Connexient

How We Solved Technical & Product Challenges

 

I designed and then developed both the product and Go-to-Market strategy for MediNav that enabled us to pioneer and create a new space for Indoor Mapping & Navigation.  The key was to leverage the value, priority - and budgets - that healthcare networks were just start to place on "Patient Experience" - encapsulated in the new role of "Chief Patient Experience Officer" that many were hiring.  Key capabilities & value propositions included the following.

 

1. Indoor Mapping

We evaluated over multiple approaches including building own own platform, using Google Maps with custom javascript,  and over a dozen indoor (or generalized) mapping platform companies.   We ultimately selected Visioglobe, an indoor mapping platform partner with whom we worked closely to push the technology, process and & UX forward to meet the requirements of not just mapping,, but also crucially indoor navigation - a very demanding and different experience.
 

2.  Indoor Positioning 

This was a particularly thorny challenge, as the state of the art in 2013 with Enterprsie WiFi was positioning accuracy of over 10 - 15 meters (30 - 45 feet)  and refresh rates of no less than 30 seconds (and often minutes).   We piloted and collaborated closely with Cisco in this area for several years as they worked to improve and enhance what could be done with WiFi.

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With the arrival of new standards and equipment for Bluetooth Low Energy Beacons at the end of 2013, we immediately spotted the potential of this technology and started real world testing and evaluating vendors,.  This lead to the a long and productive partnership with Polestar to push this technology forward not just for accuracy and refresh rates, but also how to deploy and manage it in massively scaled and complex buildings.

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3.  User Expectations for Navigation  

Inevitably, users would compare their indoor navigation UX to what they experienced with Google or Apple outdoor navigation to get around the world.   That's a very high bar - as these companies have hundreds of engineers, massive revenue bases, and decades of technology evolution and experience with both GPS (which they did not have to deploy and manage) and outdoor mapping & navigation to build upon. 

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To make things even harder:

1. there is no systematic structure equivalent to roads & highways, exit numbers, towns/city destinations, etc. which an indoor navigation UX can leverage; 

2. clear visual cues that can be quickly and easily recognized by a user while walking are often absent; and

3. many big facilities have very large open spaces - lobbies, atriums and the like - right at the starting point for most journeys which are particularly challenging environments in which to orient and navigate the user.

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4.  Business Model and GTM

​The product design and GTM strategy enabled us to solve the puzzle of both capital constraints and selling an unproven new product into the very risk-averse large enterprises that are major hospitals and healthcare networks.   We were able to leverage existing budgets for facilities with a new focus on Patient Experience - encapsulated at many organizations by the new role of Chief Patient Experience Officer - to sell in an innovative product that addressed one of the most important pain points of every customer arriving for an appointment.

5.  Capital Constraints

Solving that also helped greatly with the capiital constraints, as we were able to sell in long term contracts with up-front moneys for deployment.   ​We built the company & business and took it to exit with less then $3M equity capital over 7 years.