In recent years, our company has developed a system for locating people indoors through the use of smartphones..
Here you can see the bases of our R&D and some of the projects carried out.
This solution does not need infrastructure for indoor location (it is based on the use of smartphone sensors), however, after multiple projects and contacts with customers has also detected the need to incorporate thelocation of things, also indoors, such as business cards for people or devices (tags) for locating assets.
For these reasons the project "LOCATE" is born now to attend to the location needs of people and things in interiors via the new IoT networks.
In this way we hope to meet the needs of companies and public authorities in the needs of location and integrated management of people / assets in buildings, warehouses, large surfaces and / or large events.
Solution Architecture
Today there are many solutions for locating people and things in buildings. We can highlight RFID systems for the location of assets in the distribution sector and / or systems based on WiFi / beacons for the location of "smartphones" inside buildings. Our own R&D project allows it with a simple "smartphone" and without infrastructures. In addition, we also have the new LPWAN networks (Lora, Sigfox, Dash7, ...) that are being introduced into the market as communications platforms for IoT and that, in most cases, also contemplate providing location services. Then and for very high precisions (tens of centimeters) there are other types of technologies such as UWB and Ultrasound systems.
However, these solutions are not compatible with each other and usually focus on solving vertical problems or problems of "niche" projects.
In this situation, our company proposes a new architecture for the simultaneous determination of the location of people and things (IoT) in buildings based on the use of of multiple technologies beacons (i.e. anchors), according to the project demanded precision, but with a new approach that allows to industrialize this type of solutions for multiple and different markets.
We can summarize the main innovations planned for our project:
- Simple and easy zone coverage processes: Deployment of power and self-calibrated beacons on premises ceilings.
- Multiple IoT devices manufacturers support to customize the solution to each client/project.
- Proven positioning algorithms: "Received Signal Strength Indicator" (RSSI) for zone detection, Angle of Arrival (AoA) location for 2m or 3m accuracies and of Time Difference Of Arrival (TDOA) for tens of centimetres accuracy.
- Simultaneous location of smartphones and IoT devices
- Ciber safe operation of different IoT devices
- Third party platforms integration
The "LOCATE" project will allow the location of people and things (IoT) in buildings in an economic and generalized way. In addition, by using these IoT networks, new value-added services can be easily incorporated (f.e. sensorization).
Some of the basic features of the LOCATE solution are summarized below:
- Support for multiple beacon systems (WiFi, BLE, UWB and ultrasound) from different manufacturers and algorithms (e.g. TDOA or AoA) for simple and economical deployments.
- GNSS support for indoor/outdoor scenarios
- Self-calibrating location for quick and easy installation and maintenance
- Threat detection module to prevent unauthorized connections
- Support for different IoT devices and form factors from multiple manufacturers
- Mutiple localization features but also for the sensors readout info
- Support of WAN protocols for mixed positioning (indoor and outdoor), such as NB_LTE/4G or LoRaWAN with GNSS
- IoT device management module:
- Device management: support for updates, configurations and users
- Device monitoring: Device status
- Security: extreme to extreme encryption, spoofing prevention, crack prevention
- Rules: Alerts by state (battery, location, etc)
- 3D graphical module for demonstration and verification of system performance
- SDK to use location information for customer smartphone apps
- Cloud SW platform (private or public) or in-premises version
- Microservice architecture and REST API interface for connection to third party systems
The "LOCATE" project will allow the location, with different levels of accuracy, of smartphones and all types of IoT devices in indoor and outdoor areas.
On this IoT infrastructure, it will also be possible to create sensor networks to help in the analysis of the situation/scenario and the operations environment.
In this video we can see a demonstration of our location solution for one scenario without infrastructures and for another with BLE beacons.
The project is already in the marketing phase for the solution based on WiFi/BLE and UWB beacons.
On the other hand, the solution based on ultrasound is also ready for pilots.
In parallel and to complement the IoT needs of these projects, our company is establishing joint development and marketing agreements with manufacturers of different IoT sensors.