Precyse Technologies Developers' Blog – The latest on Asset Network Technologies, wireless, real time location systems, rfid, The Internet of Things and more… Welcome!
“InnoCentive, a crowdsourcing company based in Waltham, Mass., worked with Precyse Technologies, a wireless technology company based in Atlanta that wanted to conserve its own engineering resources, to develop a product that would activate a device remotely.
InnoCentive helped Precyse draw up a detailed description of its goals, and the project was listed on InnoCentive’s Marketplace. The price tag was listed as $50,000. Problem “solvers,” as InnoCentive calls its work force, selected Precyse’s project from among others in the queue. The result: hundreds of ideas for a technology that could activate a device remotely. “They delivered not just a solution, but also the algorithm and calculations that proved the solution could be done,” said Rom Eizenberg, chief marketing officer at Precyse.”
I wanted to share with you an excellent article I recently ran into by Mckinsey’s business Technology office. The story’s title is “the Internet of Things” and it is closely related to what Precyse is doing today and our vision of a world of made-smart, interconnected assets. Today, more and more objects are becoming embedded with sensor enabled wireless communication devices – a “cell phone” for assets – gaining the ability to communicate. The resulting information networks promise to create new business models, improve business processes, and reduce costs and risks. “In most organizations, information travels along familiar routes. Proprietary information is lodged in databases and analyzed in reports and then rises up the management chain. Information also originates externally—gathered from public sources, harvested from the Internet, or purchased from information suppliers. But the predictable pathways of information are changing: the physical world itself is becoming a type of information system. In what’s called the Internet of Things, sensors and actuators embedded in physical objects—from roadways to pacemakers—are linked through wired and wireless networks, often using the same Internet Protocol (IP) that connects the Internet. These networks churn out huge volumes of data that flow to computers for analysis. When objects can both sense the environment and communicate, they become tools for understanding complexity and responding to it swiftly. What’s revolutionary in all this is that these physical information systems are now beginning to be deployed, and some of them even work largely without human intervention.”
Precyse is delivering customers with asset network solutions today. Very much like the internet in its early days, these are typically closed-loop asset networks that enables high value assets, like engines or transmissions on an automotive manufacturing line, to communicate their location and status along the process, providing manufacturers with Real Time supply chain Visibility and the ability to exercise proactive, real time management. We see these asset networks expanding all the time, first from the OEM to the supplier, then to ports, vessels and eventually into a global information network that allows assets to communicate with computers and people – adding Anything to the familiar Anywhere, Anytime global communication backbone, making the internet of things a reality. Please feel free to contribute – we are always on the lookout for new ideas or cooperation to shape the future of the internet of things. Post your comments below or get in touch with us today! You can read the full story by Mckinsey here: http://tinyurl.com/yasbyph
Within a few minutes of Denis Browne’s demonstration of Precyse technologies real time asset tracking and visibility solution, the audience began enthusiastically nodding their heads. Now at this point I had been with Precyse for 3 days and had limited knowledge of its technology and its capabilities. I was, however, pretty excited about what I learned thus far. That I had reason to be excited was confirmed by the animated and lively faces of each person seated in that room as they responded positively to Denis’s presentation. Denis picked up his tools took five steps across the room and his movement was tracked instantly by Precyse’s Ilocate tracking system.
Why is this technology special? No matter what your industry–manufacturing, automotive, areonautical, or defense–some assets are just too important to lose. Precyse’s technology integrated with SAP can help you protect and track those important assets by providing real time asset location for those assets, whether they be tools, parts, machinery, or even employees. This real time tracking is accomplished by affixing Precyse’s smart agent tags–which are no bigger than half a golf ball–to whatever assets you want. Once attached, the assets’ current location and its past movement are provided to you on your PC in real time with an accuracy of up to 3 feet and within a tracking zone up to one mile.
The Scenarios for applicability of Precyse’s solution would seem to be endless. Whether it is the U.S. military tracking munitions, jet parts, vehicle, or even soldiers, or a manufacturing company tracking heavy machinery and tools, Precyse can paint a crystal clear picture of where those assets are and where they have been. The expense and cumbersome inefficiencies of manual and RFID systems tracking should soon be things of the past once supply chain, logistics, and operations managers experience Precyse’s technology.
We’ve included a video so you can see for yourself how Precyse’s technology works.
Land sea or sky, the iLocate system is all over the place. take a look at these pics from a field trial day together with MayDay, a new business partner.
We fitted the PBS (base station) and iLocate gear to an helicopter to enable smart agent communications from the air!
It was great fun – the system was able to track down a smart agent hidden inside the forest below from almost a mile away. A second team on the ground with a mobile iLocate kit mounted on an SUV was then able to do close-range accurate location and “touch” the agent in the trees. Kind of treasure hunt game…
