Anagog Positioning System Improves Location Accuracy to 13 Meters
How accurate is smartphone location? It depends. GPS-enabled smartphones are typically accurate to within a 5-meter radius under the open sky. However, dense urban environments can impair the location accuracy by over 30m!
The Anagog Positioning System (APS) is unique in its ability to improve location accuracy in dense urban areas and can reduce the average location error from 25m to 13m.
Signals transmitted by GPS satellites can be very accurate when it comes to location. However, what is being received depends on other factors, such as indoor or underground use, the number of visible satellites available, or signal blockage from buildings, bridges, or trees. The signals are also influenced by atmospheric conditions like solar storms, signals reflected off buildings or walls, and radio interference.
Anagog’s system runs on-device algorithms that analyze the GPS signals and fuse this data with other smartphone sensors to provide a more stable and accurate location. This powerful solution is a game changer for many different domains, including AI solutions providers, mobile app developers, automotive OEMs, retailers, smart cities, IoT, and more.
Here are a few of the many use cases where the APS algorithm can bring high value:
- Ride-Sharing
The emerging ride-sharing economy relies heavily on the availability of super-accurate location technologies. There are often situations where an Uber user is ordering a ride, but can’t set his exact pickup location due to the positioning inaccuracy. The APS provides a more accurate location indication, reducing the need for back and forth interaction between drivers and passengers, frustrating trip cancellations, and customer-service related costs.
2. Business Analytics
Anagog now offers an ingenious web-tool that can compare any two or more brick-and-mortar businesses. The tools provide in-depth analyses of the selected businesses based on anonymized foot-traffic data. This cutting edge analytics product is allowing businesses around the world to better understand their performance and compare it with its nearby competitors, based on the same parameters.
This anonymized big data tool, which is accessed through an advanced analytics dashboard, is an eye opener for any brick-and-mortar business. Being able to more accurately define the location of customers, allows for enhanced foot-traffic analytics and better business intelligence reports.
For example, on Broadway Street, which has a high concentration of restaurants, the APS can give Subway a more precise number for customers who entered the restaurant. This is done after the tool reduced the chances of error due to the inclusion of data related to other nearby restaurants.
Map data ©2017 Google
- IoT
What IoT actually refers to is the ‘location of things.’ Without location, the IoT would be lost (pun intended). Geo-IoT applications play an important role in many industries including logistics, smart cities, and wearables to name few. For example, city waste management systems that use accurate Geo-IoT can benefit from smart trash pickup and generate notifications with guidance for better waste and recycling management. For logistics, location-based IoT is being used to enhance operation and freight transportation. With millions of assets transferred daily via land, sea, and air, IoT in freight transportation moves beyond track and trace. Geo-IoT allows businesses to identify problematic segments and bottlenecks, where the location accuracy is critical in detecting and identifying these problems. Samsonite, for example, will be able to produce smart suitcases with the APS technology, making it easy for its customers to track the precise location of their luggage.
- Ad-Tech
Location is quickly becoming an important factor for most brands and businesses to connect with their customers in a more contextual way. It is already in widespread use by leading global brands such as BMW, Tesco, Starbucks, Coca-Cola, and Starhub. For example, in a hard-hitting marketing strategy known as geo-conquesting, brands are attracting customers away from competitors by using location-based ads. The ability to identify a person’s location in real-time, with a reliable degree of accuracy, has a huge impact on the targeted audience and the related costs of such mobile marketing campaigns. This is another reason companies need highly accurate positioning enhancing technologies. Otherwise, they risk losing market share to more mobile-savvy competitors.
- User Profiling
User Profiling is used to identify data about a user’s interests. In the field of computer science, and recommendation systems specifically, this information can be used by the system to offer users a more personal experience. Therefore, better information on the places where the user tends to visit will mean faster, more personalized profiling. This means that recommendation systems like Yelp can offer more accurate location-based suggestions, such as the nearest restaurant, retail stores, and social events in the city that the user is likely to enjoy.
In short, leading companies are quickly becoming aware that accurate location data is critical to their business analytics, marketing efforts, customers satisfaction, and advanced technological products. By providing a highly accurate location indication, the APS algorithm can be used to significantly improve the baseline data and ramp up efficiency across many domains.
Dr. Ori Hay has a Ph.D. in medical image processing, with over 15 years of experience in multidisciplinary companies. He has extensive experience in leading research, implementation, and productization of wide range of algorithms (machine learning, computer vision, signal processing). Ori held various development positions (R&D manager, algorithm team leader, algorithm development) both with start-ups (Innovea, MST, Sensible) and large organizations (Philips, GE, Medtronic).
