Fastlane turnstiles and AdvaNova co-exhibiting at Education Estates
Fastlane turnstiles and AdvaNova will be co-exhibiting at Education Estates – join us at stand 605 in the Manchester Central Convention Complex, 18-19 October 2022.
Education Estates is the annual gathering of the UK’s education community, organised in partnership with the Department for Education. We have teamed up with identification technology specialists AdvaNova (formerly Telepen) to showcase how the two companies’ products can integrate to create exciting new possibilities for education-sector customers.
Optimising usage of workspace resources
The education sector was hit by even greater COVID disruption than most elements of our society. Because of that, and because of the need to maintain tight belts in a time of continuing economic difficultly, education sector customers are increasingly looking for ways to optimise their usage of workspace resources, whether that be teaching spaces, staff meeting rooms or personal study spaces. Consequently, Integrated Design Limited (manufacturers of Fastlane turnstiles) and AdvaNova – both separately and together – have been working on ways to help with that.
IDL products are classed as entrance control, and, like all such systems, they need to be integrated with partner technology that handles identification and authorisation (for a primer on the difference between entrance control and access control, go here). Entrance control and access control link together according to internationally recognised standards, meaning that IDL products can connect to any identification and authorisation solution, but we at IDL have quite a history of working with AdvaNova, and we’ll be joining forces again in Manchester this October.
Our goals at Education Estates are to show how seamlessly our two companies’ offerings integrate, but also to talk about how the data gathered can be put to powerful, additional use.
Any system that identifies individuals so as to control access, ends up knowing how many people pass through each control point. Historically, that data wasn’t used once the authorisation task was complete. Nowadays, the insight it can provide is much more valuable.
‘Smart building’ is a term you hear more and more these days, and accurate people-counting is at the heart of all of the efficiency gains that are to be had from that. If you know exactly who is where, your building management system can automatically adjust temperature and lighting throughout the day, driving sustainability-related outcomes and making for a more consistently pleasant space for all occupants.
But moment-to-moment occupancy counting is only the simplest way in which this data can be used. Once gathered, it can be accessed by management staff, who now have a powerful tool to analyse usage patterns. Note that there is often a large discrepancy between booking information, even where available, and actual usage data. Only with the latter can you really know whether you have too many teaching spaces, or too few, and so on. Perhaps some should be turned over to other use, or perhaps underused meeting rooms can be reassigned in purpose. Modern tools can increasingly provide more subtle results, such as a squeeze on self-study space, but only on the days leading into work hand-in deadlines.
This data affects more than heat and light. It can tell you which are the busy days when you need extra staff, or more cleaning done at the end of the day. It may let you see what equipment is experiencing heavy use, and is thus likely to require more maintenance going forward.
And see this link for astonishing information on how our partner AdvaNova is using neural networks to create learning systems that themselves analyse data, to become adaptive and predictive, not just reactive.
The specific items on show in Manchester will centre on a Fastlane Glassgate 150 Speedgate, integrated with AdvaNova’s 2D imager and RFID reader technology. But, representatives from both companies will be ready to talk to you about all of our products and research areas.
If you can’t make it to the show, but would like to learn more about our integrated solutions for the education sector, please get in touch.
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