How does vending machine telemetry work?

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Summary

Our vending machine telemetry system watches for interesting events hapenning inside a vending machine, and reports useful information about them via 4G network to the cloud. Vending operators are able to remotely figure out what’s going on with their machines in real-time.

Background

Most vending machines (manufactured after 2000) are typically equipped with and MDB (Multi-Drop Bus) system. It’s the most common protocol for communication between the vending machine control board and vending machine peripherals. It’s everywhere - it’s on the coin mech, note reader, credit card reader and other devices as well. You can even find it on auto car wash stations or commercial shared laundries sometimes.

This MDB port enables vending machines to be compatible with peripherals of different brands.

Data Gathering

The communication on the MDB port is quite active. Some vending machines will query the peripherals every 100ms, that’s faster than a blink. The Vending on Track telemetry system will listen on this MDB port, keep track of each communication packet, and store the transactions and sales in its internal storage space.

Data Aggregation and Transport

After saving the useful information locally on the device’s internal storage, the telemetry device will upload the information to the cloud server using 4G LTE network in the next available time slot (typically less than 2 seconds).

Data Processing and analyzing

Having received the uploaded data, the Vending on Track app server will process the data stream, and based on historical data and previous sessions, it could generate