Wireless point-of-sale terminal

The present invention relates to point of sale terminals generally and more particularly to hand-held point of sale terminals.

Point of sale terminals are well known in the art and are widely used for credit card transactions. The present assignee is a major designer and manufacturer of such terminals.

Hand held and wireless point of sale terminals are also known.

The present invention seeks to provide an improved hand-held and wireless point of sale terminal.

There is thus provided in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention a wireless point of sale terminal including an operator interface, point of sale circuitry coupled to the operator interface, a printer coupled to the point of sale circuitry, a wireless transceiver coupled to the point of sale circuitry and a flexible antenna coupled to the wireless transceiver.

In accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the flexible antenna is formed as part of the printer.

In a most preferred embodiment of the present invention, the printer includes a paper roll holder and the flexible antenna is mounted on a curved surface of the paper roll holder.

The present invention will be understood and appreciated more fully from the following detailed description, taken in conjunction with the drawings in which:

FIG. 1 is a general pictorial illustration of a wireless point of sale terminal constructed and operative in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a sectional illustration of the wireless point of sale terminal of FIG. 1, taken along the lines II—II in FIG. 1 and;

FIG. 3 is an illustration showing the mounting of the flexible antenna on the underside of a paper roll holder forming part of the point of sale terminal of FIGS. 1 and 2, taken along lines III—III in FIG. 2 .

Reference is now made to FIGS. 1, 2 and 3 , which illustrate a wireless point of sale terminal constructed and operative in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention. As seen particularly in FIGS. 1 and 2, the wireless point of sale terminal comprises a housing 10 which includes an operator interface, indicated generally by reference numeral 12 which typically comprises a keypad 14 and an operator display 16 . The operator interface 12 is electronically coupled to point of sale circuitry 18 , which may be entirely conventional.

Preferably, the wireless point of sale terminal also includes a printer 20 , for printing receipts or other documents, which is operated by the point of sale circuitry 18 . The printer preferably comprises a printing head 22 arranged to operatively engage a roll of paper 24 , which is supported on a paper roll holder 26 and is driven by a paper feeder 28 .

A wireless transceiver 30 is coupled to the point of sale circuitry, typically for communication with remote verification apparatus. In accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention an antenna 32 is coupled to the wireless transceiver 30 . Antenna 32 is preferably a flexible antenna such as is commercially available from MARS Antennas and RF systems of Holon, Israel and is typically connected to the transceiver 30 by means of a coaxial cable 34 , such as an RG-178 coaxial cable.

In accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the antenna is mounted on a curved underside surface 36 of the paper roll holder 26 . This arrangement is particularly advantageous inasmuch as it requires nearly no space for the antenna 32 , while providing it with substantial mechanical support.

It will be appreciated by persons skilled in the art that the present invention is not limited by what has been particularly shown and described hereinabove. Rather the scope of the present invention includes both combinations and sub-combinations of the various features described hereinabove as well as variations and improvements therein as would occur to a person skilled in the art upon reading the foregoing description and which are not in the prior art.