Winner of a Technology Strategy Board IC Tomorrow digital innovation challenge, the technology will allow a new generation of location-aware festival apps to deliver ground-breaking features for audiences, and a new level of behavioural understanding for promoters.
For Wireless, Crowd Connected used a combination of code embedded into the official iOS and Android Wireless mobile apps. The team then provided promoter Live Nation with a web-based console displaying a real-time crowd density heat-map overlaid on the Finsbury Park site map, and real-time occupancy and dwell time information for everything from stages to bars to sponsor activities.
Crowd Connected founder and CEO James Cobb explains, "Unlike similar systems, Crowd Connected doesn't just rely on iBeacons for customer positions, but uses a patent-pending combination of multiple positioning technologies including Bluetooth low energy, GPS and Bluetooth classic. The result is truly accurate crowd information, rather than the simple proximity offered by iBeacons alone.
"As well as positioning information - invaluable for crowd control and health and safety - the marketing potential of this information is huge, allowing sponsors and artists to connect via instant push notifications to people's mobile phones. This data can then be used to segment and reconnect with customers in the future."
The trial at Wireless saw Crowd Connected install over 90 iBeacons covering the entire site. During each of the three days of the festival; 15,000 unique devices connected to the system with over 55m individual data points logged.
The system also offers benefits to the festival-goer, with Cobb commenting, "Imagine that your festival app can tell you not just where the nearest toilets are, but the ones with the shortest queue, or the exact location of your tent or your friends - even if they're front of stage with tens of thousands of other people. That's what Crowd Connected does, and it does it all without draining precious battery life as you don't need your GPS turned on."
Chris Mitchell, digital marketing manager, Live Nation UK, added,"Working with Crowd Connected has been a pleasure. They've provided the nimbleness and agility you'd expect from a start-up, and their innovation has great commercial potential. The value they've brought to Live Nation and Wireless Festival 2014 has enabled a thorough analysis of our customers' behaviour, improved our understanding of front-of-house and enhanced crowd management abilities."
Matt Sansam, programme manager of IC Tomorrow, added, "The Technology Strategy Board, through its IC tomorrow innovation programme, is delighted to have funded and facilitated this truly innovative trial. This is the first time a system such as this has been trialled at such a large event and it's hugely encouraging to see the level of consumer take up and the insights for the festival organiser this produced.
"All this was achieved within just a few months of Crowd Connected winning the contest. This is a great example of what IC tomorrow is all about - helping to fund early stage innovation and finding industry partners for these small companies, to help them on the road to wider commercialisation."
(Jim Evans)
