Hybrid cloud location services by Pitney Bowes and IBM

Pitney Bowes Inc. and IBM have announced collaboration on IBM’s codename “BlueMix” platform-as-aservice to develop new hybrid cloud location services that help businesses unearth deeper connections between their customers, their geography, and their networks to deliver more personalized services and contextually relevant experiences. BlueMix provides DevOps in the cloud – an open, integrated development experience that scales to any level. Pitney Bowes is among the first third-party solutions now available to developers and companies on the new IBM BlueMix Platformas- a-Service (PaaS). www.pb.com

Garmin Xperia™ Smartphones

Garmin® International Inc has announced a new navigation app for Xperia™ smartphones1 with an extension for Sony SmartWatch 2. The new app seamlessly integrates with Sony SmartWatch 2 to display walking directions, providing users navigation information right on their wrist and without having to hold a phone. www.garmin.com/pressroom

High-tech surveillance data on China islands

China has collected detailed topographic information and images of all its islands using aerial remote sensing. The completion of the project marks the country’s first “systematic and comprehensive” move to collect surveillance information on the more than 10,500 islands within its territory, said the State Oceanic Administration (SOA). It took three years of work by the aviation law enforcement forces with the China Marine Surveillance (CMS), according to an SOA statement. http://news.xinhuanet.com

Global location chip targets wearables

Broadcom Corporation offers the industry’s first GNSS system-on-chip (SoC), designed for low-power, mass-market wearable devices such as fitness trackers and smart watches. The BCM4771 GNSS SoC with on-chip sensor hub enables consumers to more accurately track and manage their health and well being by delivering precision activity tracking and location data while consuming less power than traditional architectures. This enables location intelligence and the extended battery life needed by the growing wearable market. The chip constantly monitors user activity levels and location history to improve accuracy while adding advanced features such as location batching. www.broadcom.com

Pinpointing users where GPS doesn’t work

Ruckus Wireless has unveiled the Ruckus Smart Positioning Technology (SPoT) service. This cloud-based service gives carriers, service providers and enterprises the ability to deliver location-based services using Wi-fi in locations where GPS is not effective.

New and existing Ruckus Smart Wi-fiaccess points are now capable of powerful and accurate client positioning for indoor or dense urban environments, where GPS doesn’t always work. By knowing where clients are located, companies are able to help them get wherever they need to go, making the network experience better for them, or use data from their location to optimise their experience. www.crn.com.au

GPS devices in election campaign in India

Over 400 campaign vehicles and tempos of the Bharatiya Janata Party in Uttar Pradesh (UP) have been fitted with GPS devices to keep a check on any laxity from workers while campaigning in each assembly constituency in the state. Monitoring of these campaign vehicles will be done from a control room set up in state capital, Lucknow. According to a party leader, installation of GPS devices and monitoring from a control room would be done only to keep an eye on the workers so that the party is not misled by workers about the movement of vehicles. Monitoring at the control room would be done by volunteers of Citizens for Accountable Governance (CAG), a non-profit group supporting BJP prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi. www.dnaindia.com