Ekahau takes in $6M for Wi-Fi tracking tech
Ekahau, a Saratoga, Calif., developer of Wi-Fi based real-time location systems, raised $6 million in a recent funding round. Several large international investors, including Nexit Ventures, Irish Life International, Startup Fund I-Ky and 3M, took part in the round.
Ekahau sells systems that track the location of cell phones, radio transmitters, Wi-Fi enabled devices, and the company’s own “Wi-Fi tags” — small, inexpensive transmitters that can be attached to anything from medical equipment to forklifts — within a Wi-Fi network. The company is marketing the technology to hospitals interested in keeping tabs on their patients and to manufacturers who want to track products along a production line. The tracking systems can also be used as a security tool that follows the movement of valuable assets within a business or government organization.
Ekahau uses advanced triangulation methods developed at Helsinki University in Finland, which the company says are accurate to within a meter. Ekahau, founded in 2000, scored a 2006 deal with the U.S. Air Force to track ground-support equipment, but many of the startup’s biggest wins have been outside the United States. For instance, the company has taken on projects tracking public buses in Madrid, amusement-park visitors in Dubai, medical equipment in Belfast and hospital patients in Belgium.
Ekahau competes with Newbury Networks, a Boston firm whose technology can track any device within a Wi-Fi network. Ekahau’s system are designed only to follow devices that are using Ekahau software, although the company claims that its approach is more accurate and reliable than Newbury’s offering.
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