Well, it seems another year has gone by since I posted an update on the blog. That means I’ve been busy with work, right? Right! I’ve spent the last year designing and implementing new products at Silent Partner Technologies, and they are finally ready for launch. Our online asset management system, IntelliView, is one of the most full featured cloud-based asset management systems available. It is the only asset management system that I know of that supports both active and passive RFID technologies out of the box. In addition to assets we provide an Inventory (consumables) management section and a Service (work orders) section. The most interesting part of the product suite, however, are the tablet based RFID reader apps. We have had our Windows CE passive RFID application running on a CSL 101 for 6 months now, but this month we are introducing Android based apps for active and passive RFID readers. Now you can take your Android phone or tablet and use it as a real-time heads up display showing what assets are nearby. We have several specific use cases for this, but our big push is for mobile equipment tracking. Lets say you’ve got a truck full of equipment, and you need to make sure you have everything you need before you head out on the road. Our IntelliVan readers and app will let you know, instantly, what equipment is in your truck and if certain predefined items are missing. During beta testing, these product were used by our EMS, fire/rescue, landscaping, and auto and motorcycle racing clients. The app is Android only for the moment, once we sort out Apple’s MFi program we will have and iOS app available as well.
But wait, there’s more. In addition to IntelliVan and building MyAssetsFaster we’ve been working with our partner company Oil Country Tubular Goods in a joint venture, called Oil Country Asset Management, to integrate yard management capabilities into MyAssetsFaster. Our yard management product allows pipe manufacturers & processors to keep tabs on their pipe. No more pencil and paper to keep track of where pipe gets laid. We use a GPS-based Android app along with batch processing on MyAssetsFaster to provide shipping and receiving logging and pipe location tracking throughout the processing cycle. This product is still in beta testing and will be ready for launch by the end of the year.
And just one more thing, we developed a parking management system this year for collaborative parking management between tow companies and property managers. This system is applicable to hotels, universities, apartment complexes, condos, municipalities, etc. Anyone who has a fixed amount of parking space, reserved for paying customers, but ends up with lots of moochers. Using a vehicle-mounted RFID system and RFID enabled parking tags we have been able to increase the productivity/income of our beta tow companies by 30%. Instead of having to visually check every single car in every parking lot, they use our Parking Management Android app as a heads-up display in the truck. As they drive by a car, -beep-, that car’s info pops up to the top of the list. If there if the car doesn’t match the information in the database, someone is sharing a parking tag. Give them a warning. Next time it happens. TOW ‘EM. If there is no -beep-, the driver can search by license plate. If no record found, TOW ‘EM. If a car comes up highlighted in red, the tag is expired. TOW ‘EM. In the case of universities and municipalities, GIVE ‘EM A TICKET.