Copyright © Françoise Herrmann
Begone leashes! The Halo smart safety collar for dogs lets your dog roam free, anywhere you go, camping or traveling, and at your residence, without the need for enclosures, or physical restraints of any sort.
Using the Halo app, comprising a GPS-connected map, the user simply draws a virtual fence, marking a specific location, which is stored in the dog's Halo collar. The Halo smart collar comprises a power source, a memory, a processor able to geolocate its own position, and sensors to determine motion and direction, as well as a communication interface able to receive and send data. Depending on the position of the collar relative to the virtual fence, the Halo smart collar sends customized corrective feedback to the dog. Customized corrective feedback, such as escalating sound, pre-recorded message, vibration or stimulation, not only to prevent the pet from crossing the virtual perimeter of the area marked on the map, but also to lead the pet away from the virtual perimeter, back into the enclosed safe area. Using the Halo system, owners can store up to 20 virtual fences in the dog's Halo collar.
The Halo virtual fence and smart collar system is actually much safer for dogs, and more practical or versatile for owners, than any in- or over-the-ground fence systems, or existing user-activated corrective collar systems. Because the geolocated information of a specific virtual area and perimeter is stored inside the Halo smart collar, and the collar processes the pet's geolocation relative to the perimeter of the stored virtual area information, owners do not have to constantly keep an eye on their pets to activate the corrective collar, nor do the dogs have to stay within range of radiofrequency signals to obtain feedback.
The Halo virtual fence is also more practical than in-the-ground electrical fences, because no digging is required for installing wires, and no obstacles such as driveways need to be circumvented during installation. Plus the Halo virtual fence is not subject to the power outages of any hardwired fences, or to lawnmower accidents that risk severing wires.
The Halo virtual fence is also much safer for dogs than over-the-ground fences, considering over-the-ground fences have openings, can easily be jumped, and cannot be set up anywhere, on camping or wilderness trips. Finally, Halo system users living next to lakes are even able to mark a portion of a virtual fence perimeter in the water, allowing dogs to jump in, and out of the water, next to their docks.
Designed for dogs "any size, any age, any breed", who love to run wild in the great outdoors, the Halo smart collar was originally designed to prevent the staggering number of road accidents involving pets. The Halo smart collar also prevents some of the ten million pets lost each year, considering that the collar enables users to keep track of their dog at all times, via their app, and the geolocated information emitted by the collar.
Finally, several modes already exist for the Halo system, such as a beacon system mode to keep dogs away from a specific dangerous spot or area, or a virtual leash mode to keep dogs at a much closer range. To use the collar in all of its modes, the app also includes 20 hours of training with one of the expert founding members of the Halo team. The training is designed to coach dogs to respond to the two-step Halo collar feedback.
The Halo smart collar was a finalist in the line-up for an SXSW 2023 Innovation Award, in the Design category. The Halo collar is also a patented invention. The US utility patent US11330803B2, titled Corrective collar utilizing geolocation technology, was awarded on May 17, 2022.
The Figure 1 depicts a user device 110, typically a mobile phone, smartwatch, tablet, or laptop, in communication with a collar 120, equipped with processing, geolocation, and communication capabilities. The communication capabilities of the collar 120 are designed to transmit geolocation, and other motion and direction data, to the user device 110, via a network 130. The collar 120, and the user device 110, are in communication with a Geolocation Service Provider Server 140, equipped with a processor 142, and a memory 140, able to accurately process the location data, communicated by the collar 120.
The disclosed technology includes a pet collar that can be configured to determine its geolocational position and evaluate that position with respect to the geo-fence of a predetermined, geo-fenced “safe” zone. If the collar determines that its position is inside a safe zone but is near the geo-fence, the collar may be configured to provide a warning correction. If the collar determines that it is outside a predetermined safe zone, the collar can also be configured to provide a stronger correction to discourage the pet from continuing away from the safe zone. The collar may also be configured to guide the pet back to the safe zone such as by varying the strength and/or type of correction provided based at least in part on the distance of the collar from the geo-fence. [Abstract US11330803B2]
References
Halo
SXSW 2023 - Innovation Awards Finalists
