Real-time data tracking helps businesses improve efficiency of manual workers

Australian startup, Lighthouse, is disrupting labour based industries by using Bluetooth beacons to increase worker efficiency.

In the age of data, businesses are increasingly tracking their customers, using that information to improve the quality and efficiency of their services. Springwise has recently written about a number of innovations that use beacon technology to this end. Blip Systems uses them to improve airport traffic by providing accurate wait-times, and Placemeter uses beacons to help businesses and city planners to optimise space. Now, Lighthouse is a new workplace tracking system that uses beacons to allow businesses to improve the efficiency of those working for them.

It works like this: companies equip their workers with a mobile app which tracks data from sensors like Bluetooth beacons and delivers practical information such as task lists, instructions, safety content and alerts based on their exact position. This means that in spaces like shopping malls, airports, hospitals and stadiums, workers become more efficient at checking things which really do need fixing, leading to reduced operational costs. Lighthouse includes an interesting heat-map feature that shows where workers are spending their time across different sites. Patrick Carne, Lighthouse CEO explains that they “see a huge opportunity to disrupt labor based industries that are using extremely inefficient, manual and paper based processes.”

With future features including an If-This-Then-That (IFTTT) engine that will be able to detect changes from sensors and trigger outputs to relevant workers, it’s clear this system has potential to disrupt. How else will physical data tracking be used to improve facilities and businesses?