The Guardian device was announced last year, as a method of allowing parents to track their children or for locating them in the tragic event of a kidnapping. Now, Taipei-based BeLuvv is launching a sister product called Puppy, which allows pet owners to keep track of their pets.
Puppy uses the same tracking technology as Guardian, but it does it in a pet-friendly form factor. It includes the tracking device itself as well as a pouch that can be affixed to most dog collars. The company promises that the device is thin and light enough to be easy for a dog to wear. It's also water resistant, so owners can leave it on the dog while bathing or in a rain storm. It's not meant for swimming though, and the company recommends removing it before such activities.
Puppy connects with its app using Bluetooth Smart and allows users to see the last known location of the animal. In the event of a runaway, this should make it fairly painless to track down the dog and bring it home. If the dog leaves a range of 230 ft (60 m), the user receives a notification so they can begin locating their pet.
Like the original Guardian, users can authorize other people to be in their safety network. This means they can also track the dog and help with the search. Additionally, if the signal is lost, a search mode will launch, in which other Puppy users will join in the search anonymously.
BeLuvv is offering its Puppy tracking devices for pre-order for US$29.95. It did not announce a final release date.
The video below offers a humorous look at how Puppy works.
Source: BeLuvv
Really, this system is only going to work in heavily populated areas with a reasonable number of people using the system. But until that happens, there is no incentive to use it, so it's a bit of a catch 22 situation really.
Of course, I could be missing something, but there is no decent technical explanation on their site, which is actually quite crap as websites go, I wish companies would keep their overly enthusiastic web designers under control...
Viv Lu