Introducing Density Open Area

In 2017, we had a customer tell us she spent $700,000 every year for each building in a 4 million square foot office portfolio. $700,000 bought her human consultants who would visit her offices and do 7-day observational studies of how busy different spaces were (once per quarter).

As it turns out, she was not alone. Over the years, hundreds of customers have asked if they could use the infrared technology in our Entry sensors for open space detection (to measure desk availability, lounge use, how people use an amenity, and so on). Our answer has always had to be, no.

Not yet, anyway.

Since then we have been thinking about and working to solve the thorny problem of counting people in unbounded space and making it affordable to scale to tens of thousands of business and hundreds of millions of square feet.

Today, we're proud to introduce  Density Open Area the latest addition to our platform.

Technical Leaps

Once, every few years, you get a glimpse of the future and how it might work. The famous ones are well known: the internet growing at 2,300%, Englebart's mother of all demos, Steve's visit to Xerox PARC.

The importance of a novel observation or technical leap is obvious in retrospect but it's easy to disregard at the moment: hypertext, vaccines, the cambered wing, luggage with wheels, even the steam engine was not of any immediate consequence. It often takes decades even centuries of maturing before any given innovation's future is assured. But every now and then, if you squint, you sometimes get a chance to make out the rough profile of the future.

The Power of Radar

Open Area leverages a radar system of our own design.

Each dot is a depth value generated from thousands of small movements in three-dimensional space. We use these clustered data points to count people and observe movement anonymously.

Open Area's range and ability are extraordinary. The sensor is accurate up to 20 feet off the ground, can handle 1,325 square feet, and has a dynamic field of view configurable through a web app.

The technology fits in the palm of your hand, is unaffected by sunlight or reflectivity, and mounts in minutes. It is more accurate than a camera, anonymous at source, and made in America.

Features & Benefits

The sensor comes with a suite of new applications designed to take advantage of Open Area's unique aerial dataset. Users will be able to access:

• 60% reduction in cost to deploy (vs. camera / optical alternatives).
• 20-foot range, 40-foot effective diameter (4x coverage of alternatives).
• 1,325 square feet of coverage
• Measure up to 20 desks
• Historical occupant pathing and heatmaps
• Desk and room availability (+ release)
• Touchdowns and dwell time

Availability & Price

Available today in limited quantity. Large scale production starts in early 2021.

Hardware: $399 / sensor*
Software: $199 / sensor / year*
‍*Introductory pricing is available on orders through 2020.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."— Arthur C. Clarke, Profiles of the Future (1962)‍

One more thing ... In the process of exploring Open Area's unique capabilities, we realized something novel – a way of looking at people in space we'd never seen before.

Synchronize your floorplan and turn on Density Live. It will feel like a fragment of the future.