We just exhibited at GFX (Government Fleet Expo), organized by Eric Bearly at Bobit, which was a great show with 500 attendees.
Whenever we go to a show, we have a big 52″ LCD at our booth. To rent a cheap 50″ which has poor resolution typically would cost us $950, which is nuts. So I usually buy a new one at Best Buy for less than double that instead and store it in the closest office/friendly person’s home for use in the next local conference where we exhibit.
Well, my TV just went out at home, so guess what? I get this one.
But shipping them is a nightmare, since they sit on a dock & stand a pretty good chance of getting stolen.
So I stuck a GPS tracking device, an EZ-1000 in it (someone called the device Telemundo, Spanish for TV, I guess…)
When I was at the Airport, I was able to confirm that they picked it up using my iPhone like this:
(Here is how to take a screen shot with an Iphone — hold down the round application button & press the top power button.)
So I knew it made it off the dock and to a transfer dock to be shipped to my office (and then my living room…).
I was surprised to see they flew it, and our 900 lb trade show booth from Denver to Salt Lake City, then to LA. Hopefully we’ll see the TV on Monday, and then I can watch TV again.
Here are a few more screen shots of how I was able to track the TV on the way from the trade-show:
I clicked on Get Directions to see how far it was, thinking they were driving it (but it’s being flown apparently):
Note that it’s at LAX Airport right now.
While it’s in the air, we don’t receive GPS or transmit location, since the plane blocks the GPS signal, but this is pretty good for determining roughly where a TV is. We are working on a different product which is better for determining an asset’s location, even if it’s well inside a truck/structure. But for now, we stick to vehicle, and the occasional TV headed for Rob’s living room, and this does the trick. If it had wound up in a dockworker’s home, we would have been able to send police pretty easily.
We only sell EZ-1000’s for business use, such as for security patrols/bike police, etc., but those security-oriented customers occasionally use them to track things like this, & I’m glad we have this capability ourselves. We also use them as easy demo units, so if you want a very quick proof of concept, charge one up, stick it in a vehicle or two’s drink-holder, & you’ve got a tracking proof of concept without having to do an install (which still is only typically 15 minutes or so).
Rob.
