BLE

BLE stands for Bluetooth Low Energy. Aadona BLE beacons are small devices broadcasting a Bluetooth signal that can be picked up by nearby devices (usually a smartphone). The true power of beacons, though, lies with the powerful software that allows you to build extraordinary apps for almost any kind of use case.

An overwhelming amount of beacon use cases are built with Proximity technology. It’s all about your apps interacting with places of interest – sculptures in a museum, stores in a mall, machines in a factory or check-in gates in an airport. You can use beacons to tag those places and build an app that can scan for those particular items. The moment they’re detected on Bluetooth-enabled tag devices or smartphones, all kinds of events can be triggered.

With beacons and your dedicated app, you can monetize your ideas, increase employees’ productivity, attract new customers (and retain the old ones) and more!

Few applications as follows:

• Help people navigate around any space and optimize the experience for them, specially known for indoor navigation.
• Track assets and robots.
• Track customer movement, monitor his buying behavious and taget interest based advertisments.
• Display contextual information on nearby screens.

A beacon is a tiny device that broadcasts Bluetooth data packets. For example, think of a lighthouse that is placed in a harbor. It sends its signal in the form of light to nearby ships. The light itself is meaningless, but when picked up by the captain of a ship, they can determine which lighthouse the ship is approaching and can roughly estimate how far from shore the ship is. The captain can then perform specific actions based on this data – they can change the direction of a ship, start preparations for arrival or even sound an alarm if they’re dangerously close.

Now, imagine that instead of a lighthouse, we place a beacon and instead of ships, people with mobile devices are wandering around. Instead of light, a beacon is sending a Bluetooth signal, and the captain’s knowledge about what to do when they sees a lighthouse we replace with a dedicated mobile app installed on our Bluetooth tag device or a smartphone.

You need a device that is able to receive the Bluetooth signal sent by beacons and also interpret it. So whether you want to track people or objects, log or welcome visitors to your event or automate a process, there needs to be a mobile device in the equation.

• We provide mobile tags which can be mounted on assets or carried by users (indoors).
• Users may use their iOS or Android smartphones with app installed.

Beacons send Bluetooth data packets that can only be understood by the compatible devices. These packets are definitely not notifications or any other media, instead they are seemingly random sets of letters and digits. Beacons broadcast them with a certain strength in every possible direction. In each packet, beacons “introduce themselves” by sending their unique identifiers as well as certain additional data.

The moment a packet arrives, a corresponding app is immediately launched and the first thing it does is ask our IoT Cloud for additional context (e.g. instruction on what to do about this particular beacon). The Cloud, also in the matter of milliseconds, returns the necessary information and the app performs the programmed activity. In order to do that, it will often have to communicate with its own server (in addition to the exchange with our IoT Cloud). This requires internet connection for interaction to take place. Although this might seem like a lot of steps to perform a simple action, all of them are taken almost instantly. On top of the internet connection, Bluetooth needs to be enabled on the user’s device in order to receive the packets in the first place.

Proximity means that an IoT-enabled object reacts and changes according to your location. For example in a smart home you can teach your home to adjust the lighting based on your preferences and time. The lights are switched on as you walk into your apartment or change automatically as you go from room to room.

Proximity marketing is a strategy for local and in-store advertising that is provided to customers at the moment where it matters most. You need customized advertisements for your customers, not just set ads you see on a television or a pop-up as they are less actionable. Proximity is about reaching a user or customer based on their actual physical relationship to other objects. For example, when they are on a bus or when they are approaching a particular coffee shop or when they are exiting your store. Technology means businesses can choose when to send which messages and to whom in order to achieve the best results and satisfy customers. Proximity means knowing where your customers and assets are and interacting with them in ways that are meaningful. Without proximity technology, marketing efforts can fall flat by not addressing the customer at the right moment in their journey.

Bluetooth beacons play a hugely important role in both the future of the IoT and proximity. Beacons have been of growing importance in proximity for a number of reasons including:

• High penetrations rates: over 90% of smartphones are equipped with Bluetooth?
• Long range: Bluetooth can broadcast up to 100m (max)
• Energy efficiency: BLE is far more energy efficient than many other methods

With Bluetooth, that same business could send out more timely and targeted messages. If the customer approaches the cafe, they may receive 10% off a coffee. If the customer has been viewing seasonal products online, they could be notified about promotions relevant to their expressed interests. This is the difference between vague promotions and smart proximity marketing. Beacons offer businesses the chance to use their creativity and power campaigns that benefit both parties. All of these factors also make Bluetooth the prime candidate for standard of the IoT revolution. As items become smarter, they’ll all need to speak the same language. Bluetooth can connect all the moving parts and things to create a consumer-friendly network and power the automation required to create fully seamless, wireless ecosystem.

ZLOC-B provides precise indoor tracking of resources using BLE technology, Industrial Inertial Measurement Unit and our Smart Firmware and Software. ZLOC-B solution enables you to track resources using Bluetooth tags provided by us and track users through their smartphones. The solution contains a set of devices and software tools as follows :

• Wireless tags with BLE to be placed on the things to be tracked.
• Hubs/Gateways connected with power and Ethernet / WiFi which map the area and track the tags with accuracy.
• A server running on premises/cloud for managing and setting up the network
• A warehouse/industry/factory 3D simulation environment with ability to place and name tags for various machines, devices and humans. This allows you to watch, zoom and track every resource on the floor in real time. These set of devices can provide unprecedented level of accuracy for asset tracking in any industry. With ultra low power consumption and robust network, it works in high speed environments with ease.

With meter level accuracy, the user can set-up geofencing for resources and humans to generate alerts whenever a breach occurs. Access to various regions in the premises can be provided using the tags. To decrease the latency in tracking, the server for monitoring and controlling the devices can be setup in the premises for swift notifications and actions.

• Turns a factory/shop-floor/manufacturing unit/warehouse into an interactive map showing each resource and people’s locations in real-time.
• Makes your space smarter by setting up geofencing on resources to allow you to get notified when a resource reaches a particular place.
• Makes your space adaptive by learning the behaviour of each resource and the path it takes during its operation and suggesting potential faults and optimization of resources.

• Precise location tracking upto meter accuracy better than any other technology in the market at a lower cost.
• Upto 3 years on battery life.
• Data rate upto 0.5 Mbps.
• Location aware hubs which adapt to your architecture.
• Warehouse/factory map environment for adding tags, hubs and naming them.
• Ability to watch the warehouse/factory with all resources moving in real time.
• AI based engine which studies the behaviour of each resource and suggests optimization for your working environment.
• An integrated dashboard with complete control, configuration, emergency actions and alerts.

Smart tags are a type of Bluetooth LE gadget that really shows off the technology’s potential. The most hyped example of smart tags is Tile. You can attach this small tag to anything you like and it’ll communicate with your phone over Bluetooth LE, allowing your phone to keep track of its location.

• Presence authentication, proximity marketing, and automation.
• Optimized for reliable entry and exit events.
• Authenticate presence, send contextual notifications, display proximity-based content, or create software automation.
• Locating people, way-finding, and attendance tracking.
• Watch real-time position of users on a floor plan, collect attendance data.
• Deliver way-finding instructions.
• Real-time asset tracking and wireless sensor networks.

Allowing consumers and retailers to interact with each other quickly and easily. Beacons track the route of people moving around a shop. This can be used to gather customer data to provide a more personalized experience. Beacons can push media such as ads, coupons and supplementary product information.

More than a million beacons are expected to be installed in Indian retail stores by 2020. AADONA is capable to deliver highly customize solution based on customer requirements and challanges they face in day to day basis. By Implemention of BLE in Retail business it can improve effectiveness of sales and customer management by 30-34%.

For passengers, the app provides personalized directions through an airport and helps them find restaurants, services and baggage carousels based on their location. The aim is to help passengers navigate around the airport by sending relevant messages at different locations. It can help airline track it’s customer who are delaying or if they are lost due to last minute terminal change and many more.

93% of all MLB stadiums in the US have deployed beacons, along with 75% of all NFL stadiums, 53% of all NBA arenas, and 47% of all NHL arenas. Applications based on the data from beacons could promote merchandise or food sales. It can help in crowed management in large events areas, help them with directions and many other important information.

A museum in Antwerp, called Ruben’s House, has been using iBeacons to enable visitors to guide themselves around the various exhibits. The app allows visitors to get extra information on their phones as they walk around the exhibits. India got hundreds of historical places and tourist spots, AADONA BLE can help trourist with criticle information like history, can act as virtual guide, guide them food courts, ticket counter, other amanities, their travel schedule and even can help them to keep themselves connected to their other fellow travellers, it can be used as panic button in case of any emergency and also can help track their location.

Light on the roads interacts with software in a smartphone. It becomes brighter and stronger at roundabouts, road junctions and to approaching car headlights Another smart lighting application is collecting data about a city environment. The cities of San Diego (California) and Jacksonville (Florida) are running trials that use LED streetlight technology to collect real-time data not only to manage lighting, but also to manage parking, locate and identify potholes and keep track of repairs to municipal streets.

For example, a blood glucose, heart rate sensor, sleep sensor, step counter or pressure monitor could report its status over BLE. It can help maintaining medical record of the patient or the user and also can report to the family doctor, therapist or dietitian Another interesting case is automated emergency calls. If you need help urgently, it’s enough to just dial medical emergency number. IoT technology does the rest. Your phone automatically turns on its location capabilities, pings Bluetooth beacon signals around you, determines your location down to the room number, floor number, and physical address, and automatically sends that information to first responders. It is estimated that improved indoor localization technology and implementation of effective Medical BLE could save 20,000 lives per year in India.