blog about smart buildings
Sony Nimway Smart Office Platform:
‘It simply works’
Making people's lives easier in the office. That, in a nutshell, is the idea behind Nimway indoor navigation from Sony. With this smart office solution, employees can use their smartphones and displays in the building to easily track colleagues and find and book a free workplace or meeting room for instance. Since 2020, Sony and Fagerhult have been working together by combining Nimway with Organic Response lighting control. This two-in-one system makes rolling out indoor navigation even easier and building management more efficient and sustainable.
This blog is an elaboration of the interview our IoT specialist Dennis van Doorn had with Lars-Gunnar Lundgren, head of Nimway at Sony. Among other things, Dennis asked him about the history of the product and the added value of working with Fagerhult.
Indoor Navigation as in internal tool
Lars-Gunnar explains that Nimway was originally developed as a tool for internal use. 'Around 2008, Sony Mobile in Lund, Sweden, employed 5,500 people across 13 different locations. At the time, Sony was pioneering Activity Based Working and flexible workplaces. A number of designers at Sony discovered how difficult it was to find their way around the different locations. The result was that people were often late for their appointments. They sometimes also had trouble finding a free place to work or meet. “At the time, Sony Mobile had just introduced GPS for cell phones. 'We could not yet apply this indoors, but a group of researchers at Sony was developing a technology that would make this possible.” The researchers and designers worked together to develop an app. That was something very special at the time because apps were a new thing.” The tool was ready in 2010 and was named Sony Map.
From Sony Map to Nimway
After Sony Mobile had been using Sony Map for indoor navigation for several years, the company did an inventory of assets that could be commercialized. "Sony Map offered lots of opportunities. We knew our office challenges were not unique. More and more companies were moving to activity-based working. With our application, we could solve their problems as well. In doing so, our first client had not 13 but 52 different buildings.” Sony Map became the basis for Nimway and in 2016, a new business was born. “Nimway was based on a product that we had been testing extensively for years on our own employees, so we had already learned a lot about it. This gave us a solid foundation to introduce it successfully. These days, by the way, when we want to try something new with Nimway, our own employees still act as guinea pigs.”
Removing micro-frustrations
Nimway stands for ease of use and a positive experience. During installation, analysing data but especially in daily use by employees. “We bring a consumer-level experience into the office environment. And of course, it helps that Sony has already produced millions of consumer products.”
How does Nimway improve the people’s experience of the office environment? Lars-Gunnar: “It makes employees' lives easier by removing lots of their daily micro-frustrations. Did you know that people spend an average of over 30 minutes a day trying to find colleagues or a free desk or meeting space? These delays all have knock-on effects. If I'm late for a meeting, then everyone else is wasting their time too. Everyone gets frustrated, not just me.”
About the name Nimway
When choosing a name for this product, Sony looked for a word with a Scandinavian touch. “'Nimway is actually a play on words. 'Nim' is a term used in southern Sweden and part of Denmark to mean ‘smooth’ or ‘easy’. So Nimway stands for "the easy way".
Sony X Fagerhult: a clever collaboration
Like Fagerhult, Sony’s Nimway solution team puts people in the centre.
But that is not the only similarity between the two companies, according to Lars-Gunnar. "What we also share is a new approach to the working environment and a focus on innovative technologies. We all want to make sure that employees have the best possible experience, in order to reach the highest levels of creativity and productivity. Lighting and lighting control are key components. For us, it is very valuable that Organic Response is linked to the building infrastructure. From here, we can collectively take the office environment to the next level.”
“With the combination of lighting control and indoor navigation, we can do much more in the future. We can make the work environment match the needs of the organization and the people who work there even better than it’s done today. We do this with high-quality solutions that offer good value for money and comply with privacy legislation.”