayfinding, check in or queue management project, we can help you size the right panel and pair it with the right software platform.
The APPC-10SFN suits meeting room doors and desk mounted status displays. Larger models in the range suit reception kiosks and self service check in. We support integrators through specification, supply and after sales.
Get in touch with the AVD team to talk through your next ProDVX deployment.
