🛠 Why Phygrid? The Hidden Chaos of DIY Touchscreen Deployments

Deploying an e-commerce website on an iPad or a touchscreen might seem quick and cost-effective—but at scale, in real-world environments, that approach fails fast. Phygrid exists to solve the entire category of problems that arise when software meets the unpredictability of physical space.

🧑‍💻 1 Devices Are Not Personal, But the Web Assumes They Are

• Websites are designed for personal use: Browsers autofill personal data like email addresses, phone numbers, payment methods, and login credentials.
• Risk of data leakage: If a new customer walks up to a kiosk, they might see the

previous customer's details autofilled. This violates privacy regulations and undermines trust.

• No automatic session management: Tablets or browser-based apps won’t

automatically reset sessions reliably between customers, unless custom dev work is done on every screen.]

✅ Phygrid enforces strict, policy-based session isolation. Every interaction resets cleanly. No traces left behind.

🔐 Privacy-Compliant, Secure, and Trackable Checkout

• With Phygrid, you can offer QR-based checkout with Apple Pay or similar flows.
• Just like Instagram shopping: scan QR ➜ scan face ➜ done.
• The customer shares name and shipping seamlessly, with no typing or account login required.
• Crucially, staff attribution is built in—the associate who helped close the sale gets credit.

✅ This ties digital conversion back to human engagement, boosting motivation and performance tracking.

🔌 Consumer Hardware Is Unreliable in Commercial Environments

• iPads go missing, get stolen, or simply run out of battery.
• Power outages can leave Windows machines in a corrupted state or stuck in a BSOD.
• No way to remotely intervene without physically being on-site or using consumer tools

not built for enterprise use.

✅ Phygrid runs on industrial-grade, edge-optimized hardware with built-in remote management, graceful recovery, and hardware-aware monitoring.

🛠 Software Updates Can (And Do) Break Things

• An automatic iOS or Android update can disrupt how peripherals work (e.g., card readers, printers, scanners), or break a browser-based flow.
• E-commerce platform updates (Shopify, Magento, etc.) may change front-end

behaviors that weren’t built with shared-kiosk logic in mind.

✅ Phygrid decouples frontend flows from OS volatility. You control the update cadence. All updates are staged, tested, and rolled out with version pinning and rollback support.

🌐 Networking Nightmares in Retail Environments

• Stores often have locked-down firewalls, and managing access to dozens or hundreds of

devices is a massive operational burden.

• Each tablet or PC might need specific ports or IPs opened—a nightmare for IT.

✅ Phygrid requires only a single IP and port, no matter how many devices. Traffic is routed via an edge tunnel, making network operations simple, secure, and scalable.

🔒 Security, Compliance, and Observability

• Ad-hoc setups rarely meet security baselines.
• Consumer devices aren't enrolled in secure MDM.
• Kiosks are often ignored by IT compliance teams.
• No clear audit trails, monitoring, or alerting exist for devices going offline or

misbehaving.

✅ Phygrid is ISO 27001 certified, with: ✅ Built-in fleet monitoring ✅ Role-based alerts (ops, IT, customer service) ✅ Remote access and diagnostics ✅ Encrypted communications and device authentication

📦 Fleet Management Built for Physical Retail

• In-store tablets are often not logged, monitored, or maintained properly.
• No way to know what version of the app is running across stores. No simple way to push

updates.

✅ Phygrid offers centralized control over your entire device fleet: ✅ Push updates, restart devices, check logs, all remotely. ✅ View health metrics, usage analytics, and uptime status by location. ✅ Geofenced policies for alert routing and device behavior.

🌍 Designed for the Edge — Not the Cloud Alone

• Browser-based websites assume stable internet and don't work offline.
• Edge AI, customer interactions, and sensor data can't be processed reliably.

Websites aren’t aware of their environment—no camera, sensor, or store-level context.

✅ Phygrid supports Edge AI + Hybrid Cloud, so: ✅ Devices continue working offline or with intermittent connectivity. ✅ You can run real-time models (e.g., queue detection, facial recognition, sensor fusion). ✅ Apps are context-aware—connected to their physical location, usage, and operational schedule.

🚀 Summary: Phygrid = Purpose-Built Infrastructure for the Physical World

You don't build an industrial factory with IKEA tables and home routers. Likewise, you shouldn’t build a modern digital experience for physical retail using e-commerce websites and tablets.

Phygrid provides the missing infrastructure layer that connects software to the unpredictability, constraints, and complexity of physical environments—at scale, securely, and with full operational visibility.