JP2018128293A - Beacon tracking system and method - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To reduce power consumption at a beacon terminal.SOLUTION: In a receiver device 20, a trigger transmission unit 21 transmits a trigger signal TR for activating a beacon terminal 10 from a device-side antenna 23, and a beacon receiving unit 22 acquires beacon information on the basis of a beacon signal BC from the beacon terminal 10 that was received by the device-side antenna 23. In the beacon terminal 10, a trigger receiving unit 11 generates electric power on the basis of the trigger signal TR from the receiver device 20 that was received by a terminal-side antenna 13 and outputs a trigger detection signal DET in accordance with a rise of an obtained power generation voltage Vp, and a beacon transmission unit 12 transmits a beacon signal BC that includes a terminal ID on the basis of the trigger detection signal DET from the terminal-side antenna 13 by ultralow power UWB wireless communication.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 1

Description

  The present invention relates to a tracking beacon technique in which a receiving device receives a radio signal transmitted intermittently from a beacon terminal and tracks the position of the beacon terminal.

Conventionally, as a beacon system for specifying the position of a beacon terminal, a beacon tracking system for tracking the position of a beacon terminal by receiving a radio signal intermittently transmitted from the beacon terminal by a receiver has been proposed (for example, And non-patent document 1).
Such a beacon tracking system has been widely used due to a decrease in hardware prices and the spread of low-power wireless technologies such as BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy: registered trademark).

  In this beacon tracking system, a beacon signal including a terminal ID is wirelessly transmitted from a beacon terminal at regular intervals. Since the beacon terminal and the terminal ID correspond one-to-one, it is possible to easily identify which beacon terminal exists at which position. A wireless communication profile for beacon signal transmission can be selected according to the use and distance required for the beacon terminal. If an excellent wireless communication profile is adopted, a long transmission distance can be handled with low power consumption. Therefore, a medium level communication distance and a low power consumption BLE beacon are used for general tracking applications.

"Track your phone, wallet, keys & anything else with TrackR!", TrackR, Inc., https://buy.thetrackr.com/jp/ Shoichi Oshima et al., “Low-power technology for wireless sensor terminals using nanowatt-class wireless circuits”, NTT, NTT Technology Journal, 2014.11

  FIG. 6 is a configuration example of a conventional beacon tracking system. FIG. 7 is a transmission example of a conventional beacon signal. Because the beacon terminal is small, it can be attached to a key, bag, pet, etc. As shown in FIGS. 6 and 7, it is lost by continuously transmitting a beacon signal at regular intervals in all directions from an omnidirectional antenna. You can track when you get lost or lost.

  However, such a conventional beacon terminal always transmits a beacon signal at a constant interval t, and the receiving device is based on the latest received beacon signal according to the arrival of the position specifying timing having a constant period T, for example. The position of the beacon terminal is confirmed. For this reason, the beacon terminal requires a certain amount of power, so the battery life is relatively short, and depending on the usage, there is a problem that the battery or the beacon terminal itself needs to be replaced within one year.

  The present invention has been made to solve such problems, and an object of the present invention is to provide a tracking beacon technology capable of reducing power consumption at a beacon terminal.

  In order to achieve such an object, a beacon tracking system according to the present invention includes a beacon terminal that is attached to a tracking target and wirelessly transmits a beacon signal including a terminal ID unique to itself, and the received beacon signal. A beacon tracking system comprising: a receiving device that acquires beacon information for specifying the target location based on the beacon terminal, in order to activate the beacon terminal in response to the arrival of the location specifying timing A trigger transmission unit that transmits the trigger signal from the device-side antenna, and a beacon reception unit that acquires the beacon information based on the beacon signal received from the beacon terminal received by the device-side antenna, the beacon terminal The trigger signal from the receiving device received by the terminal-side antenna A trigger receiving unit that generates power based on the generated power generation voltage and outputs a trigger detection signal according to the obtained power generation voltage, and a beacon signal including the terminal ID based on the trigger detection signal, an ultra low power UWB (Ultra Wide Band) And a beacon transmitter that transmits from the terminal-side antenna by wireless communication.

  Also, in one configuration example of the beacon tracking system according to the present invention, the device-side antenna includes a directional antenna having a certain directivity, and the terminal-side antenna includes a directional antenna having a certain directivity. It will be.

  Also, in one configuration example of the beacon tracking system according to the present invention, the device-side antenna has a directivity for transmitting the trigger signal in a first constant direction, and the beacon signal is transmitted to the first beacon signal. A device-side receiving antenna having directivity for receiving from one constant direction, the terminal-side antenna having a directivity for receiving the trigger signal from a second constant direction, and the beacon signal. And a terminal-side receiving antenna having directivity for transmitting the signal in the second constant direction.

  Also, in one configuration example of the beacon tracking system according to the present invention, the receiving device includes, as the device-side antenna, a plurality of device-side individual antennas arranged in different directions. A reception control unit that switches between a trigger transmission unit and the beacon reception unit, and the beacon terminal includes a plurality of terminal-side individual antennas arranged in different directions as the terminal-side antenna, and the terminal-side individual antenna Each includes a beacon unit including the trigger receiver and a beacon transmitter, and further includes a beacon controller that selectively activates any one of these beacon units.

A beacon terminal according to the present invention is a beacon terminal used in any of the beacon tracking systems described above.
A receiving apparatus according to the present invention is a receiving apparatus used in any of the beacon tracking systems described above.

  In addition, the beacon tracking method according to the present invention includes a beacon terminal that is attached to a tracking target and wirelessly transmits a beacon signal including a terminal ID unique to itself, and the location of the target based on the received beacon signal. A beacon tracking method used in a beacon tracking system including a receiving device for acquiring beacon information for specifying, wherein a trigger transmission unit of the receiving device activates the beacon terminal in response to arrival of a position specifying timing A trigger transmission step of transmitting a trigger signal for transmitting from the device-side antenna, and a trigger receiving unit of the beacon terminal generates power based on the trigger signal from the receiving device received by the terminal-side antenna, and obtained power generation A trigger detection signal is output when the voltage reaches the reference voltage. A beacon in which a beacon transmitting unit of the beacon terminal transmits a beacon signal including the terminal ID from the terminal-side antenna by ultra-low power UWB (Ultra Wide Band) wireless communication based on the trigger detection signal; A transmission step and a beacon receiving unit of the receiving device include a beacon receiving step of acquiring the beacon information based on the beacon signal received from the beacon terminal received by the device-side antenna.

  According to the present invention, the beacon signal is returned from the beacon terminal only when the trigger signal from the receiving device is detected. For this reason, it is possible to avoid transmission of unnecessary beacon signals that occur when beacon signals are transmitted at regular intervals as in the prior art, and it is possible to reduce power consumption at beacon terminals. At this time, power is generated based on the received trigger signal, and the beacon signal is transmitted in accordance with the rise in the generated power generation voltage, so that it is not necessary to use power consumption such as a battery for detecting the trigger signal. For this reason, it becomes possible to transmit a beacon signal at an arbitrary timing without increasing the power consumption at the beacon terminal.

It is a block diagram which shows the structure of the beacon tracking system concerning 1st Embodiment. It is a sequence diagram which shows transmission of a trigger signal and a beacon signal. It is a block diagram which shows the structure of the beacon tracking system concerning 2nd Embodiment. It is a block diagram which shows the structure of the beacon terminal concerning 3rd Embodiment. It is a block diagram which shows the structure of the receiver concerning 3rd Embodiment. It is an example of composition of the conventional beacon tracking system. It is the example of transmission of the conventional beacon signal.

Next, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
[First Embodiment]
First, a beacon tracking system 1 according to a first embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a configuration of a beacon tracking system according to the first embodiment.
The beacon tracking system 1 includes a beacon terminal 10 and a receiving device 20. The beacon signal BC transmitted from the beacon terminal 10 is received by the receiving device 20, and the beacon terminal 10 is attached to the target. A system for determining a position.
In the present invention, the beacon signal BC is transmitted from the beacon terminal 10 by the directional antenna in response to the trigger signal TR transmitted from the receiving device 20 by the directional antenna.

[Beacon terminal]
The beacon terminal 10 is composed of an electronic medium in which an electronic circuit and a small antenna are incorporated in a case such as plastic as a whole, is a terminal that is attached to a tracking target and transmits a beacon signal BC including a preset terminal ID. Equipment.
As shown in FIG. 1, the beacon terminal 10 includes a trigger receiving unit 11, a beacon transmitting unit 12, and a terminal-side antenna 13 as main functional units.

  The trigger receiving unit 11 is a circuit unit that receives the trigger signal TR from the receiving device 20 via the terminal-side antenna 13 and outputs a transmission instruction signal Tx that instructs transmission of the beacon signal BC. A tank circuit TUN and a comparison circuit CMP are provided.

The tank circuit TUN includes a parallel connection of a capacitive element C and an inductive element L having a resonance frequency that is tuned to the trigger signal TR, and has a function of generating power based on the received trigger signal TR and outputting the generated power generation voltage Vp. doing.
The comparison circuit CMP operates with the power generation voltage Vp output from the tank circuit TUN, and outputs a trigger detection signal DET that instructs transmission of the beacon signal BC when the power generation voltage Vp reaches the reference voltage Vref. Have.

  The beacon transmission unit 12 (nWTX) is composed of a so-called nanowatt-class ultra-low power UWB (Ultra Wide Band) wireless transmission circuit with extremely low power consumption. According to the trigger detection signal DET output from the trigger reception unit 11, It has a function of wirelessly transmitting a beacon signal BC including a preset terminal ID from the terminal-side antenna 13. For an ultra-low power UWB wireless transmission circuit, for example, by using a low power consumption technology described in Non-Patent Document 2, the terminal ID is obtained by driving a ring oscillator with power generated by a vibration sensor or a solar cell. It may be realized by a circuit that transmits a beacon signal BC including

  The terminal-side antenna 13 has directivity in a certain direction and is an antenna for exchanging the trigger signal TR and the beacon signal BC with the receiving device 20. In the present embodiment, since the terminal side antenna 13 is shared by the trigger receiver 11 and the beacon transmitter 12, the same signal frequency is used in the trigger signal TR and the beacon signal BC.

[Receiver]
The receiving device 20 is composed of an information processing terminal having a wireless communication function such as a PC or a smartphone as a whole, receives the beacon signal BC from the beacon terminal 10 attached to the tracking target, and receives the radio wave reception intensity of the beacon signal BC, The terminal device determines the position of the beacon terminal 10 based on the terminal ID included in the beacon signal BC.
As illustrated in FIG. 1, the reception device 20 includes a trigger transmission unit 21, a beacon reception unit 22, and a device-side antenna 23 as main circuit units.

  The trigger transmission unit 21 activates the beacon terminal 10 in response to the arrival of a position specifying timing such as a predetermined transmission interval or a predetermined operation input, which indicates a timing for specifying the position of the target to which the beacon terminal 10 is attached. The trigger signal TR is generated and transmitted from the apparatus-side antenna 23. As the trigger signal TR, a pulse signal or a sine wave signal having a predetermined signal frequency may be used.

  The beacon receiving unit 22 includes a general UWB wireless receiving circuit, receives the beacon signal BC transmitted from the beacon terminal 10 via the device-side antenna 23, and converts the received radio wave intensity to the beacon signal BC or the beacon signal BC. It has a function of acquiring beacon information for specifying the position of the beacon terminal 10 such as the included terminal ID.

  The device-side antenna 23 has directivity in a certain direction and is an antenna for exchanging the trigger signal TR and the beacon signal BC with the beacon terminal 10. In the present embodiment, since the trigger transmitting unit 21 and the beacon receiving unit 22 share the apparatus-side antenna 23, the same signal frequency is used in the trigger signal TR and the beacon signal BC.

[Operation of First Embodiment]
Next, the operation of the beacon tracking system 1 according to the present embodiment will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 2 is a sequence diagram illustrating transmission of a trigger signal and a beacon signal.

  First, in the receiving device 20, the trigger transmission unit 21 generates a trigger signal TR in the trigger transmission unit 21 in response to the arrival of the terminal position confirmation timing having a preset fixed period T (step 100). Transmission is performed from the antenna 23 in a certain direction (step 101).

  In the beacon terminal 10, the trigger receiving unit 11 generates power in the tank circuit TUN based on the trigger signal TR received by the terminal-side antenna 13 to obtain a generated voltage Vp. At this time, when the trigger signal TR is a signal transmitted from the receiving device 20 located in a certain direction of the terminal-side antenna 13, the radio wave reception intensity of the trigger signal TR is increased. For this reason, the trigger detection signal DET is output from the comparison circuit CMP when the generated voltage Vp rises greatly and the generated voltage Vp reaches the reference voltage Vref (step 102).

  The beacon transmission unit 12 generates a beacon signal BC including a preset terminal ID in response to the trigger detection signal DET from the trigger reception unit 11, and transmits the beacon signal BC from the device-side antenna 23 in a certain direction (step 103). .

  In the receiving device 20, the beacon receiving unit 22 processes the beacon signal BC received by the device-side antenna 23, and acquires the radio wave reception intensity related to the beacon signal BC and the terminal ID included in the beacon signal BC. At this time, when the beacon signal BC is a signal transmitted from the beacon terminal 10 located in a certain direction of the device-side antenna 23, the radio wave reception intensity of the beacon signal BC is increased. For this reason, as the beacon information necessary for specifying the terminal position from the beacon signal BC, it is possible to obtain a sufficiently large radio wave reception intensity and an accurate terminal ID for identifying the bin married terminal.

  Thereafter, the receiving apparatus 20 stops transmitting the trigger signal TR until a new confirmation timing based on the constant period T arrives, and transmits the trigger signal TR according to the arrival of the new confirmation timing (step 110) (step 111). ). Thereafter, steps 112 to 114 similar to steps 102 to 104 described above are repeatedly executed, and new beacon information is acquired based on the new beacon signal BC transmitted from the beacon terminal 10.

[Effect of the first embodiment]
Thus, in the present embodiment, in the receiving device 20, the trigger transmission unit 21 transmits the trigger signal TR for starting the beacon terminal 10 from the device-side antenna 23 in response to the arrival of the position specifying timing. The beacon receiving unit 22 acquires beacon information based on the beacon signal BC received from the beacon terminal 10 received by the device-side antenna 23, and the beacon terminal 10 receives the trigger receiving unit 11 received by the terminal-side antenna 13. 20 generates power based on the trigger signal TR from 20 and outputs a trigger detection signal DET in response to the increase in the generated power generation voltage Vp, and the beacon transmission unit 12 includes a beacon signal including the terminal ID based on the trigger detection signal DET. BC is transmitted from the terminal side antenna 13 by ultra-low power UWB wireless communication.

  Thereby, the beacon signal BC is returned from the beacon terminal 10 only when the trigger signal TR from the receiving device 20 is detected. For this reason, it is possible to avoid unnecessary beacon signal transmission that occurs when beacon signals are transmitted at regular intervals as in the prior art, and it is possible to reduce power consumption at the beacon terminal 10. At this time, power is generated based on the received trigger signal TR, and the beacon signal BC is transmitted according to the increase in the generated power generation voltage Vp, so that power consumption such as a battery is used to detect the trigger signal TR. There is no need. Therefore, the beacon signal BC can be transmitted at an arbitrary timing without increasing the power consumption in the beacon terminal 10.

In the present embodiment, a directional antenna having a certain directivity may be provided as the apparatus-side antenna 23, and a directional antenna having a certain directivity may be provided as the terminal-side antenna 13.
Thereby, exchange of trigger signal TR and beacon signal BC between receiving device 20 and beacon terminal 10 can be limited to a fixed direction. Thereby, compared with the case where an omnidirectional antenna is used, it becomes possible to improve the precision which pinpoints the position of beacon terminal 10, and beacon terminal 10 started by trigger signal TR can be limited, and beacon terminal The power consumption at 10 can be further reduced.

[Second Embodiment]
Next, a beacon tracking system 1 according to a second embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a beacon tracking system according to the second embodiment.

  In the first embodiment, when receiving the trigger signal TR and transmitting the beacon signal BC in the beacon terminal 10, one terminal-side antenna 13 is shared, and in the receiving device 20, the trigger signal TR is transmitted and the beacon signal is transmitted. The case where one device-side antenna 23 is shared when receiving BC has been described as an example. According to this configuration, when one terminal-side antenna 13 is shared and one device-side antenna 23 is shared, it is necessary to align the signal frequency between the trigger signal TR and the beacon signal BC.

  In the present embodiment, as shown in FIG. 3, in beacon terminal 10, terminal-side receiving antenna 13 </ b> R used for receiving trigger signal TR and terminal-side transmitting antenna 13 </ b> T used for transmitting beacon signal BC are provided separately. In the receiving device 20, a device-side transmitting antenna 23T used for transmitting the trigger signal TR and a device-side receiving antenna 23R used for receiving the beacon signal BC are separately provided.

  Thereby, since the transmission antennas 13T and 23T and the reception antennas 13R and 23R are separate, different signal frequencies can be used for the trigger signal TR and the beacon signal BC. Therefore, a higher signal frequency can be used as the trigger signal TR compared to the beacon signal BC. Thereby, the range in which the trigger signal TR reaches can be expanded, and the position specifying range of the beacon terminal 10 can be expanded. Moreover, the antenna size used for transmission / reception of the trigger signal TR can be reduced, and in particular, an increase in the terminal size of the beacon terminal 10 can also be suppressed. As in the first embodiment, directional antennas may be used as the transmission antennas 13T and 23T and the reception antennas 13R and 23R.

[Third Embodiment]
Next, the beacon tracking system 1 according to the present embodiment will be described with reference to FIGS. 4 and 5. FIG. 4 is a block diagram illustrating a configuration of a beacon terminal according to the third embodiment. FIG. 5 is a block diagram of the configuration of the receiving apparatus according to the third embodiment.

In the first embodiment, by using a directional antenna as the terminal-side antenna 13 of the beacon terminal 10 and the device-side antenna 23 of the receiving apparatus 20, the direction in which the trigger signal TR and the beacon signal BC are transmitted and received is limited. explained.
In the present embodiment, a case will be described in which the direction in which the trigger signal TR and the beacon signal BC are transmitted and received is switched. In the following, the case of switching to one of the three directions will be described as an example, but the number of directions is not limited to three directions, and may be two directions or four or more directions.

  As shown in FIG. 4, beacon terminal 10 according to the present embodiment includes a plurality of terminal-side individual antennas 13A, 13B, and 13C arranged in different directions as terminal-side antennas, and these terminal-side individual antennas 13A. , 13B, and 13C are provided with beacon units 10A, 10B, and 10C each including a trigger receiver 11 and a beacon transmitter 12, and beacons that selectively activate any one of these beacon units 10A, 10B, and 10C. A control unit 14 is further provided.

  Thereby, in the direction where the corresponding terminal side individual antenna among terminal side individual antennas 13A, 13B, and 13C is arranged by any one of beacon units 10A, 10B, and 10C selected by beacon control part 14, The trigger signal TR is received and the beacon signal BC is transmitted. In addition, about the selection method of beacon unit 10A, 10B, 10C in the beacon control part 14, you may select based on the preset schedule, for example, and you may select at random.

  As shown in FIG. 5, the receiving device 20 according to the present embodiment includes a plurality of device-side individual antennas 23A, 23B, and 23C arranged in different directions as device-side antennas, and these device-side individual antennas 23A. , 23B, 23C and a trigger control unit 24 for switching between the trigger transmission unit 21 and the beacon reception unit 22.

  Thereby, transmission of the trigger signal TR and reception of the beacon signal BC are performed in the direction in which one of the device-side individual antennas 23A, 23B, and 23C selected by the reception control unit 24 is arranged. In addition, about the selection method of the apparatus side separate antenna 23A, 23B, 23C in the reception control part 24, you may select based on the preset schedule, for example, and may select it at random.

  Therefore, one direction can be selected from among a plurality of directions for the exchange of the trigger signal TR and the beacon signal BC between the receiving device 20 and the beacon terminal 10. Compared with the case where the trigger signal TR and the beacon signal BC are exchanged only in one direction, the position specifying range can be expanded without reducing the accuracy of specifying the position of the beacon terminal 10.

[Extended embodiment]
The present invention has been described above with reference to the embodiments, but the present invention is not limited to the above embodiments. Various changes that can be understood by those skilled in the art can be made to the configuration and details of the present invention within the scope of the present invention. In addition, each embodiment can be implemented in any combination within a consistent range.

  DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Beacon tracking system, 10 ... Beacon terminal, 10A, 10B, 10C ... Beacon unit, 11 ... Trigger receiving part, 12 ... Beacon transmission part, 13 ... Terminal side antenna, 13A, 13B, 13C ... Terminal side separate antenna, 14 ... terminal control unit, 20 ... receiving device, 21 ... trigger transmitting unit, 22 ... beacon receiving unit, 23 ... device side antenna, 23A, 23B, 23C ... device side individual antenna, TUN ... tank circuit, CMP ... comparison circuit, C ... capacitance element, L ... inductive element, Vp ... generated voltage, Vref ... reference voltage, DET ... trigger detection signal, TR ... trigger signal, BC ... beacon signal.

Claims (7)

A beacon terminal that is attached to a tracking target and wirelessly transmits a beacon signal including a terminal ID unique to itself, and a receiving device that acquires beacon information for specifying the location of the target based on the received beacon signal A beacon tracking system comprising:
The receiving device is:
A trigger transmitter that transmits a trigger signal for activating the beacon terminal from the device-side antenna in response to the arrival of the position specifying timing;
A beacon receiving unit that acquires the beacon information based on the beacon signal from the beacon terminal received by the device-side antenna;
The beacon terminal is
A trigger receiving unit that generates power based on the trigger signal from the receiving device received by the terminal-side antenna, and outputs a trigger detection signal according to an increase in the generated power voltage,
A beacon tracking system comprising: a beacon transmission unit that transmits a beacon signal including the terminal ID based on the trigger detection signal from the terminal-side antenna through ultra-low power UWB (Ultra Wide Band) wireless communication. The beacon tracking system according to claim 1,
The device side antenna is composed of a directional antenna having a certain directivity,
The beacon tracking system, wherein the terminal-side antenna is a directional antenna having a certain directivity. The beacon tracking system according to claim 2,
The device-side antenna includes a device-side transmitting antenna having directivity for transmitting the trigger signal in a first constant direction, and a device-side receiving antenna having directivity for receiving the beacon signal from the first constant direction. Consists of
The terminal-side antenna includes a terminal-side transmitting antenna having directivity for receiving the trigger signal from a second constant direction, and a terminal-side receiving antenna having directivity for transmitting the beacon signal in the second constant direction; Beacon tracking system characterized by comprising. In the beacon tracking system according to any one of claims 1 to 3,
The reception device includes a plurality of device-side individual antennas arranged in different directions as the device-side antenna, and further includes a reception control unit that switches between the device-side individual antennas, the trigger transmission unit, and the beacon reception unit. Prepared,
The beacon terminal includes a plurality of terminal-side individual antennas arranged in different directions as the terminal-side antenna, and each of the terminal-side individual antennas includes a beacon unit composed of the trigger receiver and a beacon transmitter. A beacon tracking system, further comprising: a beacon control unit that selectively activates any one of these beacon units.   The beacon terminal used with the beacon tracking system in any one of Claims 1-4.   The receiving apparatus used with the beacon tracking system in any one of Claims 1-4. A beacon terminal that is attached to a tracking target and wirelessly transmits a beacon signal including a terminal ID unique to itself, and a receiving device that acquires beacon information for specifying the location of the target based on the received beacon signal A beacon tracking method used in a beacon tracking system comprising:
A trigger transmission step in which a trigger transmission unit of the reception device transmits a trigger signal for activating the beacon terminal from a device-side antenna in response to arrival of a position specifying timing;
The trigger reception unit of the beacon terminal generates power based on the trigger signal from the reception device received by the terminal-side antenna, and trigger reception that outputs a trigger detection signal when the generated power generation voltage reaches a reference voltage Steps,
A beacon transmission step in which a beacon transmission unit of the beacon terminal transmits a beacon signal including the terminal ID based on the trigger detection signal from the terminal-side antenna by ultra-low power UWB (Ultra Wide Band) wireless communication;
A beacon receiving method in which a beacon receiving unit of the receiving device includes a beacon receiving step of acquiring the beacon information based on the beacon signal from the beacon terminal received by the device-side antenna.

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