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Connexient

Connexient started with one simple need and question:  why can't we have Indoor GPS?

Addressing that required understanding and solving challenges that spanned technology innovation, extraordinary UI/UX demands, user behaviors and adoption, and matching product capabilities to the real world needs and expectations of large Enterprise customers.  

Along this journey we achieved something that even Google and Apple have still yet to reach:  true turn-by-turn indoor navigation in highly complex and scaled indoor facilities.

   

The Problem

 

My client, GDS, inc. had a successful business providing 'Wayfinding' signage for hospitals in the Northeast of the US.  Their clients spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to design & install and then tens of thousands of dollars annually for signage systems to help patients find their way to their destinations.  Yet, over 85% of patients still got lost, resulting in poor Patient Experience, missed appointments, distracted staff and overhead.  So, my client asked:   "Why can't we have indoor GPS?"

This was a clear pain point and business opportunity for a large Enterprise client base.  But solving it presented numerous deep challenges.

 

  1. Indoor Mapping.  Nobody had ever mapped buildings of the scale & complexity of major hospitals / healthcare campuses.

  2. Indoor Positioning.   There were no solutions for accurate, real-time indoor positioning at that time.

  3. User Expectations.   Everyone uses Google or Apple navigation to get around the world, so expectations of the UX would be very high.  To make things even harder, there is no systematic structure equivalent to roads & highways, exit numbers, towns/city destinations, etc. which an indoor navigation UX can leverage.

  4. Business Model and GTM.  How do you get a large Enterprise client to pay for something that has never been done before, and cannot be proven until you deploy it at scale in their buildings?!

  5. Capital Constraints.  My clients wanted to minimize outside capital and bootstrap the business based on revenues as much as possible.

The Solution:  MediNav

 

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. All Screens Solution.   Mobile, Web, Kiosk - plus print options - ensure that we could address the needs of all patients, not just the technically adept one.

  2. True Turn-by-Turn Indoor Navigation.  This was critical, as these facilities are simply too complex to use floor maps and directions.  With MediNav, you just followed the blue dot and voice directions.

  3. Patient Experience Integrations.  By integrating with major platforms & solutions such as Epic's MyChart, we could deliver an end-to-end experience for the patient, that also had measurable ROI & KPIs for the client.

  4. Indoor + Outdoor, End-to-End Navigation.   Many of the biggest pain points for patients and anyone visiting a major healthcare campus - such as where to park - start before they get the the front door.  Therefore, we formed a strong partnership with Google Maps to deliver an end-to-end solution that addressed the entire user problem and experience requirements.

  5. Enterprise Platform and Roadmap.   Patients are not the only people impacted by the problem of wayfinding in hospitals.  Knowing where people & things are and how to get there negatively affected the efficiency of operations across many areas, as well as mission critical things like incident response and emergency evacuations.  By building out a robuts platform with SDKs and APIs and incorporating this vision into our roadmap, we were able to build relationships and stakeholders across the organization that put MediNav into their strategic plans and budgets.

 

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.

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.

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. 

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.

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.

The Results

 

By solving all of these challenges, we were able to deliver the first true turn-by-turn indoor navigation that could guide end users through enormous, complex, maze-like buildings & facilities.   The All-Screens, Indoor + Outdoor capabilities, along with our Enterprise vision and roadmap also crucially positioned us to work with our clients are partners on a longer term roadmap, buying us crucial time as we worked out the technology challenges and processes to do this at a scale and complexity never attempted before. 

  • We launched MediNav in 2014, and over the next 5 years continually improved the product while signing clients such as the National Institutes of Health, Hackensack Meridian Health, New York Presbyterian Health System, UAB Medicine, Northwestern Medicine, Rush Healthcare and Baycare Health.   

  • Starting in 2016, we forged a strong partnership with Epic and tight integrations with their MyChart application to deliver measurable ROI to our customers in reducing missed and lost appointments, and improving Patient Experience ratings.

  • By 2018, we had established ourselves as the clear market leader, with over 35 healthcare network clients and 100+ sites deployed.

  • In 2019, Connexient was acquired by Everbridge, to expand its reach as well as apply this technology to emergency response & other critical operational needs in very large and complex facilities.

 

Connexient in the News

Follow this link for a sampling of media coverage and  customer videos of MediNav

MediNav Spotlight

A showcase of the key features of MediNav and how they address customer and user needs

Connexient and MediNav are now part of Everbridge's Digital Wayfinding Division.  You can learn and see more on the Everbridge Web site.

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True Turn-by-Turn Indoor Navigation

Provides reliable indoor positioning accuracy of 1 to 2 meters, navigation cues, visual landmark references, off-route notification and more, without tracking personal or identifiable information, as patients and visitors move throughout the hospital campus.

Zone-based Alerts

Send targeted alerts to staff, patients and visitors within a certain area, providing informa­tion based on the user’s location, whether within or outside the hospital.

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Meet Me Feature

Provides location-sharing and location-based analytics, enabling patients and visitors to connect on the hospital campus.

Multi-channel, multi-modal approach

Accounts for a wide-range of demographics and is available in a mobile version for both iOS (iPhone/iPad) and Android devices as well as a web version for desktop use and digital kiosks.

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Parking Planner

Helps patients and visitors easily find a garage closest to their destination within the hospital, automatically detecting arrival in the garage, saving the parking location, and directing the user to the correct entrance based on the parking location.

Compatibility with Leading Infrastructures


Integrates with EHR systems and appointment scheduling apps. The solution’s location engine is compatible with all leading location infrastructures (Cisco, Centrak, Mist/Juniper, Siemens/Enlighted, HP/Aruba, etc.).
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MapKit


Responsible for rendering map, POIs, Routes and Navigation UX/UI

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LocationKit
 

Integrating device position, managing zones, proximity actions and other location-based services

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CMSKit
 

Data integration with our CMS, or using data from client CMSI

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AnalyticsKit
 

Reporting & analytics on user traffic flows, dwell time, behaviors, etc

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