Forbes
There has been much attention given recently to indoor positioning systems and the value they bring to application and device creators. Apple ’s iBeacon initiative is perhaps the best known example – the technology enables push notifications to be sent to iOS devices in close proximity. The system works on Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) and enables location and context awareness to be built into applications in a low-power way.
The uses for Beacon technology are pretty obvious. Currently, however, most real world applications of Beacon seem to be for marketing or retail applications. A typical example would be when a customer enters a store and Beacon delivers them a special offer. But Beacon technology offers real opportunities beyond these simple use cases. There are some interesting applications for Beacon technologies in healthcare and education, for example.
Mobile Backend as a Service (MBaaS) vendor Kinveyis rolling out a solution this week that aims to help developers build Beacon applications using the development tools of their choice and differing hardware. They’re also launching a demonstration application at the Glue Conference being held this week. “Who’s at Glue” is a simple tool that has been built to showcase how Kinvey’s service works. The app is designed to improve and personalize the conference experience. After downloading the app, attendees at the conference sign-in with their LinkedIn credentials or create an account with an email address and check-off their areas of interest. As they move about the conference, a mix of iBeacons and Gimbal beacons track attendees’ locations and notify them of people with similar interests located nearby. Using the app, attendees can request and accept meetings on the fly with conference-goers who may share interests or have specific expertise, and select the best meeting location, such as the closest or the least crowded. Given my experience of conference apps, the Who’s At Glue app will get little usage – but as a case study in what Beacon technology can offer, it’s certainly interesting.
Kinvey believes that BLE, and corresponding hardware and communication standards, will launch a new generation of businesses and use cases. To this end the company is supporting Beacon via specific Client Library extensions and business logic modules.
This is a logical area for vendors like Kinvey to move into. MBaaS platforms are built to help organizations create and deploy mobile applications. Application components such as identity management, integration with existing data, business logic elements and hybrid deployment are all part of what Kinvey offers. Delivering solutions via BLE fits well into that classification.
On the front end, using Kinvey’s Beacon-specific solutions, developers can forego writing discovery and management code for Beacon devices – the platform covers those requirements. On the back end it also provides solutions for some Beacon shortcomings such as reporting frequencies, proximity fluctuations and data smoothing. The client libraries integrate with the mobile backend to ensure the accuracy of beacon proximity reporting, manage notifications, securely connect user ID with beacon proximity, ensure delivery of personalized content to specific users, and map to the enterprise’s IT systems of record.
BLE generally, and Beacon more specifically look to be an important technology development – Kinvey’s early foray into helping developers build BLE solutions is likely to pay dividends for the company.