Tom wants to make a good impression on his first date with Sarah. He’s hoping to use his smartwatch's navigation to arrive on time at the appointed café. That’s why accurate navigation and position tracking are essential. But right from the start, Tom’s smartwatch takes a long time to calculate the route and is unable to precisely define the shortest path. Will he arrive on time? Let´s see what happens …

After some irritations and detours, Tom seems to have gotten a chance to catch up with his date, Sarah. But all of a sudden, the GPS gets lost when he reaches the city. High buildings and underpasses can block the GPS signal. This means his smartwatch is unable to provide any navigation. Tom is getting increasingly annoyed. In addition, the smartwatch's battery is getting dangerously low. Will he be able to find his way to their meeting place? where Sarah is already waiting?

The warning was clear: low battery. After a short time, the battery dies completely. Because of their small size, wearables such as smartwatches and hearables have much smaller batteries than, for example, smartphones. Navigating with GPS, consumes a lot of power and thus quickly drains the battery of those devices. Tom is now running desperately through the streets without any navigational aid.

Tom doesn’t give up and tries to find his way without the help of his smartwatch. When he finally arrives at the café, his doubts become certainties: He’s too late. The café is closed and Sarah has already left. Will Tom get a second chance to make up for this disaster?

Sarah is willing to give Tom a second chance. To arrive on time, Tom is using a different smartwatch that promises a reliable and power-efficient navigation function: position tracking, also called pedestrian dead reckoning (PDR). Since position tracking is an always-on feature, the smartwatch immediately finds the correct route right from the start. Let's follow Tom!

Tom is relaxed: His smartwatch is navigating accurately and the battery power is stable. This new solution tracks Tom's position by applying a motion sensor with an integrated algorithm for pedestrian dead reckoning (PDR): The BHI160BP calculates the user’s relative location and then recalibrates itself every few minutes to obtain the absolute position provided by the GPS module. This way, the GPS can be kept in sleep mode for most of the time, which drastically reduces the wearable device's power consumption and extends its operating time.

After reaching the city, with its urban canyons, skyscrapers and underpasses, the position tracking solution BHI160BP ensures that the smartwatch can maintain accurate and reliable navigation even when the GPS signal is weak or blocked. Also, no recalculation is needed because of the seamless and always-on nature of the solution. Tom knows exactly which direction to take!

After a short walk, Tom has reached the destination even before Sarah. He is surprised to see that his watch’s battery is still almost fully charged! The BHI160BP enables pedestrian position tracking with up to 80% savings in system power consumption compared with a typical GPS-only solution, without compromising on accuracy. When Tom looks up, Sarah is standing in front of him, smiling away. The story has a happy end afterall!