One of the many benefits of locating on-site at an incubator is the collaboration that develops among the entrepreneurs. As the Macomb-OU Incubator focuses on high-tech companies, all of the clients within our building have many efforts in common and opportunities for working together. A prime recent example is the connection between Coupon Wallet and Automation of Things.
Coupon Wallet’s digital coupon solution makes mobile couponing easy, giving customers the ability to save coupons to their phones to take to the store to redeem while giving businesses the ability to track analytics for promotional marketing efforts. Automation of Things is a software development company devoted to the automation, controls and embedded industries. The company’s software platform, FourZero, is a complete application design, runtime and intelligence environment with many innovative features that enable faster design and deployment.
Though perhaps seen as two completely different types of companies on a surface level, a chance meeting at a Macomb-OU INCubator hosted event translated to each company discovering similarities. At the Velocity Hub of the Michigan Cyber Range ribbon cutting, Sam Taylor and Phil Kanaby, of Automation of Things and Coupon Wallet respectively, took the opportunity to meet and discuss their separate initiatives.
Many retailers utilize expensive and outdated scanner systems, most of which do not come with a point-of-sale machine to connect to the scanner. The extra cost of both of these items is a big investment for small businesses. In addition, these standard models are not typically internet-enabled to process mobile coupons. Seeing a benefit to both companies, Sam was able to offer the solution of creating a scanning device solely for Coupon Wallet’s use, with which Coupon Wallet can control the reprogramming as well as allowing for a pricing model that is more in line with the expectations of small businesses.
Seeing a benefit to both companies, Sam was able to offer the solution of creating a device solely for Coupon Wallet’s use, with which Coupon Wallet can control the reprogramming as well as allowing for a pricing model that is more in line with the expectations of small businesses. In turn, this offer results in a strong benefit to Sam as his use of the FourZero technology in this project propels the release of his own project to market. The FourZero technology takes any hardware and converts it into an embedded platform. As this project has informed this platform, the process for Sam has been beneficial to moving forward.
Automation of Things is a software development company devoted to the automation, controls and embedded industries. AoT products streamline the efforts of automation and industrial-systems engineers by maximizing reuse and simplifying the processes. The current application platform available from AoT is based on the IEC 61499 standard. The disruptive change this platform provides creates a more efficient and sustainable system, catalyzing operational innovation.
As the name suggests, automation is the use of automatic equipment, such as within manufacturing, robotics or energy generation. It involves various control systems working together to reduce the dependency of human intervention and to increase human productivity. The automation industry spans a wide range, covering not only manufacturing but also industries such as building automation, utilities and transportation.
Coupon Wallet is the world’s most advanced big-data analytics platform for promotion marketing. Coupon Wallet’s patent-pending technology associates return-on-investment for every type of promotion/distribution channel while collecting customer demographic information and building stronger relationships with customers. Brands can now monitor large scale marketing efforts and receive granulated performance data by promotion, distribution channel, ad spend, store, and customer, allowing them to audit multi-million dollar marketing campaigns, demonstrate efficacy to marketing efforts, and eliminate fraud. Today, Coupon Wallet has won numerous awards including the Facebook Start mobile app award, Macomb-OU Incubator Business of the Year 2014, Best of MichBusiness 2015, and has Mobile Apps available in Apple AppStore and Google Play Store. Coupon Wallet will be rolling out to major grocery and retail in 2016 and is furthering partnership relationships necessary to expand nationally.
Source: Macomb-OU Incubator