Latest News: Ubisense on course to be Cambridge’s next £1bn company!

Published in Business Weekly

Feb 24, 2012

It’s 10 years since Ubisense spun out of Cambridge University’s Computer Laboratory – such fertile territory for technology greats.

The rich potential identified by the founders has every chance of ensuring the Real Time Location Systems specialist becomes Cambridge’s next £1 billion company. CEO Richard Green certainly believes the achievement is well within Ubisense’s compass.

Events in a dizzy 2011, reinforced by a stunning start to 2012, have strengthened the company’s hand. So, too, has the market intel that highlights the scale of the sectors Ubisense technology can leverage.

A recent report from Cambridge based IDTechEx forecast that the RTLS market would rise from $255 million to $293m in 2012 and then power up to nearly $4 billion in 2022. It stressed how well placed Ubisense was to exploit the opportunity. As Business Weekly recently reported, Ubisense, could increase headcount by 50 per cent in 2012 after winning a string of new orders and lining up a potential bonanza in Asia. Acquisitions could fast-track the growth process, according to Green. He says: “We went from 100 staff at the start of 2011 to 170 by the end of the year. Crystal ball stuff – we could easily be up to 250 people by the end of 2012.

“Cambridge is a great place to be with bags of talent when a technology company is in growth mode and acquisition might be a good way for us to maintain that talent pool.”

In recent months Ubisense has won a surge of new orders with Airbus, truckmaker PACCAR, BMW plus another German automotive company – and broken into Korea by landing a contract with Hyundai.

Green said that after a few false dawns for RF technology, “This time it looks like its time is ripe – the market makers certainly believe so. We had an absolutely stunning year in 2011. We thought the high spot would be the London stockmarket listing in the summer but between then and the end of the year the orders just continued to flow. New contracts are still coming in.”

Prime among these was the signing of a new global licensing agreement with Airbus. Ubisense tracking technology is now installed at 10 Airbus sites – up from three at the start of the relationship.

The relationship with BMW goes from strength to strength – the latest installation being a significant one in China, given the company’s growth ambitions in Asia.

At the end of 2011, Ubisense landed a contract with another big German automotive company. And the cup was overflowing when Ubisense clinched a new relationship with PACCAR, the multinational truckmaker headquartered in Washington State.

Ubisense then broke into Korea – courtesy a landmark Asian deal with Hyundai. An alliance with Jaguar Land Rover, which has its own ambitions for growth throughout Asia, could also prove important.

The sheer diversity of major markets in which Ubisense’s tracking technology holds a USP may prove the most accurate barometer of its future fortunes.

The company was pleased to establish a stronghold in the energy market with two important contracts. It won a landmark deal with partners S3ID for AGIP – the Italian automotive gasoline and diesel retailer subsidiary of multinational petroleum company Eni. This followed its success with partner, PA Consulting Group, in winning a contract with a large energy utility in Washington State.

Ubisense’s collaboration with Atlas Copco is meanwhile opening up some terrific business opportunities in the field of automotive.

In the past six months, Ubisense’s Tool Location System (TLS) solution has been deployed by six new Atlas Copco customers including BMW, Jaguar Land Rover, Audi, GM, Hyundai and Paccar. The sizes of the installations vary from single production work stations through to multi-global site installations.

The Atlas Copco-branded TLS software was jointly developed with Ubisense under a collaboration agreement signed in 2009 for the research and development of Real-Time Location Systems applications for industrial tooling.

Green said: “The fact that one in every three cars in the world is assembled with Atlas Copco tools highlights the enormous growth opportunity for the TLS, particularly as the solution is now being sold through the Atlas Copco catalogue providing increased exposure to a greater number of automotive manufacturers across multiple geographies.

“As the TLS is adopted more broadly, we are finding that manufacturers require additional applications relevant to the assembly line, further endorsing our RTLS solution in the automotive industry. It also highlights the important benefits that can be driven by collaborating with the world’s leading industrial tool manufacturer.”

The TLS is comparable to small scale GPS but instead of using satellites, customers use sensors inside their manufacturing plants to monitor the position of tools and assets in real-time and with precision accuracy to 15cm.
This allows error-proofing to be taken to the next level and allows customers to ensure that tightening is performed reliably at the correct tool setting and at the correct work station.

The solution is compelling for automotive manufacturers as it provides a range of benefits for the assembly line floor – including increased productivity, improved quality and, importantly, helps to reduce costs. The TLS is now available from Atlas Copco’s worldwide application and customer centres and installations in North America and Europe have already been achieved.

Ubisense’s financial transparency and clear focus have already made the company something of a darling with London stockmarket investors. More remarkably for any hi-tech business, while its technology has continued to evolve Ubisense hasn’t had to pivot to the contortionist levels forced on some of its Cambridge contemporaries to gain global market traction.

Strong and sustainable international growth will be the likely – and thoroughly deserved – reward.

http://www.ubisense.net/

When Should a Transit Agency Start to Worry About its Technology Infrastructure?

By Adrian Jennings
Published in MassTransit Magazine
Feb 9, 2012

Technology infrastructure in a transit yard may not be at the top of most people’s minds, but there are some simple indicators that suggest when it’s time to be worried.

Indoor location systems are becoming widely adopted to solve all of the problems with a single solution. These location systems use sensors and tags to keep track of vehicles indoors just like GPS satellites and tags keep track of them outdoors. By knowing the precise location of vehicles and integrating this with information from maintenance, dispatch, scheduling and vehicle equipment databases, operators are gaining new visibility into their operations and control over their fleet of vehicles.

Yard Visibility

Does “yard visibility” mean referring to a handwritten markup sheet generated by a manual yard audit? Then it’s time to be worried about your technology infrastructure.
Markup sheets provide a simple visual reference for understanding where vehicles are located, but suffer from two key limitations: in any manual, repetitive process like a yard audit, mistakes can be made, and given the constant movement of vehicles, the information from any given yard audit is quickly out of date.

An indoor location system can completely replace manual audits and markup sheets with an automatic, real-time vehicle location system. As mentioned, such a system operates much like GPS, with tags on vehicles being tracked not by satellites (which cannot see indoors) but by sensors mounted in the ceiling of the yard. This network of sensors updates the location of vehicles several times a minute with an accuracy of just a few feet. The result is an electronic markup sheet that shows the exact location and identity of all vehicles in the yard and updates that information constantly.

This is the core value of an indoor location system, and it was this that led Metro Transit in Minneapolis to be among the first to adopt such a system. The yard audit task typically took between 30 and 60 minutes, and with buses constantly in motion the data required constant updating. Audits were performed on an almost hourly basis, and were often out-of-date before a single round of the facility was complete. The inefficiencies of this process were clear to Metro Transit at different levels: in the time taken to collect the data; in the effects of inaccurate bus location data such as poor on-time departures due to blocked buses; and in the time wasted by maintenance staff searching for vehicles.

In order to realize the full potential of its location system, Metro Transit was quick to realize that having bus location information in electronic form created an opportunity to bring together multiple software systems.

Software Application Integration

Does software application integration mean running different applications on different computers and manually entering information from one system into the other? Then it’s time to be worried about your technology infrastructure.

Once the markup sheet is in electronic form, a huge amount of added value can be incorporated into the yard map view. The first software integration point is to connect the electronic map with the vehicle equipment database so that a simple mouse-click on any vehicle icon reveals a wealth of information: bus length, diesel or hybrid, wheelchair accessible, etc. Some of these attributes can also be indicated visually using different icons and colors making the markup sheet a rich source of useful information-at-a-glance. Need the next available hybrid ready to be dispatched? Electronic surveillance contractor needs a map of all buses with DVRs? That information can reliably be available all the time.

Metro Transit went one step beyond this and also integrated information from the dispatch and maintenance systems. This allowed the map display to show vehicle attributes and also route assignments and maintenance status. For maintenance, the bus icon would change to show a minor or critical fault so that a dispatcher had immediate feedback if a vehicle was not ready to be assigned.

Coordinated Operations

Does “coordinated operations” mean picking up the phone or leaving a note to pass critical information between departments? Then it’s time to be worried about your technology infrastructure.

When the Réseau de transport de Longueuil (RTL) public transportation service in Longueuil, Quebec, adopted an indoor location system, the technology had become more than a yard information tool: it was now a yard automation tool. With a rich set of integrated data deeply linked to bus location, RTL was able to streamline many operations simultaneously improving quality of service and efficiency.

At RTL, the electronic map display can not only be used to provide data about vehicles, but also to perform operations like assigning buses to routes, assigning drivers to buses, etc. To assign a bus to a route, a dispatcher simply has to drag-and-drop a bus icon onto one of the routes displayed in a list. Any bus showing a critical fault will immediately be rejected to prevent safety issues. When a driver arrives at the start of a shift he approaches an electronic kiosk where he swipes his smart card to be given his route and bus assignment, along with a map showing where the bus is located. Digital displays throughout the yard help direct him to the bus to expedite pullout.

This is a typical example of how operations can be coordinated once all information is integrated into one place along with the exact location of the vehicle. These operations can be as diverse as dispatch, maintenance, revenue drop, cleaning, fueling, etc. As more information is integrated into a single application, more decision making can be automated.

Intuitive User Interface

Does “Intuitive GUI” remind you more of the life forms evolving in your fridge than the user interfaces for your current computer applications? Then it’s time to be worried about your technology infrastructure.

Most people today have become rather adept at using graphical user interfaces (GUIs), and a well-thought-out GUI can make your computer experiences much simpler.

A well-designed indoor location system has just such an interface: displaying vehicle location and identification over a map of the facility or facilities. As mentioned previously, the icons that represent vehicles are often color-coded or overlaid with other symbology to indicate critical information just by looking at the map. Maintenance status, vehicle type and home-garage for multi-garage operations are all typical examples of information that are displayed graphically.

Today, indoor location systems are replacing manual markup sheets with reliable, up-to-date electronic maps showing all vehicles across one or many facilities. By integrating this information with other data sources, indoor location systems are streamlining and error-proofing dispatch and pullout, improving maintenance efficiency and optimizing parking to avoid time wasted due to blockage. But what of the future?

A Better Way

When you are surrounded by paperwork, trying to use computer applications that frustrate more than they help, the best way to know what’s going on is to get up and walk the yard. Do you think that there must be a better way to manage a yard? Then it’s time to get excited about your technology infrastructure.

Indoor location systems are transforming yard operations first by providing yard information, then yard automation. But how far can that go? A few “day in the life” vignettes can help illustrate where indoor location systems can take yard management.

The driver arrives at the yard at the start of his shift and approaches the electronic kiosk. When he swipes his smart card he not only clocks-in for his shift, but also receives his day’s driving assignment and a map to the bus he has been allocated. As he walks through the garage, digital signs help direct him to his assigned bus. When he reaches the bus he’s happy to see the one parked in front just pulling out: no blockage and no late-pullout today. On his inspection of the bus he notices a flat tire: this bus is going nowhere. He reports this using his mobile device — a few taps on the touchscreen and he is given his new bus assignment and a map of its location. This time there is no blockage and no flat tire, and he pulls out on time.

During the day he notices a vibration through the steering column and reports it on his touchscreen console. When he arrives at the yard at the end of the shift he is directed to the next available revenue drop, then given instructions and a map about where to park.
The dispatcher has already defined the route requirements when the day starts. Each route has been flagged with vehicle requirements: one route through the city center, for example, requires a hybrid bus with a particular vinyl wrap advertising an upcoming movie. When all of the route requirements are defined, the auto-dispatch module takes a few moments to allocate buses to routes based on the bus type and configuration, maintenance status and position in the yard.

During the pullout process one driver reports a flat tire, immediately activating the auto-dispatch module. The bus is flagged for maintenance pickup and the entire remaining dispatch plan is redone to ensure that the correct buses still pull out on time and onto the correct routes. Account is taken of the fact that the disabled bus is now blocking all buses in the row behind it, and all affected drivers get their revised bus assignments on their mobile devices.

At end of day, maintenance reports one bus has a critical fault causing a steering vibration and the estimated repair time is 22 hours. The auto-dispatch module updates the pullout plan, and the auto parking module adjusts its parking assignments for the rest of the buses to ensure minimum overnight shuffling.

The maintenance worker gets an alert on his mobile device that a bus has a flat tire and is directed to its location. The wheel can be changed on-site, and when complete he registers the fault as rectified and the auto-dispatch system reincorporates that vehicle into its plan.

Later that day he receives another alert directing him to the right location to pick up a bus with a steering column vibration. When he starts the bus he is notified that diesel pump #3 happened to be free and is directed to take the opportunity to fill the tank. When he arrives at the pump, the bus identity and type is automatically registered and the pump activated since the fuel type is a match. When full, the pump flags the bus as refueled and records the amount of diesel used into the bus’s record.

So, how far into the future is the vision of the smart yard? The building blocks are already in place and software applications are maturing rapidly. The fundamental foundation of location systems and data integration are already available, with the automation modules either already available or in development.

For the complete article, visit www.MassTransitmag.com/10614025. MT

Snapshot or movie? Exploring the differences between RFID and RTLS

The terms Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) and Real-Time Location System (RTLS) can cause confusion since they are often used interchangeably. In fact, they mean something very different and RFID and RTLS solutions are used in very different ways.

RFID is the term used to describe the wireless retrieval of an identification code from an electronic tag using a radio signal emitted from the tag. These systems were developed to solve some of the shortcomings of barcodes, which can only be read at very short range, are easily damaged and become unreadable - if you can’t see the barcode you can’t read it. RFID systems solve this problem by using a radio signal rather than an optical scanner, and that radio signal can be read over longer ranges, even when no line-of sight exists between the tag and the reader. RFID tags come in two varieties: passive and active. Passive tags use no battery, and instead derive power from the radio signal emitted by a reader. These tags can truly be thought of as “next generation barcodes.” By contrast, active tags are powered by batteries, and as a result can transmit signals much further (10s and even more than hundred meters). This type of tag has advantages in certain situations but the battery makes them more expensive both from a manufacturing and maintenance standpoint.

Degrees of location

Real-Time Location Systems (RTLS) not only retrieve the ID of an electronic tag but also pinpoint its location in real-time. In order to do this, the signal from the tag is received at multiple sensor locations which use methods such as triangulation or multilateration to calculate the tag position. This seems to be very different from the definition of an RFID system. So why is there confusion? The confusion comes from defining exactly what is meant by “location information” and the following examples helps to illustrate the point.

Area location

RFID systems only provide
 limited location information

A single RFID reader is placed at the center of a warehouse,and items are identified using long range RFID tags. Since the reader cannot physically hear tags outside the warehouse, it makes a list of all the tags that it can hear, and labels them as “in the warehouse.” In this case “in the warehouse” is location information derived from an RFID system comprising a single reader and active tags.

Proximity location

Two RFID readers are placed at either end of a warehouse populated as above with active tags. Both readers hear all tags, but they are connected via a network to a software application which compares the signal strength received. For a given tag, this application determines that the northern reader is receiving far more signal than the southern reader, and determines that the tag is therefore in the northern part of the warehouse. Again “in the northern part of the warehouse” is location information derived from a RFID system comprising multiple readers and active tags.

Choke point location

A single RFID reader is placed over a doorway, under which items pass which are identified using passive tags. The reader can only detect tags that are within 1,5 meters (due to their short range), confirming that any tag that it does hear must be in the vicinity of the doorway. Each tag ID is recorded as “at the doorway” along with the time at which it was detected. In this case “at the doorway” is location information derived from a RFID system comprising a single reader and passive tags.

Real-time location

A network of RTLS sensors is distributed throughout a building, and items in the building are identified using active tags. Anywhere in the building, multiple sensors can receive the signal from a given tag and measure either its signal strength, its time of arrival or its angle of arrival (or sometimes more than one of these). This information is passed via a network to an application that calculates the tags coordinates in the building. In this case “coordinates in the building” is location information derived from a network of RTLS sensors and active tags.

RTLS allows users to identify products at any stage
 of the assembly line and to control processes
based on the relative location of
products, tools, and mobile devices.

A better definition

These examples make both the reason for the confusion and the solution clear. Any system can be thought of as providing “location information” - even a barcode scanner. But a better definition of the term “RTLS” can immediately distinguish these systems from RFID systems: A Real-Time Location System is any system using a network of sensors to determine the coordinates of a tag in real-time, anywhere within an instrumented area. Using this definition we immediately understand that “in the warehouse” and “at the door just a minute ago” do not fall under the definition of RTLS. Rather “on shelf B7 on aisle 9 of the warehouse” and “entering through the door and turning towards aisle 3” are the hallmarks of location information delivered by an RTLS solution.This definition also makes no mention of radio frequency on purpose. RFID very clearly means radio frequency ID, without exception.

One further differentiator is that RTLS tags and sensors, whereas predominantly RF, can also use other technologies such as infrared and ultrasound. A good way to think about the difference is to think of RFID as a fixed still camera, and RTLS as a panning video camera. The fixed still camera can provide information about the scene within its field of view at the time a photo is taken. By contrast, a video camera that can pan and zoom provides continuous, real-time scene information over the entire area. This is the fundamental difference between RFID and RTLS: snapshot vs. movie. A series of snapshots at strategic times and locations can help build a picture of what was going on in the past, but only a video camera with a live feed can give real-time information about what’s going on, all the time.  That’s the power of RTLS.

Employee Spotlight: Deb Miller

Name: Deb Miller

Hometown: Vancouver, B.C.

Ubisense Location: Denver, CO

Ubisense Department: Geospatial

Education: Master’s Degree in Computer Science; Master’s Diploma in Cognitive Science

How long have you been with Ubisense and what is your background?

Deb: I started with Ubisense in 2004, but have been in GIS now for 15 years. I originally started with GeoData Solutions, which was one of the first Smallworld consulting companies in the U.S. After that, I ran a small consulting company before finally joining Ubisense.

In university, I specialized in Artificial Intelligence, and during my master’s degree, I developed a neural net to control lighting in a house. It was actually installed in my professor’s experimental house, and to test it, I had to walk around and flap my arms to set off the motion detectors.

What’s a typical day like for you?
Deb: Currently I’m working on a major installation of Smallworld GIS and PowerOn Outage Management at a north west utility.

What is the most significant trend you’ve seen in your field?
Deb: GIS has followed the same trend as technology in general: Geospatial solutions have been getting faster, better, more affordable, and more accessible. GIS solutions used to exist only on expensive IBM mainframes; now they’re embedded everywhere, in every phone and tablet computer. MyWorld pushes that trend even further, bringing enterprise GIS solutions to any web-enabled device. It’s a pretty exciting time to be in the industry.

How did you become interested in GIS?

Deb: When I finished my master’s degree – and gave up my career as an arm flapper – I ended up in GIS almost by accident. Russ Chandler, a friend, was starting GeoData and offered me a position. I planned to stay a couple of years, but got hooked on Smallworld and never looked back. I was fortunate to start on some very interesting work; for example, I became the chief architect of the PowerOn network model, which provided some major design and mathematical challenges.

What was your very first job?
Deb: My first job, in high school and first year in college, was a librarian for a children’s library. When I wasn’t shelving books or studying, I got a chance to read some serious classics; my favorite: Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are.

What do you enjoy doing in your time off?
Deb: I like to spend time outdoors – mostly hiking and biking; especially winter hiking. I enjoy travel and spent a year in Europe, the middle east, and North Africa. I was also fortunate to be able to spend 4 months in South America, mainly camping and hiking in the national parks and wilderness areas of Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, and Chile.

What is your favorite city?

Deb: It’s really tough to choose just one city, so I’ll name a few: Florence, Italy (art and food), Goreme, Turkey (amazing rock formations and friendliest people), Chachas, Peru (this small village is so remote it has no roads or electricity, and can only reached by a grueling all-day trek down a steep canyon, and back up the other side).



Jumping a crevasse