RTLS Value & Demand Strongest in Hospitals

Analyst Briefing titled "RTLS Technology: Value Proposition Overrides Costs" concludes RTLS has the strongest demand in hospitals.

Frost and Sullivan conducted a briefing yesterday (August 5, 2010) on RTLS and concluded that in many industries including healthcare the value proposition of RTLS overrides the cost. Neelima Sagar, Senior Research Analyst, presented her findings following recent research on the state of the industry. Although her presentation included market trends in many business verticals, including manufacturing, retail, transportation and defense, she boldly concluded that RTLS has the strongest demand in hospitals.

Here are some highlights, commentary and observations from Awarepoint’s perspective:

1. Interest for RTLS has increased over the years, but oftentimes, cost remains a deterrent. The ROI must be clearly understood!

At Awarepoint, our focus on Client Success is all about driving value, proving the ROI and remaining involved with our hospital partners to assure their RTLS investment is returning value every day. We have dozens of client success stories at our nearly 70 hospital sites across the country - many of whom are willing to speak at conferences and events on the benefits of RTLS at their facilities. I’ll continue to share client presentations, and encourage you to keep checking this blog for news about events where our clients are speaking and so you can view downloads of their presentations. Here are a few recent client success stories:

• UCSD Medical Center: Using RTLS to Overcome Business Challenges in Today’s OR
• UCSF Medical Center: RTLS Asset Management Case Study
• San Joaquin Community Hospital: Successful Deployment of RTLS in Healthcare 

2. The healthcare vertical is the largest market segment for RTLS.

Managing mobile assets in a hospital is an enormous task. Nurses, techs and support staff must spend time looking for equipment throughout the day to care for patients, and thousands of pieces of equipment constantly move around the hospital. Considering the very personal, vastly significant human impact of the business of healthcare, finding what you need when you need it is more imperative here than in any other industry.

3. ZigBee is evolving as a renowned technology and is anticipated to show high growth over the next several years.

Technology innovations, better functionality, high accuracy rates and falling price are anticipated to keep up the demand for this technology. ZigBee is expected to drive market demand and is growing in both healthcare and industrial applications. As any of you who follow Awarepoint know, our RTLS solution is ZigBee-based. Awarepoint is setting the standard for networked awareness infrastructure to support hospitals today and into the future. Matt Perkins, Awarepoint’s CTO, wrote a very informative blog post a few weeks back that describes ZigBee in more detail. The referenced Market Dynamics report from OnWorld also verified that ZigBee is crossing the chasm. This report further confirmed that ZigBee market opportunities are expanding for smart energy, healthcare, retail, consumer electronics, building automation and telecommunications.

Frost and Sullivan concluded that the RTLS market is expected to continuously grow in the future and there is significant scope for emerging applications. And, the “way forward” will focus on greater emphasis on operational efficiency and effective utilization of resources.

You can view the entire Frost and Sullivan presentation by clicking on this link and filling out the registration form for RTLS Technology: Value Proposition Overrrides Costs.

~ Valerie Fritz