A new use of an existing technology

Contact tracing took off during the pandemic and two years on there are many types of wearable, but predominantly wrist based and focused on health.  

The need for an industrial contact tracing device

Our partner Urban.io devised a contact tracing device initially for a milling company, where it was critical to keep producing flour for basic foodstuffs during the pandemic.  This clip on device’s focus was on proximity to others rather than location, but the ‘no battery recharging’ technology became proven, along with the convenience of near real time centralised insights.

Developing a tracking device specifically for rail workers

Maintaining the ‘no battery recharging’ promise, long standing partner Urban.io developed the device concept into something much more practical for a physically active rail engineer.  The result was two new products, the IntraPuck and the ContactKey.  Both are rugged with smooth edges to avoid the danger of getting snagged and can be clipped onto a keyring. 

With the team at Transportise’s expertise in the rail industry, it was clear that the need was less proximity and more location based, working within the zoning system to maintain ranges where needed, so that at any time, workers can be instantly located.  In a potentially hazardous working environment, it is imperative that workers feel safe, in addition to ops gaining the efficiencies of knowing that a person is in the right place at the right time.

Developing a convenient system, easy to set up and integrate

The convenience and ease of a cloud based IoT approach provides access to and perpetual ownership of Contact Tracing IoT data, use of SaaS software that takes care of configuration and display of data, with API for a fuller integration into a TMS.  In addition, usage of IoT wearables to capture locations, IoT locator devices to define zones in your worksite and access to local IoT network equipment to connect to the cloud. 

Working in the IoT space

It requires good partnerships and an agile and problem solving mind to create opportunities in this vast arena.  By creating an industry niche, it has been possible to devise new products and solutions around legacy assets and in this case, human resource, in a way that is particular to the way the rail industry works.