It’s not just hardware manufacturers who are back in crisis mode. The entire digital signage industry is feeling the uncertainty on the customer side – projects are being postponed and budgets are being cut. What feels a bit like the pandemic is the new tariffs reality.
On Tuesday evening, invidis consulting went back on air – with a 30-minute update on current developments in punitive tariffs, the new role of AI, assessments of the most important hardware manufacturers from Infocomm China, and market data.
There is a strong need for up-to-date market data among industry leaders. That’s why invidis consulting has returned to crisis mode and resumed its regular executive briefings. As during the pandemic, these exclusive briefings provide global industry leaders with insights, analysis, and current market data.
Punitive tariffs
US punitive tariffs have reached an average level of 20-25% – a 90-year high. With typical hardware margins in the single-digit range, tariffs of 20 percent or more are an immense burden. The punitive tariffs with China are particularly threatening for the US market, where trade is currently virtually suspended.
But even best-case scenarios of 10% punitive tariffs would lead to significant drops in sales in the digital signage market. Demand is subdued worldwide – currently primarily due to uncertainty and a lack of predictability.
Hardware glut expected in Europe
Electronics manufacturers, including those producing digital signage hardware, are shifting shipments from North America to Europe. Starting in mid-June, this could lead to a hardware surplus in Europe and put downward pressure on profit margins.
Digital resilience
There is concern in Europe that US cloud service providers could shut down their services by government order in the event of a crisis, as the US did for Starlink in Ukraine. Therefore, European customers and digital signage providers are increasingly looking for cloud alternatives to AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud.
Although a shutdown scenario is highly unlikely, end-customers and suppliers should still prepare for potential disruptions as part of their business continuity planning. The first step is to create backup plans—not to replace existing services. However, modern service cloud platforms are now so strategically important that switching to an alternative is not simple. This presents a difficult decision for the industry, especially since returning to on-premise solutions is not a viable option.
AI is evolving into two incompatible worlds
The geopolitical development of AI platforms is emerging as the most long-term challenge for the digital signage industry. The US government is urging allies in Canada, Europe, Japan, and South Korea to exclusively use American AI.
The White House administration wants allies to eliminate a mix of Chinese (Deepseek, Huawei AI, etc.) and US (Nvidia, OpenAI) AI. Washington envisions two separate and incompatible AI worlds. This would mean significant additional work for global digital signage concepts, hardware, and software developers – similar to what the automotive industry is already facing.
Times are turbulent; agility and flexibility are required. Waiting is not an option – decisions, both small and large, must be made promptly.
The next invidis update will be presented as part of the invidis keynote on May 22 at DSS Europe 2025.
