Next-gen kid tracking device for active families

Haltian team designing

Kii and Haltian join forces to add peace of mind for families by bringing extra security and functionality for child safety

San Mateo, CA, and Oulu, Finland; February 16, 2016 – Kii, the leading Internet of Things (IoT) cloud platform provider, and Haltian, a high technology electronics design and production house, today announced a new portable tracker and communication device called “Snowfox”. This next generation tracking solution consists of a durable and portable device with voice calling, GPS tracking and an app – all backed by Kii’s IoT platform. This collaboration between Kii and Haltian delivers a solution to help address the highest priority for any parent – their child’s safety.

Today there are several kid trackers in the market, but with Snowfox, which has an embedded SIM card and is ready out of the box, key differentiators that make it stand apart include:

  1. Powerful two-way calling feature, including a simple button that can work as a panic button or a simple check-in button;
  2. Reliability – with its accurate GPS tracking;
  3. Rugged all-weatherproof design that is impact-resistant;
  4. Multiple geo-fencing zone capabilities that allows a parent to see the tracker’s most recent location, create no-go zones and get notifications when a tracker reaches or leaves a specific place;
  5. Simple design – both in the device (for kids) and in the app (for parents) – makes the solution very easy to use and adaptable;
  6. Cool, attractive-looking and colorful designs that can be easily attached to a zipper or jacket or onto a child’s backpack/bag.

“As a spin off from Nokia, our engineers are the best in the world and have created such an easy to use and reliable wireless tracking device as Snowfox,” says Pasi Leipälä, Haltian’s CEO. “This product gives parents added peace of mind by enabling a ‘connected circle of care’ between loved ones.”

“Successful IoT device adoption depends on seamless integration of different parts of the solution – the device, the back end, the app, connectivity – and with Snowfox, Kii and Haltian have achieved just that, which is why we are thrilled with this collaboration,” said Masanari Arai, CEO of Kii. “With the combination of Haltian’s hardware and software design and Kii’s highly scaled back end solution, we see Snowfox as a ‘best-of-breed’ in kids tracking today.”

Snowfox will be presented on the Haltian booth (Hall 5 Stand 5C43) at Mobile World Congress, Barcelona on 22-25 February 2016. The devices will be commercially available in Q2 2016 in selected markets. More information about the product and its availability can be found at https://www.snowfoxfamily.com

University usability laboratories in Oulu in Finland, where Haltian is based and where the devices are manufactured, have also been testing Snowfox devices. A quotation from the University study: “My five-year old daughter took great pride in owning a Snowfox device. She always remembered to take the device with her when changing jackets. She also felt safe knowing she could always reach mom when outside of the home.”

About Kii

Kii enables customers across the world to rapidly create compelling IoT solutions with its scalable, easy to use and feature rich IoT platform. The global platform enables all three layers of a typical IoT solution (things, services, apps), thereby significantly reducing the time it takes to create solutions, freeing up the customer to focus on their solution differentiation. Kii provides a flexible deployment model (public cloud, dedicated cloud, private cloud) globally, thereby enabling seamless solution deployment for customers of all sizes. In addition to the platform, Kii’s ecosystem initiatives (like Space) also enable customers to distribute their solutions in premier carrier and retailer channels.https://en.kii.com Follow @KiiCorp on Twitter

About Haltian

Haltian is a three year old a spin off from Nokia with world-class talent in high technology electronics design and productization. This year, Haltian was selected as the first Finnish company to take part in the Open Future Program by Telefonica. Haltian has almost 100 world-class talents whose expertise range from miniaturized mechanics combined with sensors and radio technology to high quality software. Haltian has also been chosen as the start up of the year 2014, and is the fastest growing company in Northern Finland. Find more at haltian.com Follow @haltian on Twitter

Media contact (Finland): Heini Tuorila, +358 40 7096512, heini.tuorila@haltian.com

Media contact (US): Kirtee Mehta 650-575-2341, kirtee.mehta@kii.com