Already, people
who own an iPhone belong to a certain club. But what if that club came with
fringe benefits, like being able to avoid long lines at Starbucks and other
stores? A recent
patent application
by Apple hints at a killer
future feature that would let iPhone owners bypass long lines by placing orders
at coffee shops and other retail outlets right from their phone. They would then
be alerted via their mobile device when their order is ready. Apple’s head of
hardware engineering Anthony Fadell is listed as the inventor. He states the
problem Apple is trying to solve in the application:
Using a cell phone or other such device to remotely enter into a commercial transaction (such as food or drink ordering) is widespread and well understood. However, in order to initiate such a remote transaction using a cell phone, a user must be aware that a merchant of interest is nearby, must be aware of a list of available items for purchase by the merchant, must be aware of a price for each item, etc. Even in those cases where all the relevant knowledge is available and known, the user must then pay for the services or goods purchases. In some cases, the user must use a credit or debit card by repeating very sensitive information in a voice loud enough to be heard and understood over the phone, or enter the information manually if speaking is not an option. In some cases, if the merchant does not accept the particular payment method, the customer must pay using cash thereby eliminating most, if not all, of the perceived efficiencies of remotely ordering using the cell phone, PDA, media player, etc.
In any case, once the transaction is entered into, the customer order is then queued up in, typically, a first in first out order without distinguishing if the order was placed locally or remotely. In this way, a remote purchaser has only an approximate idea of a time to actually retrieve the order. This can result in an annoying wait in a long queue if the purchaser arrives before completion of the order. In the case of a food and/or drink purchase, a hot drink such as coffee is picked up in a tepid state if the purchaser arrives substantially after the ordered hot drink is ready for pickup.
Therefore, there is a need for improved approaches to process a remote order.
As frivolous as this may seem, what this points to is a larger opportunity for mobile devices to automate commerce in physical stores by connecting the consumer directly with a store’s order-processing system. If Apple is serious about this, it should consider implementing the service in its own Apple stores, where long lines are becoming increasingly common (see photo above).
Note that this is only a patent application. The patent may never be granted, and the idea here may never see the light of day—in an iPhone or any other Apple product. But mobile e-commerce will move in this direction one way or another, combining the convenience of online ordering with the immediacy of physical stores. What the patent application is silent on other than in vague terms is how such transactions will be paid for. Your iPhone or other mobile device would act not only as a mobile ordering system, but also as a mobile wallet.
Here I am speculating, but it could be tied to an existing credit card, your cell phone account, or a separate Apple account. Whoever controls that account, of course, would be in a position to collect any associated merchant transaction fees. Or Apple could waive such fees as an incentive for merchants to sign up for any such future service, since widespread adoption would make its iPhones and other mobile devices that much more desirable.
techcrunch.com
Analytics
have turned shopping sites into finely tuned machines, enabling publishers to
efficiently direct the flow of traffic around a site. However, the same can’t be
said for their real-world counterparts. Aside from running tests using video
tapes and infrared counters, there’s no comprehensive way for businesses to
monitor how customers are flowing through their space. That was until Path Intelligence
came along.
Path
Intelligence is a U.K. based company that monitors foot traffic in a rather
ingenious way, through customers’ cell phones. Periodically our cell phones ping
the nearby cell towers basically saying “Here I am”. Path Intelligence has built
receivers that detect these signals and triangulate the owner’s location with
accuracy of up to a meter.
Each ping also includes the cell’s unique identifier (think IP address). While these IDs help track the movement of the signal and it’s owner, they don’t reveal the identity of the user. Only your service provider knows that. This is a similar, but more precise method than Google Maps is using to detect your general location on your mobile phone by cell tower.
Path Intelligence can then map these signals and track anonymous customers as
they move around and answer questions about the store’s layout through online
reports. Where are the bottle necks? Where do customer’s spend the most time.
How many customers browse and go? You can see the demo here.
The company is currently only launched in the U.K. Possible future plans include allowing users to tie their phone number to their signal ID so they can get special offers (hopefully not spam) linked to their location or other similar location based services. The company has raised about $1 million so far led by Tim O’Reilly’s AlphaTech Venture Partners.
http://storefrontbacktalk.com/story/110207smartcard
Written by Evan Schuman
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With
contactless payment leading the way, the market for smartcards is expected to
hit $1.42 billion by 2011, up from about $472 million today, according to a
report published this week by RFID analyst firm Venture Development
Corp. "As smartcards continue to penetrate applications such as contactless payment, ticketing, security/access control, and e-government, the need to simplify interactions by reducing the overall number of smartcards used by an individual will increase," the report said. "Similar to how cell phones continue to morph into 'Smartphones' by integrating new applications and convergent technologies, so too will smartcards change into a single platform capable of supporting multiple uses. The days of the traditional, single-function smartcard may be numbered." Is this getting us to the point where the rectangular plastic card will become obsolete, with its essence boiled down to a chip inserted in a phone, fob or even someone's head? This raises the troubling question of whether today's offers of a free phone with a multi-year service subscription may be replaced by a multi-year credit card loyalty pledge in exchange for coupons for free chemotherapy? |
Douglas Joyce of Punta Gorda, Fla., with a tracking report on the driving habits of his son, Douglas Joyce, 17.
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THERE is no moment where childhood and incipient adulthood collide that is more universal than the moment a teenager gets behind the wheel of a car. For the teenager, it is simple — it is the first real taste of freedom. But for the parents, that is when the worrying begins.
Some parents, though, are adopting new technology to monitor their fledgling drivers.
David Phipps, a security consultant in Baltimore, is one of them. After his daughter, Katie, got her driver’s permit, Mr. Phipps said he worried about her safety on the road. So this year he bought a palm-size global positioning device that uses satellite technology to keep an eye on her Toyota Scion.
“I can click on the ‘track now’ button,” said Mr. Phipps, of Bel Air, Md., “then go online, and in 35 seconds I can see where she is.
Ordering
a Big Mac by RFID
Telecom & mobile
A pilot program at a Seoul McDonald's lets customers place orders
by pointing their cell phone at the items they want. Orders are
auto-
matically charged to the customer's phone bill.
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