Z Axis – It’s not as hard as some are making it out to be

We all know first responders can handle emergencies better if they know which floor people needing help are on (keep in mind an estimated 75% of 9-1-1 callers can verbally share this with the 9-1-1 telecommunicator). Five years ago to find a devices’ Z axis height location was voodoo engineering magic to come up with this information and required a lot of investment from carriers, building owners, etc.

Before anyone rushes out to install in building location tech, we should look at what the devices of today are capable of. If you have in building wifi, some random bluetooth beacons (more than you think are already out there), crowdsourcing, barometric sensors, a weak GPS signal, some pedometer readings, and historical location data, guess what, the devices of today and tomorrow know what floor they are on.

Before someone floods my comments below with meters above sea level don’t help dispatchers! (you are right). Some floors are 12 feet tall, some 14, some 20, you can’t tell which floor the device is on! Au Contraire, Mon Frere. These devices have a “historical plane” of data (in some cases millions of points of reference) they know most of the devices travel on and can, wait for it, give a very high confidence of which exact floor number that specific device is on in the building. I predict within 12 months, this will be solved.

I am sorry Mr. Silicon Valley VC who blew $50m investment on a new in building location tech company, that tech is no longer needed, good luck convincing all those frugal landlords out there to invest millions on in-building tech. Or convincing wireless carriers in a hyper competitive market to spend scarce capital. Why would they if the devices of today and tomorrow already do this with the help of the companies that already do location for them?

For carriers who have been mandated to offer this capability, good news, you don’t need the capital investment in network technology you once thought you did. Companies, like Intrado and others who serve location data can easily inject this into the network and pass this to 9-1-1 center’s and train them how best to use this new information (without costly software upgrades).

Can’t wait to deliver floor number (along with a confidence factor) to first responders. It’s here. Now let’s move on to the staffing crisis plaguing our 9-1-1 centers across this nation, its not as easy to solve …