Once upon a time
GPS was founded by the United States of America Defense Department in 1973. It works through a 24 active satellite network distributed along 6 Earth orbital planes, known as the Global Satellite Navigation System. The key objective is to transmit signals to GPS devices, that receive the request and turn available real-time their localisation. These devices can be placed in multiple actives, including vehicles, machines, people and things.
But... how does GPS work?
Through a system named triangulation it is possible to reach extremely low error margins, below twenty metres. This is how the system works: three satellites submit the signal for GPS receivers continuously, that compute how much time it took to reach them. Asset localisation is in the intersection of those 3 values. In a graphical way, imagine our planet over 3 different planes and craft 3 circles with submitted signals. Your localisation is the only point where circles meet each other.
With the regular signals submission it is possible to monitor assets motion, opening new productivity and performance opportunity windows for the daily business management.
GPS & iOT: A great partnership
GPS was a pioneer method to retrieve and process physical world information in digital format. iOT presents a unique capability to retrieve, process, organize and optimize large chunks of information of anything connected to the Internet. It also enables the communication between those things and automatisation of activity flows related to their usage.
Example: With iOT applications you can know real-time when a bus suffered an accident or a pet left home without anyone noticing. Complementing this with GPS it is possible to send specialized teams to restore normality.
Summing it up, iOT is responsible to monitor things in order to digital process massive information related to usage. GPS is responsible to turn available physical geographic coordinates of that thing. Working simultaneously, the range of possibilities is endless - from smart cities until innovative products such as autonomous cars or health wearables solutions.