Integrating building automation with location awareness utilizing wireless mesh technology

• US 10,419,889 B2
• Filed: 12/17/2018
• Issued: 09/17/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 11/14/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: WiSilica, Inc.
• Original Assignee: WiSilica, Inc.
• Inventors: Singamsetty, Suresh, Kwan, Dennis Ching Chung, Antony, Francis
• Primary Examiner(s): Wong, K.
• Application Number:
  US16/222,841
• Publication Number:
  US 20190141484A1
• Time in Patent Office: 274 Days
• Field of Search: None
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/56 Provisioning of proxy services store-and-forward switching systems in data switching networks H04L12/54
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/566 Grouping or aggregating service requests, e.g. for unified processing
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/33 for indoor environments, e.g. buildings
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/70 Services for machine-to-machine communication [M2M] or machine type communication [MTC]
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/80 Services using short range communication, e.g. near-field communication [NFC], radio-frequency identification [RFID] or low energy communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/18 Self-organising networks, e.g. ad-hoc networks or sensor networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 88/16 Gateway arrangements

Abstract

A system for providing location awareness in a building automation system includes a mesh network of lighting devices on a first floor of a building and a second mesh network of lighting devices on a second floor of the building each aggregating a tracking tag signals at a floor level gateway of the building automation system.

Claims

1. A method for providing location awareness in a building automation system, the method comprising:

receiving a tag signal at a first plurality of nodes of a first mesh network of devices on a first floor of a building and aggregating the tag signal at a first floor level gateway of the building automation system;

receiving the tag signal at a second plurality of nodes of a second mesh network of devices on a second floor of the building and aggregating the tag signal at a second floor level gateway of the building automation system;

at a premise level gateway of the building, aggregating the tag signal aggregated by the first floor level gateway and the second floor level gateway into tag data, and communicating the tag data to a cloud server;

wherein the cloud server processes the tag data to compute a tracking tag location and mobility; and

wherein the tag location and mobility is distributed to the first plurality of nodes and the second plurality of nodes.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising associating the tracking tag location with a floor level.

3. The method of claim 1, identifying the tracking tag location relative to one or more of a smartphone, tracked object, or device.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the tracking tag location is associated with a control module on a device.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising controlling the device remotely over one or both of the first mesh network and the second mesh network.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the device is a lighting device.

7. The method of claim 5, further comprising controlling the device for one or more of lighting color, lighting brightness, and lighting temperature.

8. The method of claim 5, wherein at least one device of the first plurality of nodes or the second plurality of nodes is a mobile device.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein the first mesh network and the second mesh network conform to the Bluetooth Low Energy standard.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the tracking tag is coupled with an object that is to be tracked.

11. The method of claim 1 where in the tag data comprises sensor readings collected in proximity to the tracking tag.

12. The method of claim 1 wherein a combination of a first node in first known location, a second node in a second known location, and a third node in a third known location of one or more of the floor levels triangulate the location of the tracking tag by computing a difference in RSSI values for the tag signal received at the first node, the second node, and the third node.

13. A system for providing location awareness in a building automation system, the system comprising:

a first plurality of nodes of a first mesh network of lighting devices on a first floor of a building, the first plurality of nodes aggregating a tag signal at a first floor level gateway of the building automation system;

a second plurality of nodes of a second mesh network of lighting devices on a second floor of the building, the second plurality of nodes aggregating the tag signal at a second floor level gateway of the building automation system;

a premise level gateway of the building aggregating the tag signal aggregated by the first floor level gateway and the second floor level gateway into tag data and communicating the tag data to a cloud server that processes the tag data to compute a tracking tag location and mobility and initiates distribution of the tag location and mobility to the first plurality of nodes and the second plurality of nodes.