Bluetooth tracker helps parents to keep track of their kids

When people talk about bluetooth tracker, they usually mean those little thingies that are supposed to help you find your keys or similar in your own home – until the scrappy battery is dead. But a bluetooth based kids tracker system from Favendo is much more than a key finder.

A bluetooth based kids tracker system from Favendo helps parents to always keep an eye on their children. Even then and there, when they don’t actually keep an eye on them. For example, in confusing buildings such as hospitals and large malls or in amusement parks or even on cruise ships. A kids tracker system proves to be extremely helpful on cruise ships in particular. Several thousand passengers are spread over up to nineteen decks. The ships are large and confusingly complex, especially for children. However, many parents would like to relax on a long saved cruise. This is much easier when older children are allowed to take a walk alone.

Why use bluetooth tracker?

With the help of a bluetooth tracker this is possible. A bluetooth tracker for children works similar to a keyfinder or tile tracker. A bluetooth tag sends signals that are picked up by the receiver infrastructure and forwarded to a server. There the Location Engine calculates a position from the signals. This position can be displayed on the parents’ mobile phones using a corresponding app which turns the phones into tracking devices. In fact, with such a bluetooth Kids Tracker system it is even possible to be guided directly to the children’s location via the app. Not to where the kids were the last time you looked in the app, but to where the kid is right now!

The Favendo system is able to track at least 1000 tags at the same time, which send a signal every 100ms tot he beacon trackers in range. Every second a new position of each tag is calculated. The bluetooth tag, as the transmitter is called in this case, is worn by the children as a fancy bracelet – powered by a strong and lasting battery.

Bluetooth tracker vs. Kids Finder

Instead of bluetooth tracker Favendo calls its proven system therefore “Kids Finder”. The story behind this tourism solution by the asset tracking specialist from Bamberg is very straightforward. It was indeed inspired by lost children. But not inspired by devastated parents. The background of the development of Favendos bluetooth tracker “Kids Finder” was the request of a customer from the tourism industry who wanted to relieve his employees from the task of regularly searching for children who were more adventurous than their parents. Too much precious working time had to be spent on this, other work remained unfinished.

Integrate Kids Finder bluetooth tracker into any app

The “Kids Finder” or the functions of the bluetooth tracker can be integrated as a Software Development Kit (SDK) into any existing iOS or Android app. SDKs are “code snippets” that can be integrated into the code of the existing app. Extensive documentation for Android and iOS is available for the code and the integration of the code.  In this particular case, the provider already had apps for both systems, which enabled convenient wayfinding in addition to numerous other offers.

All in all, it shows that the “Kids Finder” is a much more sophisticated system than a regular bluetooth tracker or the key finder you use to find your key. Because while you will find your key – or perhaps your reading glasses – sooner or later, with or without technology, this tracker must be extremely reliable and stable. Everyone who has ever lost sight of their child or who has been waiting for an overdue message from their own child knows this. These things do not tolerate any delay and are also extremely well suited to screw up your holiday. The „Kids Finders“ keeps Kids virtually in range of their parents any second on board.

What else can a bluetooth tracker be used for?

The bluetooth tracker can not only be used in tourist facilities or in the already mentioned large shopping malls. Wherever people have been given responsibility for other people, a tracker can be used. For example in hospitals or nursing homes. Here the finder functions can be supplemented with geofencing or zone alarm. In these cases, the bluetooth tracker sends an automated notification when a person leaves a certain area in the hospital. Or vice versa, if the person enters an area without authorisation. Due to the associated sensor infrastructure, a bluetooth tracking system covers all parts of the building and can also be used where GPS signals are no longer received.

We can state that the structural circumstances are often diametrically opposed to the intended use and therefore do not allow the use of a GPS tracker. It would not work in an underground car park, for example. Favendos „Kids Finder“ communicates with the infrastructure set up for this application and therefore works reliably in this case as well.