RE:Does anyone remember the days of SamsysYes the issue with RFID is it worked, but it was TOO expensive and had too much complexity. Unlike Bluetooth beacons or m-IoT beacons, RFID tags require several "readers" which are easily a few $1,000s each. You then have RF (radio frequency) considerations to think about as well. Therefore, it's true that RFID tags are cheap -- companies weren't lying about this. What was left out is the fact that readers are required, are expensive and many are required to cover a certain perimeter. Furthermore, the tags didn't have sensors strapped onto them unlike BeWhere's products, which can do much more with the sensors, e.g. detect temperature, humidity, light, collisions/impacts, you can sound a buzzer or light to find individual beacons.
Bluetooth beacons bypass the need for a reader by connecting direcly to a WiFi-Bluetooth gateway (aka a router), employees's cellphones or telematics units. Yes the issue with RFID is it worked, but it was TOO expensive and had too much complexity. Unlike Bluetooth beacons or m-IoT beacons, RFID tags require several "readers" which are easily a few $1,000s each. You then have RF (radio frequency) considerations to think about as well. Therefore, it's true that RFID tags are cheap -- companies weren't lying about this. What was left out is the fact that readers are required, are expensive and many are required to cover a certain perimeter. Furthermore, the tags didn't have sensors strapped onto them unlike BeWhere's products, which can do much more with the sensors, e.g. detect temperature, humidity, light, collisions/impacts, you can sound a buzzer or light to find individual beacons.
Bluetooth beacons bypass the need for a reader by connecting direcly to a WiFi-Bluetooth gateway (aka a router), employees's cellphones or telematics units. As for the M-IoT beacons, they connect directly to a cell tower (either LTE-M or NB-IoT tower). The carriers are particularly interested in BeWhere's product because they want to get as many users on their new networks to get the monthly connection fee from every device. BeWhere has the first available product for asset tracking/monitoring over LTE-M / NB-IoT. Once BeWhere passes certification, it wll begin commercialization of the product in late November. We should then see sales roll in very quickly IMO for the aforementioned reasons.
To get back to your question, I think BeWhere has proven the usefulness of it's technology. If you look at it's list of clients and partnerships, and you consider what it's done over the timeline since it's inception at the end of 2014.
- End of 2014: company was created, began R&D on Bluetooth beacon
- 2015: R&D on Bluetooth beacon
- Mid 2016: completed R&D and testing of Bluetooth beacons. Commercialization of Bluetooth beacon. Built strong distribution channnel with Bell, Geotab, Fleet Completed and many more VARs.
- End of 2016: started pilot trials, which many turned into larger orders. Generated revenue in it's first half year of commercialization. Already something since many start-ups don't generate revenues after only 2 years.
- Early 2017: signed on 2 large clents: Brinks and Aphria. Began working on M-IoT product.
- Mid 2017: R&D on M-IoT. Revenues growing fast from Bluetooth beacons - Q2 did $430k in revs.
- End 2017: R&D on M-IoT completed, certification should be finished and sales should begin especially with US carriers who already have their LTE-M networks running. Q3 and Q4 revs should be much higher than Q2 revs as the company said revs would double QoQ for the next few Qs.
In summary, BeWhere is better compared to the telematics industry when it started to take off in the late 90s / early 2000s. The LPWA (low power wide area) market will be HUGE and much larger than telematics IMO. You can look at any indsutry research report and they'll all say the same thing. Why? Because M-IoT beacons are so much cheaper than telematics units in terms of hardware and monthly connection fee. Not to mention battery life is YEARS compared to DAYS.