BluBits

2006 Consensus Software Awards

Product Description

McSoft BluBits (formerly McSoft BlueThunder) is a Bluetooth development library for Windows XP, Windows XP Embedded, Windows CE and Pocket PC devices. We have developed a .NET software library that makes implementation easier and allows devices to go in and out of range while holding multiple channels of communication. We are currently trialling with Qld Police, for use in their vehicles, having obtained appropriate hardware during a trade mission to Taiwan. We are also using BluBits at a John Holland construction site in NSW, with a variety of their sites due to have BluBits installed in the coming months.

Innovation

McSoft BluBits allows end users to obtain and synchronise data up to 100m away from it's source using low powered PDA devices. Currently the end user must use physical hardware connections (eg a USB cable) to do this. Adding this sort of technology to vehicles will allow workers to have "structured data" connectivity to their office (via Bluetooth and GPRS/CDMA) while away from their vehicle.

Performance

This development allows for Police officers to work with a PDA up to 100m from their vehicle and still be connected to the database in a secure PC-like device in the boot of their car, and optionally via GPRS from that PC-like device to a central server. Presently Queensland Police have a dashboard mounted PC that is costly and bulky, and cannot be taken outside the vehicle. With the likelihood of Smart-card or barcoded drivers licenses being introduced soon, now is the time to capitalize on this technology space.

Potential

Via the Qld Govt, we have had interest from the Canadian Govt for their entire police force vehicles and from places such as Vietnam (putting a proposal to the World Bank in May 06 as part of a $US90m IT systems initiative in this country). Venture capitalists have pointed out to us that the US market is very fragmented, so we are targeting Canada as a gateway. Currently trialling with John Holland in Australia, at one of their construction sites, so that supervisors can collect job data in the field and have it synchronised with the main office database each time they return. A number of companies supplying work related communications gateway’s into vehicles, similar to our InCarComms (picture and description available on www.mcsoft.com.au ), as far afield as Canada have also expressed a strong interest.

Other information the judges should know

Over the coming months we will be exhibiting at CeBIT in Hannover, Germany in March (Austrade Pavillion), at CeBIT in Sydney in May (with Queensland .NET), at the Microsoft Embedded Developer’s Conference in Melbourne in June (as we also launch the Windows Embedded Developer Interest Group – Australia), and at CommunicAsia in Singapore in mid-June (with AEEMA).

More information available on our website at www.BluBits.com

We have been trialling with a variety of Bluetooth 2.0 dongles that we collected in Taiwan and will shortly brand such dongles with the BluBits name.

McSoft BluBits will also be used in a $300m shutdown of the Port Kembla steelworks in Sept 2007 when John Holland will have about 800 blokes working around the clock for 85 days to relign Blast Furnace No 5 of the plant. Every day late will cost John Holland several million dollars time and data efficiency will be of prime importance. We are looking at integrating a number of technologies (RFID, GPS, GPRS, CDMA, Barcode, Smartcard) into a "complete solution" for this project. We have also developed a click-n-flick business management system creation tool fully integrated with Microsoft Visual Studio 2005, using this as our base on which to add technologies such as McSoft BluBits.

We now share office space with our Police Car Project partner, Intellidesign, a 25 person hardware design and manufacture company based in Ashgrove, Brisbane, Queensland.

Content Copyright©Company McSoft Pty Ltd
Format Copyright©Consensus Pty Ltd

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