Abu Dhabi Based Ebtic Is Preparing To File A Patent For An Indoor Positioning System
Indoor positioning is still an untapped market
Imagine yourself as a visitor of an unfamiliar shopping mall unable to find himself among the numerous stores. A personal indoor-positioning system (IPS) that seems likely to come soon to any mobile device could solve this problem in seconds and let get directions to a place you are looking for. At least the navigation experts at the Ebtic (Etisalat BT Innovation Centre) are thinking so and are ready to file a patent for what they say may become one of the hottest trend in the branch of personal navigation and positioning.
The pioneers of indoor mapping, such as NAVTEQ partnering in the development of their Destination Maps with Nokia, or Micello with their Inside Maps, do actively work on the improvement of their indoor positioning systems wishing to fully integrate them into traditional outdoor maps.
Indoor positioning -Navteq
However, according to Dr. Nayef Al Sindi, a senior researcher on the project in Bahrain the indoor positioning is still an untapped market which can be explained by some existing limitations of today’s personal navigation related solutions. That’s true – unlike GPS the indoor-positioning systems cannot rely on satellites due to the fact that their signals cannot penetrate walls of most buildings.
In-building Wi-Fi internet routers will help create a highly effective indoor-positioning system
An effective indoor-positioning system must be capable to cover the large and spacious buildings – malls, airports, train stations, office and conference centers, hospitals and so on. It also have to be quick-responsive, accurate and affordable.
The existing IPS solutions are based on the received signal strength (RSS) and the total power of the signals arriving to a mobile device from the various access points. The localization signals however may be being bounced off by walls and other heavy objects which makes their accuracy weak and delayed. To avoid this and make the IPS systems highly effective and accurate the Ebtic researchers propose using Wi-Fi internet routers placed in a building. A such comprehensive network of positioning points will be capable identify location footprints based on the Wi-Fi signals that are picked up by personal mobile devices, such as cell phones, tablets or laptops. The next step of the Ebtic researchers is to fine-tune the positioning algorithm to calculate locations and test their solution over the next year before building a read-to-use prototype.
