Resonai: Augmenting the shopping experience with intelligent building ecosystems
About Resonai
Resonai is an Israeli startup working in artificial intelligence and computer vision. Resonai scans buildings to create digital replicas, giving its customers a new way to manage their properties, from AR experiences to automating facilities management.
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Built on Google Cloud, Resonai’s flagship platform, Vera, transforms buildings into intelligent ecosystems, giving building owners an operating system from which to manage and monitor their buildings.
Google Cloud results
- 1,000+ terabytes of data stored in Cloud Storage
- Creates innovative AR shopping experiences for customers with insights from BigQuery
- Gives mall owners powerful insight into how users interact with their properties, using Looker
- Provides shopping malls with new revenue streams
Turns buildings into smart systems with Google Cloud
With footfall in shopping malls down 7% in the US between 2019-22, and 18.8% in the UK, retailers are having to get creative to restore customer numbers to pre-pandemic levels. For many, that means putting the consumer back at the center of the shopping experience, offering the kind of event-retail that shoppers can’t find online.
By transforming buildings into intelligent digital twins, Resonai is helping retailers to do just that. Resonai uses LIDAR (light detection and ranging) scanners to create an exact digital replica of a building, such as a shopping mall. Then, with its Vera platform, built on Google Cloud, it allows mall owners to use that digital twin to create innovative augmented reality (AR) experiences that appear on customers’ phones as they move around the shopping mall. As a result, Resonai offers mall owners unprecedented insights into how shoppers use their space and provides shoppers a richer experience.
Retailers aren’t the only ones benefiting. The Vera platform enables owners of other large buildings, such as office blocks and airports, to see their properties in digital form. They can then connect that digital twin to IoT devices throughout their property to create a single operating system of their building.
"AR technology is becoming more and more prevalent, because we’re all so connected to our phones," explains Natalie Rozenboim, Resonai COO. "We want to help building owners prepare for the future, as well as differentiate themselves now by adding more experiences and innovative ways to interact with their facilities."
A smart cloud for intelligent buildings
When it came to choosing a cloud infrastructure on which to build its technology, it was important for Resonai to find a provider that made it easy to work with a large amount of data.
"We manage over 1,000 terabytes of data," says Rozenboim. "So it was important we could easily manage that ourselves. Google Cloud was the ideal solution because it allows us to be independent. Everything is well documented and easy to use, and we can set up new databases in a couple of clicks."
With Cloud Storage providing a scalable solution to store all the data from the buildings it scans, Resonai uses that data to create each building’s digital twin. Those digital replicas are the foundation for all the functionality of the Vera platform.
A mall owner, for example, can integrate Vera into the mall’s native app to provide customers with AR experiences, location capabilities and indoor navigation. Using BigQuery and Cloud SQL, Resonai can then log customers’ movements throughout the mall and generate heatmaps within the mall’s digital twin to show mall owners which areas are receiving lots of foot traffic, and which areas need attention.
"We manage over 1000 terabytes of data, so it was important we could easily manage that ourselves. Google Cloud was the ideal solution because it allows us to be independent. Everything is well documented and easy to use, and we can set up new databases in a couple of clicks."
—Natalie Rozenboim, COO, ResonaiNew experiences for shoppers and retailers alike
Mall owners can use those heatmaps to make decisions about how they run the mall. For example, they can use Vera to make AR advertisements appear on shoppers’ phone screens as they walk through busy areas, generating a new revenue stream for malls as retailers bid to get their advertisements seen. Conversely, Vera allows mall owners to encourage customers to move to underserved parts of the mall by placing AR gaming experiences in quieter locations.
Those AR experiences are helping to drive new, younger customers through the doors of malls from the US to Thailand; Europe to Dubai. The Azrieli Mall in Tel Aviv, for example, placed AR pinatas at various locations around the mall for customers to search for using their phones and pop with an AR pinata stick. Inside each pinata were coupons to redeem at stores throughout the mall. Not only did this enable the mall to direct customers to stores that needed the foot traffic, the gamified experience was also an effective way to keep a younger clientele in the shopping center for longer, as they searched for all the pinatas.
As shoppers play the game, the Azrieli Mall is able to track those customer interactions using Vera dashboards built in Looker.
"In Looker, the mall operators have their own dashboard with everything they want to see," says Rozenboim, "the number of started sessions, completed sessions, popped pinatas, saved coupons, used coupons. Whatever they want to track they can, and they can then report to management using that dashboard. They are really happy with it."
Finding the way to successful AR navigation with BigQuery
Like many malls around the world, the Azrieli Center also has a problem with customers forgetting where they left their car. Working with Resonai, the mall operators used Vera to develop and integrate a Find My Car function into the Azrieli mall app. This allows customers to take a photo of their car when they park it, and then click a button in the app to receive AR directions back to the car when they are ready to leave.
While developing this function, Resonai programmers analyzed its usage data in BigQuery and found that while lots of customers were launching the AR mode in the Azrieli app, some didn't understand what to do next. The Resonai team tested a map of the mall popping up immediately, which prompted significantly more navigation sessions.
"The insights BigQuery provides enable us to make really fast iterations and improve the product quickly as we go," explains Rozenboim. "As a startup, we’re laying the tracks as we drive the train, so the fact that BigQuery gives our programmers the flexibility to adapt queries as they go is really convenient."
"As a startup, we’re laying the tracks as we drive the train, so the fact that BigQuery gives our programmers the flexibility to adapt queries as they go is really convenient."
—Natalie Rozenboim, COO, ResonaiAutomating facilities management with an integrated operating system
As for facilities management, once building operators have connected their digital twin to IoT devices inside the building, such as lights and air conditioning, they are able to operate all those devices from one place, using the Vera app on their phone.
Vera also improves the efficiency of teams working within the building, from IT to electricians. If someone discovers a faulty computer or power socket, for example, they can take a photo of it on their phone and raise a ticket. The Vera app automatically notifies the relevant department of the problem, including information on what would be required to fix it. A technician can then use AR directions on their phone to navigate to the source of the problem. Once there, instruction manuals, schematics, and remote controls can all be integrated into the app, saving the technician valuable time.
Building the future, today
As Resonai continues to work with big mall groups around the world, it plans to expand its customer base to offer similar experiences to large hotels and resorts, while providing AR-navigation functionality to large public buildings such as hospitals and airports.
Meanwhile, Resonai continues to improve the Vera platform with Google Cloud. One solution that the team is currently trialing is Vertex AI Vision, which automatically detects and decodes text in images. When a shopper points their camera at a sign in a mall, for example, Vertex AI Vision will be able to recognise that text and cross-reference it with text stored in the mall’s digital twin, thereby improving the accuracy of the shopper’s location.
This ability for Resonai to grow with Google Cloud is something Rozenboim values highly.
"The fact that we can have so many different products and services under one roof is incredibly convenient," she says. "It means that as we grow and add new features, we can be confident that Google Cloud will have the solutions to help us get where we need to go."
"The fact that we can have so many different products and services under one roof is incredibly convenient. It means that as we grow and add new features, we can be confident that Google Cloud will have the solutions to help us get where we need to go."
—Natalie Rozenboim, COO, ResonaiTell us your challenge. We're here to help.
Contact us
About Resonai
Resonai is an Israeli startup working in artificial intelligence and computer vision. Resonai scans buildings to create digital replicas, giving its customers a new way to manage their properties, from AR experiences to automating facilities management.
About DoiT
DoiT is committed to solving customers’ cloud challenges with intelligent technology, expert consultancy and unlimited technical support.