The Chengdu High-Tech Industrial Development Zone has committed
to an investment of around 300 million Euros to deploy an Internet-of-Things
(IoT) solution for the care of the elderly in China’s 20 biggest cities,
following a one-year, 1500-person trial, beginning in 2018 in the city of
Chengdu.
On January 9, French telecare company Senioradom and Sigfox signed a strategic agreement in the
presence of both the French President Emmanuel Macron and Chinese President Xi
Jinping to begin their deployment in the Chinese market. Sigfox is the
provider of the eponymous Low Powered Wide Area Network (LPWAN) technology, enabling
connectivity for IoT devices.
Senioradom and Sigfox have developed a telecare solution for
senior citizens composed of sensors tracking different movements and detecting door
opening, as well as an alert and geo-localisation necklace. Software driven by autolearning
algorithms developed by Senioradom automatically learns the beneficiary’s
behaviour and sends an alert in the event of abnormal behaviour.
For example, if a certain individual usually spends 15 min
in the bathroom, including 5 min without moving, but on a certain day, he/ she spends
25 min there without moving, an alert will be sent.
The system can automatically detect any potential
behavioural anomalies due to a fall, a person feeling faint or a deteriorating
mental condition such as Alzheimer’s.
Senioradom’s solution has been deployed successfully in
France for the past 3 years, together with Sigfox’s technology which allows the
transmission of data at a very low cost and with minimum energy.
Senior citizens in China number over 200
million and their care poses a social challenge. A rural exodus of the younger,
active population towards major cities and the low income of a large proportion
of the elderly population, as well as a lack of adequate hospitals and doctors,
has created a need to find affordable, rapidly-deployable solutions to tackle the
issue. Such a smart IoT solution can help to better protect elderly populations
by anticipating risks and acting faster in emergencies. This could lead to
reduction in hospitalisation and medical costs, due to the prevention of
dangerous situations.
“After a year of
work with the French and Chinese authorities and our partner Sigfox, we are
proud to see that French expertise can attract the interest of such a big
nation, one that is taking a pragmatic, preventative approach to the issue of
elderly dependence”, said Thierry
Roussel, cofounder of Senioradom. “We also wish to thank the tireless work of the French Embassy in
Beijing, the BPI, Business France and our Ministries, which have been involved
throughout the negotiations. For Senioradom, which launched 5 years ago, this
is a great recognition of our work and a perfect platform for our international
development”.
Ludovic Le Moan, CEO
of Sigfox stated, “I am
honoured to sign this agreement today, as it is the product of many months of
hard work, both by our teams and those of our partner Senioradom. We are
grateful to the French authorities for their support, without which this
agreement would not have been possible.”
