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01 Oct 2021
RTLS (real-time location systems) explained in 6 minutes (or a little more, if you want all the details).
Imagine two competing businesses. The first has real-time data on its moving parts: people, parts, products, etc. The second one doesn’t. It isn’t hard to guess which of the two can operate more efficiently.
As the pace of business picks up, knowing where people and assets are real time is gaining importance. At the same time, technological progress is making ever more sophisticated RTLS solutions ever more accessible to businesses both large and small.
In this article, we’ll look at what real-time location systems (RTLS) are, the benefits they bring, and the technologies they rely on. We’ll explore important points to consider when implementing RTLS systems. And, finally, we’ll look at how u-blox can help you get started on your RTLS journey.
Real-time location services use sensing, wireless communication, and the cloud to determine the location of tagged “things” – shipments, vehicles, people, pets, and a wide variety of industrial tracking applications – and make the data available to authorized users on local computers or via a cloud platform.
RTLS solutions serve a spectrum of use cases with an equally broad range of constraints:
Solutions deployed in remote locations may, for instance, require several months of power autonomy. Those used in transportation hubs or fast-moving production lines, on the other hand, may benefit from frequent updates. And when high-value assets are involved, heightened security may become indispensable.
Real-time location services are already well established in a number of use cases, and their footprint is predicted to grow further in coming years as the technology becomes smaller, more accessible, and more tightly integrated into operations.
In hospitals, a sizable fraction of working hours are spent looking for medical equipment, putting additional pressure on an already strained system. RTLS in hospitals can help rapidly locate beds and medical equipment and potentially also doctors, staff, and patients.
RTLS systems benefit warehouse automation to automate inventory management, stockkeeping, and locating goods on shelves.
Real-time location services give companies vital insights into all aspects of the supply and distribution process. In addition to improving supply chain management, companies can use data provided by their RTLS system to mitigate bottlenecks and streamline their processes and remotely monitor the handling of their shipments, improving the quality of their products.
RTLS systems help fleet managers keep track of their vehicles, whether they are trucks, taxis, rental cars, or shared vehicles. Micromobility solution providers, such as those offering shared e-scooters, are increasingly using RTLS technologies with high precision positioning to enforce compliance with local regulations, such as sidewalk driving bans.
Transportation hubs such as airports and railway stations can benefit from RTLS technology to track baggage handling trailers, passengers with special needs, ground staff, and passengers. Data collected can be analyzed to detect and address operational weaknesses and offer an overall improved travel experience.
Real time location systems are typically made up of three components: RTLS tags, infrastructure, and software. The performance and functionality of solutions depend on the specific technological choices made in the development of the RTLS solutions.
To make location data available to their users, real time location systems need a data pipe to the internet. Outdoor real time tracking solutions such as those based on GNSS are best served with some form of cellular communication that is optimized for low power and maximum coverage, such as LTE Cat 1 or LTE-M.
Tapping into the benefits RTLS technology can bring to your business may appear challenging at first. At u-blox, our portfolio of solutions and services covers all of the technological building blocks required to build RTLS systems.
In addition to a vast selection of GNSS solutions and cellular communication modules, our offering includes high performance combo modules delivering unthrottled GNSS and cellular communication performance out of a single component – ideal for compact RTLS solutions with demanding performance requirements. Our combo modules are presented in more detail in a recent white paper.
Our short range solution offering includes the components required to build high precision indoor positioning solutions based on Bluetooth direction finding. More information is available in a dedicated white paper on how to get started with Bluetooth indoor positioning technology.
We have developed a suite of location services that bring further benefits to GNSS-based RTLS deployments.
u-blox communication services deliver data from IoT devices to the enterprise cloud with minimal overhead, making them ideal of power and bandwidth-constrained IoT deployments.