MAASTRICHT, The Netherlands — Leading coffee and coffee-machine company Luigi Lavazza SpA (Turin, Italy) has built a machine, the e-Espresso Point, that can send e-mails over the Internet to get itself restocked or to relay information on the types of coffee drunk at each location.
The Internet connection was created Using DSP-based software developed by Franco-American startup eDevice SA (Merignac, France). Using the software, Lavazza Espresso Point distributors will have online access to their stock of machines so that they can manage them remotely.
The prototype of the e-Espresso Point has a touch-sensitive display that provides access to a Web portal that can carry information such as traffic conditions and weather while it dispenses coffee to a user. Coffee drinkers will be able to register a profile to customize the home page that they see when ordering coffee.
Yves Abitbol, European director of eDevice, said, "The coffee-making machine which sends e-mails began as an in-house joke but has become an industrial reality because Lavazza has been able to take advantage of a new technology to aid its traditional vocation."
Chris Edwards is editor of Electronics Times, EE Times' sister paper in the United Kingdom.
