The BLE gateway is widely used in indoor navigation and positioning systems. It is a device that supports the communication between smart equipment (sensors, beacons, switches, etc.) and Bluetooth-based products. During the operation, the sensors find all available gateways in the room and send signals with information. BLE gateways receive these impulses and send them to the cloud server. This solution ensures the effective management of BLE devices and enables real-time indoor tracking.
BLE gateway features
The BLE gateway device is characterized by low energy consumption and doesn’t require high operation costs. The efficiency of the device is combined with a wide range of other features:
- The equipment is suitable even for harsh environments. The cost of implementing a BLE gateway is low, which makes the equipment more cost-effective compared to other Internet of Things solutions.
- The device is easy to repair. In case of the breakdown of some parts, they can be easily and cheaply replaced.
- The gateway can support various protocols, including HTTPS / HTTP, MQTT.
- The device can transmit the data using GSM, WiFi, or Ethernet.
- The equipment ensures bi-directional communication, i.e. it can send and receive data.
- The gateway also ensures data security. Thus, it can block data and require users to unlock it using the password for connecting to Bluetooth.
- Once online, the gateway executes adaptive frequency switching according to weather conditions. In other words, the equipment reduces noise and interference and lets sensors or beacons effectively work even in a noisy RF-environment.
Scenarios for the use of the equipment for Navigine solutions
Navigine actively uses Bluetooth gateways with low energy consumption to implement its solutions. There are several scenarios where the gateways can be used– tracking assets and object localization, Bluetooth marketing, and indoor navigation.
Tracking assets in industry and warehousing
The gateways can assist in defining the exact asset location in warehouses and industrial enterprises. Constant monitoring provides detailed information on equipment movement, its state, working, and idle time during the day. After installing beacons on forklifts and other equipment, they will send to the gateways the data on the equipment location in real-time, as well as warn about leaving the enterprise territory or possible collisions. The use of the devices allows planning more accurately the tasks on asset tracking, reducing equipment downtime, and optimizing logistics processes.
Bluetooth marketing
The gateways make it possible to improve the quality of customer service and get additional marketing channels for expanding the client database. If iBeacons and BLE gateways are installed around the territory, whenever a visitor enters the action zone of the device, his phone will get push notifications with advertising, information on discounts, promotional activities, or bonus offers. Using this technology, one can promote their brand or products, gather feedback, provide interactive tips with the information on a particular item. All these points increase the efficiency of the marketing campaign and make clients more loyal to the given place.
Indoor navigation
The technologies can be used in shops, hospitals, museums, airports, railway stations. The system allows building interactive maps of places, creating routes to the points of interest, searching the necessary goods and other objects. Indoor navigation, with the help of the mobile application, significantly improves user experience and optimizes visitor flows.
Use cases of BLE gateways from Navigine technological partners
Navigine works closely with the leading manufacturers of navigation equipment. While implementing the platform for navigating and tracking, we use the BLE gateway from our technological partners who offer reliable equipment with a high level of safety and data rate. Thus, the following gateways can be used for organizing positioning systems:
- G1 IoT Gateway from Minew is a powerful reader with Wi-Fi support and corporate encryption WPA 2.0. The transmission distance of the device is 300 m, Wi-Fi data transmission rate is up to 300 Mbit/sec. BLE IoT gateway is compatible with the cloud platforms AWS, Azure, Google IoT and saves information on TF-cards even in case of a shutdown.
Source - https://www.minew.com/product/g1-iot-gateway/
- Gateways from Kontakt.io are available gateways with the transit Wi-Fi network that provides for more accurate object tracking. They work on the Plug&Play principle and simplify the network deployment since it doesn’t require the installation of additional equipment.
Source - https://kontakt.io/gateways/
- MKGW1 BLE Gateway from MOKOSmart scans up to 300 Bluetooth devices in a second and can work with Eddystone sensors, iBeacons, temperature sensors, and other Bluetooth-based equipment. The maximum effective range of scanning is 120 m. It can be charged from PoE (48V), direct current, and micro USB (5V).
Source - https://www.mokosmart.com/ru/mokosmart-mkgw1-gateway-iot-cloud-platform/
Our company can help you to organize the indoor positioning system using Bluetooth gateways and beacons. We offer modern solutions in the sphere of tracking and navigation that ensure the effective development of business processes.
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