DOT Med News: FORT WAYNE, IN -- EXTENSION, INC. and AeroScout have announced that the two companies have collaborated to develop integrated solutions that combine EXTENSION's VoIP alerting with AeroScout's Healthcare RTLS (Real-Time Location System). AeroScout's core healthcare offerings provide real-time location, status and condition information about assets, patients and staff. EXTENSION, INC. provides an appliance-based software application that aggregates HL7 and web-services data from all HIS and EMR systems, delivers relevant information to mobile devices such as Cisco IP Phones and cell phones and allows recipients to send automated responses via their device. Together, the two companies can provide a more enriched, clinically-relevant tracking and alerting solution integrated with the Cisco Unified Communications platform so that healthcare organizations can improve clinical and operational workflows.

Both AeroScout and EXTENSION provide solutions that leverage healthcare organizations' existing Wi-Fi infrastructure. EXTENSION offers a comprehensive solution suite, including EXTENSION® HealthLocate™ for AeroScout and Cisco that utilizes the entire Cisco Unified Communications platform including Cisco Unified Presence Server for location services. Todd Plesko, CEO of EXTENSION, INC. noted, "EXTENSION can offer an extensive number of interfaces through a single, enterprise appliance. When healthcare institutions implement our solutions they can expect immediate improvements in communications among disparate systems, departments and across their entire organization. We are thrilled to have joined forces with AeroScout as this allows us to provide a solution in the fast-growing healthcare RTLS space with the recognized market leader."

Click here for complete story from DOT Med News

RFID News: Genesis Health System has implemented AeroScout’s Wi-Fi RTLS for hospital-wide asset tracking and management at Genesis Medical Center in Davenport, Iowa.

The solution uses Genesis Health System’s existing wireless network and consists of AeroScout Wi-Fi Tags, AeroScout Exciters and AeroScout MobileView software to track and manage about 700 items throughout the medical center, including infusion pumps, wheelchairs, stretchers and powered air-purifying respirators.

Using RFID to monitor these items significantly reduces the amount of time the staff spends searching for key equipment and gives the hospital a better idea of how to allocate its resources.

The AeroScout solution also plays an important role in the medical center’s disaster preparedness plan. Knowing the exact location of critical equipment has helped the logistics team demonstrate that it can react quickly and deliver the required equipment to the right places on time.

Click here for complete story from RFID News

RFID News: Munich International Airport has announced that it will adopt AeroScout`s GPS and Wi-Fi RFID solution to track thousands of cargo and passenger baggage dollies as they move about the airport. AeroScout T6 GPS Wi-Fi Tags will be mounted on the airport`s cargo dollies, used by cargo companies to pick up and drop off packages, and passenger baggage dollies, used for transporting baggage between terminals and airplanes. The active tags use GPS to determine location of the assets and transmit the data over a standard Wi-Fi network, which the airport already has in place.

Knowing where dollies are at all times will help Munich Airport prevent operations delays or interruptions due to missing or lost items, and eliminate lengthy searches for dollies that are due for their annual maintenance inspections. In addition, the airport will also be able to charge cargo companies more accurately based on the location and usage of dollies, according to AeroScout.

Click here for complete story from RFID News

Business Wire: REDWOOD CITY, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Following the recent announcement of an agreement between Premier Purchasing Partners, L.P., and AeroScout, the Premier healthcare alliance announced today that it has selected AeroScout as the sole source provider of RFID Asset Tracking and Management solutions for Premier’s ASCEND™ program. The three-year agreement covers AeroScout’s Wi-Fi RTLS healthcare visibility solutions for all ASCEND members. AeroScout’s solutions will leverage ASCEND members’ standard Wi-Fi networks and offer a broad range of applications and capabilities that deliver strong returns for hospital organizations.

ASCEND (Accelerated Supply Chain Endeavor) is designed to help healthcare providers achieve and sustain rapid improvements in supply chain performance. It also assists Premier alliance member hospitals in ongoing efforts to control and reduce costs through simplified purchasing processes, appropriate clinical utilization and specially negotiated contracts. More than 90 participants that represent approximately $2.7 billion in supply chain purchasing volume and close to 24,000 hospital beds are collaborating to share best practices in supply chain efficiency as a part of the program.

“Premier and ASCEND are committed to providing members with systems and solutions that improve quality, heighten safety, manage risk and reduce costs," said Mike Alkire, President of Premier Purchasing Partners.

AeroScout addresses the entire set of visibility application requirements of hospital organizations in the most comprehensive and cost efficient manner. With AeroScout’s scalable Unified Asset Visibility solutions, customers can work with a single, proven provider and implement one platform for all current and future asset, patient and staff visibility needs. AeroScout’s solutions include real-time Asset Management, Equipment Maintenance and Humidity & Temperature Monitoring and are exclusively endorsed by the American Hospital Association.

“We’re proud to be the exclusive provider of RFID Asset Tracking and Management Solutions for Premier’s ASCEND program,” said Gabi Daniely, Vice President of Marketing and Product Strategy at AeroScout. “This selection reinforces AeroScout’s position as the top vendor in the category and the market, and we look forward to working with ASCEND hospitals toward the common goal of improving operational performance as well as overall patient safety and care.”

For more information on enrolling in ASCEND, please visit www.premierinc.com/ascend.

Click here for complete story from Business Wire

TMC Net: By Marisa Torrieri, TMCnet Editor

Since Arnold Clark Automobiles upgraded to a WiFi (News - Alert)-and-RFID-based system via the Cisco Unified Wireless Network this summer, cars have become so much easier to track that the European independent auto dealer has already saved 125 hours a month, which means two service workers can focus on other areas.


Before implementing the Cisco (News - Alert) Unified Wireless Network, “the dealership -- which has 145 locations and 8,000 employees across the United Kingdom – would sometimes find it challenging to track down the right car for the right customer quickly,” saidChris Kozup ( News - Alert), senior manager of mobility solutions for networking giant Cisco. The flagship dealership, located in Stafford, maintains an inventory of 1,000 cars for sale at any given time on a 12-acre lot and 74,000 square-foot showroom.

But when a customer arrives to the sales lot, associates typically have less than 10 minutes to engage the customer and find the right car or they could lose the sales opportunity. With the new Cisco-based system in place, a sales associate can pinpoint the exact location of a desired car within minutes. First, the sales person goes to a terminal with Arnold Clark’s inventory management software that is connected to the AeroScout Vehicle Tracking Solution application. They select the parameters – for example, “customer wants a 2007 blue four-door” -- and plug in that information. The tracking system scans the inventory to see the cars that match the criteria, and then, “pings into” the Cisco “Mobility Services Engine” to determine where the car is located. Because cars wear active Radio Frequency Identification (or RFID) tags that send out signals to the tracking system, their location on a floor plan or lot is exact, Kozup said.

“What the Cisco Mobility Services Engine does is allows us to take that location information and put it into the AeroScout Vehicle tracking solution,” Kozup said. “And the combination of that information with the tracking solution helps the car sales associate know where a car is located on a floor or lot plan.”

Click here for complete story from TMC Net

Market Wire: REDWOOD CITY, CA--(Marketwire - September 15, 2009) - AeroScout, the leading provider of Unified Asset Visibility for the healthcare industry, today announced that WellSpan Health's York Hospital has deployed AeroScout's Wi-Fi-based healthcare visibility solution. York Hospital's emergency, biomedical engineering and transportation departments are using the AeroScout solution to track critical medical equipment throughout the facility to ensure that staff can quickly locate required items. The solution and its time-saving benefits are proving to be especially valuable in the emergency department during peak hours by helping to increase efficiency while improving patient satisfaction, care and safety.

York Hospital is a 580-bed, 1.2 million square-foot community teaching hospital that employs more than 3,400 people. It is currently being upgraded to one of only two Level 1 Trauma centers in south-central Pennsylvania. The hospital had wanted to implement a real-time location system (RTLS) for the last five years. When the project received approval and funding last summer, York Hospital selected AeroScout's solution primarily because it is Wi-Fi-based and because a Cisco Unified Wireless Network was already in place for data and voice over IP. York Hospital implemented the solution in collaboration with CDW Healthcare, which provided product guidance, industry expertise and logistical assistance, helping WellSpan to deploy an effective, scalable solution that supports patient care demands.

"One clear advantage of the AeroScout solution is that it leverages standard Wi-Fi, which means it was easy and cost effective to deploy and manage, allowed us to get up and running quickly and allowed us to stay within our budget," said Chad Noll, manager of biomedical engineering at WellSpan.

The solution deployed at York Hospital consists of AeroScout's MobileView software and Wi-Fi Tags. The tags are attached to a range of medical items that are constantly moving throughout the facility, including gurneys, infusion pumps, feeding pumps, portable physiological monitors and circulatory assistance pumps. The hospital also tracks its Wi-Fi enabled computers-on-wheels and IP phones. These items can be tracked without tags and without additional installed software clients, a functionality that can be achieved only with AeroScout's solution. When a tracked item is needed, staff can immediately locate it with MobleView's user-friendly interface via any computer on the network.

Click here for complete story from Market Wire

Reuters (Business Wire): REDWOOD CITY, Calif., Sep 02, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Premier Purchasing Partners, L.P., the group purchasing unit of the Premier healthcare alliance has selected AeroScout's healthcare visibility solutions as the exclusive Wi-Fi-based RFID solutions for Premier's member hospitals. Premier, a quality and cost improvement alliance of more than 2,200 U.S. hospitals and 63,000 other healthcare sites, awarded a three-year contract to AeroScout as a preferred provider for RFID Asset Tracking and Management Solutions. AeroScout solutions provide visibility into the location, status and condition of assets, patients and staff throughout all hospital departments. AeroScout is already the chosen solution for hundreds of hospitals and is exclusively endorsed by the American Hospital Association.
"Premier is proud to offer RFID solutions that drive key benefits for hospital organizations, such as ensuring regulatory compliance, improving patient safety, reducing capital and operational expenditures, increasing staff efficiency and enhancing patient care," said Mike Alkire, President of Premier Purchasing Partners.
AeroScout's healthcare solutions include real-time Asset Management, Equipment Maintenance, Humidity & Temperature Monitoring, Workflow & Resource Management and Patient & Staff Safety. These applications all employ AeroScout's industry-leading technology that leverages clients' existing Wi-Fi infrastructure and integrates with most healthcare IT software systems. AeroScout solutions serve the needs of clinical staff, IT management, clinical engineers, biomedical engineers, materials management, laboratory staff, pharmacy personnel and many other hospital users.

Click here for complete story from Reuters (Business Wire)

Globes Israel's Business Arena: AeroScout has recently completed a $13 million internal fund raising round. $7 million was raised from the company's existing investors, and a further $6 million in the form of a venture loan. This is in addition to $10 million raised by the company at the beginning of the year. The company, which was founded a decade ago, has so far raised a total of $70 million, including the current round. Investors in AeroScout include VC firms Pitango, Greylock, Star, and Menlo Ventures, and also Intel and Cisco. The company was founded a decade ago, and is now near profitability.

Click here for complete story from Globes Israel's Business Arena

PR-INSIDE.COM: AeroScout, Inc. : , the leading provider of Unified Asset Visibility solutions for the healthcare industry, today reported strong growth of its healthcare client base, revenue and solution set in the first quarter of 2009. AeroScout added more than 30 new hospital clients in Q1, and 40 existing healthcare clients made additional purchases of AeroScout solutions.

Click here for complete story from PR-INSIDE.COM

Sanjay Chatterjee, Mind Commerce: This unique report addresses core technology and business aspects of real-time location services (RTLS) and guides the reader through the most important aspects of enabling technologies including RFID. It covers the critical factors and gives the user the views about the different kinds of RFIDs. The report also addresses the advantages and the bottlenecks for deployment of RTLS applications, evaluating available solutions and the methodologies. The report includes an exhaustive study of leading RTLS companies. Different types of RTLS are evaluated and the standards and protocols related to them. The report has a great focus on the applications and the key areas that can be addressed by RTLS giving special attention to Vehicle Tracking, Port/Yard Management, Inventory Management and Real Time Tracking solutions. The report also provides an analysis of the most widely used RTLS applications today and provides a vision for anticipated future applications.

Click here for complete report from Sanjay Chatterjee, Mind Commerce