In the age of IoT, more data than ever has been generated to be analyzed for management and operational purposes. Among these data are location-based data that offer insights about a particular area, which can then help end users do related planning, marketing and decision-making.
It’s without any doubt that data has become prevalent in our everyday life. In the age of IoT, more data than ever has been generated to be analyzed for management and operational purposes. Among these data are location-based data that offer insights into a particular area, which can then help end users with related planning, marketing and decision-making objectives.
That was the point raised by
Intersec, which offers a solution called GeoInsight. “Our GeoInsights solution leverages location data from mobile and Wi-Fi networks to provide operators, companies and local authorities with a highly responsive solution for producing heat maps, location-based studies and real-time data analysis,” said Marion Choppin, Marketing Director at Intersec. “This information – provided it is properly anonymized and processed – provides the best statistical source anyone could dream of, as it avoids the cost and biases of traditional surveys drawn upon questionnaires and samples limited in time.”
(Note: The company is not to be confused with Intersec, the annual security exhibition held by Messe Frankfurt in Dubai).
Which verticals can benefit
According to Choppin, the growing importance of location data will cause an increase in demand for Intersec's solution. “Especially in the smart cities area, there are lots of demands calling upon geo-intelligence and capacity to deliver results in a very limited timeframe. Functionalities are linked to the effectiveness of public safety, carbon reduction emissions, smart lighting, parking lots management, traffic regulation, optimization of city staff’s rounds and areas refurbishing,” she said. “Geo-analytics also highlight relevant insights before users invest billions of dollars on huge projects. As new infrastructure investments – new train lines and new highways – will account for more than US$40 trillion in OECD countries in the next 20 years according to a recent OECD report, companies or governments are keen on validating their decision with indisputable facts regarding location, layout and dimensioning.”
She cited some other examples of vertical markets that can benefit from this type of solutions. “This tool provides great value to transportation companies, to retailers willing to understand customers’ journey in a mall, as well as to public institutions’ alerting purposes and public safety matters,” she said.
According to her, below are some of the questions that her company seeks to answer:
Distribution: Where should I implement a new point of sales? How do I position versus my competitors?
Marketing: Where do we lose market share? Where are my best customers located?
Supply chain: How many products X were sold in the last 15 minutes? Which points of sales are more likely to run short of stock?
Healthcare: Where do the likely contaminated people go and come from? How fast does the epidemic progresses?
Smart cities: where should I build my new railway? Where should the stations be located?
The hardware-software combination for the solution is rather simple, Choppin said. “All you need is a couple of servers and our software. The solution then connects to any type of source of data, whatever the vendor and format, through a large library of connectors. Its fast data capability using in-memory caching enables to collect, filter and correlate huge data streams without any risk of overflooding,” she said. “When probes are lacking to provide accurate location data, Intersec supplies an exclusive ‘Geosensor’ that retrieves in real-time all necessary location data from the core network. This Geosensor can read 2G, 3G and 4G interfaces.”