A national retailer replaces point of sale VDI with the enterprise browser

The situation

A national retailer with thousands of locations set out to redesign its in-store systems to improve the experience for both customers and sales staff. Previously, each store ran several point of sale stations, with a Wyse thin client connecting to Microsoft POS software. That setup meant delays whenever sales staff had to wait for an available station. In the worst case, a frustrated customer might abandon their purchase and walk out the door.

The new strategy was to equip every salesperson with a Microsoft Surface tablet so they could complete a sales transaction from anywhere in the store. With customer and payment information sent in every transaction, data security was essential. The user experience for sales staff was a high priority too, so transactions go smoothly and customers are never stuck waiting.

The challenge

While testing the mobile setup, the team hit a snag: the Surface tablet's on-screen keyboard didn't work with Azure Virtual Desktop. Switching to a Citrix VDI client solved the keyboard issue, but required scaling up VDI infrastructure in the corporate data centre. That ran counter to the project's goal of a cloud scalable solution. Real world testing surfaced another issue: typo errors increased because of the slight lag introduced by the virtualisation layer.

Unsatisfied with the technology stack, the team looked for a better solution. They found the Island Enterprise Browser.

The Island solution

Unlike VDI, the Enterprise Browser runs as a native Windows application on the Surface, so the typo-inducing lag is gone. Security controls keep sensitive customer data secure by preventing any data leakage outside the browser. Sales staff get a streamlined login, so they can pick up a tablet and start entering a transaction in seconds. The corporate team gets improved visibility of sales activity, with browser logs sent to their centralised aggregation platform.

The decision

The simplicity of the Island Enterprise Browser made this an easy decision. Removing several layers of software complexity reduced risk and improved the experience for sales staff. Island's security capabilities provide the controls the retailer needs without the significant cost and complexity of desktop virtualisation.

The rollout was remarkably fast, with thousands of stores online in a matter of weeks. The team was so confident in the Island solution that they targeted one of their busiest holiday weekends of the year as the go live date.

And as a final test of customer satisfaction, the retailer is seeing decreased average transaction time, which means more sales per day. With Island, sales staff spend their time serving customers and the technology gets out of the way.