ELEVATOR SYSTEM AND METHOD TO PROVIDE PERSONALIZED INFORMATION

Abstract

 The invention relates to an elevator system (1) and a method to provide personalized information during elevator ride. The elevator system (1) comprises at least one output device (2) disposed in an elevator car (3). This output device (2) can communicate with a data source (4) and of providing personalized information for elevator passengers (8). A detection means (7) detects an entry of passenger (8) into the elevator car (3). An identification means (6) is to assign a unique identifier for this passenger (8) and identify the assigned unique identifier. At least one control device (5) of the elevator system (1) is operatively connected to a data source (4) and/or the said output device (2). The control device (5) can personalize the information provided by the data source (4) depending on the identified unique identifier. The output device (2) is capable of outputting this personalized information from the data source (4), once the identified passenger (8) entering the elevator car (3). And the outputted personalized information is configurable by the passenger (8) using the control device (5).

Description

BACKGROUND

[0001] The invention relates to an elevator system and a method to provide personalized information for passengers.

[0002] An elevator system may comprise an elevator car that is movable vertically in an elevator hoistway or elevator shaft and/or that may be stopped at different floors of a building. The elevator car is a suitable location for presenting information to elevator passengers during an elevator ride. Examples of such information that may be provided to the passengers are textual or graphical notifications, voice, music, short movies, advertisements or infotainment.

[0003] Usually, there is a COP (Car operation panel) as a Destination Operating Panel of an elevator car to give an elevator car call and a floor-control-panel outside of the elevator car to give an elevator floor call. Passengers who will travel by an elevator may call at first an elevator car at a floor and then request a target floor by using a COP in the elevator car.

[0004] Today, more and more COP comprise a display to extend or optimise customer's experience and provide useful available information for elevator passengers. But an individual passenger may be still subjected to random information that does not correspond to her/his personal interests. On the other hand, because of the exponentially increasing amount of information, a conflict exists between the huge amount of information and the short elevator travel time. To increase the customer's convenience during the travel in an elevator car, there exists a demand for personalization and customization of information accessing and displaying.

[0005] Personalization is done by a system being used. The main goal of personalization is to deliver content and functionality that matches specific user needs or interests. Personalization may deliver or emphasize particular information and/or simplify transactions and processes by remembering information about a user. The personalized system will present different things to each user. Each profile should be unique to each user.

[0006] While a customization is done by users. The system may enable users to customize or make changes to the experience to meet their specific needs by configuring layout, content, or system functionality. Customization may involve items on an interface to reflect the users' priorities, selecting topics of interest, or altering factors related to the visual and sound design of an interface. Personalization and customization both have abilities to enhance a user's experience.

[0007] According to US2017174473 A1, a method for generating a user interface on a mobile device can be executed to interact with an elevator system which can receive a selection of a plurality of custom floors (a subset of floors). And this user interface can be generated in response to the custom floors.

[0008] WO2016207477 A1 has disclosed that an elevator passenger having a unique identifier. The passenger may have a mobile device, such as a smartphone interacting with the elevator. The mobile device receives the unique identifier and sends it to a media service. The passenger is identified and information relating to the passenger's interests may be selected and presented to this passenger during an elevator ride.

[0009] One object of an embodiment may be to optimize the functionality of an elevator operation panel (COP) and to increase the customers' convenience and comfort during the elevator ride.

[0010] Such an object may be achieved by the subject-matter of the independent claims. Further exemplary embodiments are evident from the dependent claims and the following description.

[0011] According to the present invention, an elevator system comprises at least one output device disposed in an elevator car of this elevator system. This output device can communicate with a data source (e.g. social media service) and provide personalized information for elevator passengers. A detection means can detect an entry of a passenger into the elevator car. Such a detection means may comprise one or more conventional weighing devices, cameras or optic sensors. The elevator system comprises an identification means to assign a unique identifier for this passenger and identify the assigned unique identifier. The unique identifier includes a user profile which is used to define what and how information will be displayed. At least one control device of the elevator system is operatively connected to a data source and/or the said output device. The control device could be a car operation panel (COP) or a mobile device, e.g. a smart phone. And the output device could be screen or a loudspeaker that can be a part of the control deice or a separate device. The said control device is to personalize the information provided by the data source depending on the identified unique identifier. The control device is also configured to request the personalized information from the data source. The output device is capable of outputting this personalized information from the data source, once the identified passenger enters the elevator car. And the outputted personalized information is configurable by the elevator passenger using the control device.

[0012] Then a personalized and customized information outputting is realized inside of an elevator car during an elevator ride. The elevator system can profile the passengers and adjust the information displaying according to the user profile of the individual passenger respectively. The output device allows passengers to change views so that they will contain only the information interested by themselves. The elevator system comprises an information filtering which gathers personalized information from different sources according to user profile, ranks the collected information and puts it out by the output device. Customization lets passengers make their own selections about what they want to see or configure how information is organized or generated. For example, a passenger may easily modify the display attributes of the current view on a COP-display.

[0013] As an improvement of the present invention, the control device and/or the identification means can save the assigned unique identifier of a passenger at least for a time period. Then the output device will automatically put the personalized information out, once the passenger is successfully identified. For example, if a passenger had taken an elevator car once before and is assigned with a unique identifier already, the for this passenger personalized and customized information will be generated automatically when she/he next time enters this elevator car again. The saving time of the unique identifier can be extended automatically every time when this passenger enters this elevator car or this elevator. The unique identifier may apply for one or more elevator cars of one elevator, groups of elevators, elevators of one or more certain trademarks/producers.

[0014] As an improvement of the present invention, the performance of outputting information depends on the number of output devices and/or the number of the passengers inside of an elevator car. If more than one passenger come into the elevator car successively, the executed information providing will stay unchanged for the first passenger. If there are more output devices, e.g. displays, in the elevator car, the next free display will be automatic initiated to display the defined information for the next identified passenger until no more free displays are available in the elevator car. In case of parallel requests, the passenger fist identified gets the priority or the passenger having a higher priority will be provided with information at first. For the case that the output device is a loudspeaker, if more than one passenger come into the elevator car, the sound outputting will be interrupted, unless the sound has been sending to a headset of the first passenger. If the other passengers have also own headsets, the output device can send different sounds according to different unique identifiers to the passenger simultaneously and separately. For the case that the passengers are equipped with helmets comprising glasses and headsets such as Virtual Reality (VR), they may also perceive their own information (e.g. images, music, videos, texts) individually without interacting or affecting anybody else.

[0015] As a further improvement of the present invention, the identification means and/or the detection means are a device or an application program performed by a device. The passenger may e.g. download an Identification-APP (Application software) to his personal control device (e.g. mobile phone) to build a communication between the personal control device and a data source that allows this passenger to pre-define information of her/his own interest. Alternatively, the identification is also possible through a registration which can be done before, then passengers can be identified automatically by their own mobile phones or identity cards (ID-cards).

[0016] As a further improvement of the present invention, the identification means is capable of cooperating with a payment mechanism. The payment mechanism could be an online method, e.g. Alipay, Paypal or a Credit transfer etc. The personalized information will be provided by the data source depending on a payment. The payment may be calculated on an effective interest rate or a flat interest rate and preferably executed periodically likes weekly, monthly, quarterly, or annual.

[0017] According to other embodiments, a method to provide personalized information displaying for an aforementioned elevator system, the method comprising the steps of:

• detecting a passenger entering in an elevator car of the elevator system;
• assigning and/or identifying a unique identifier of this detected passenger;
• authorizing the elevator passenger to acquire an information from a data source;
• personalizing the acquirable information according to the unique identifier of the passenger;
• obtaining and outputting the said personalized acquirable information with at least one output device disposed in an elevator car of this elevator system.

[0018] The data source sharing, passenger identification and payment here could be realized based on a so-called cloud computing architecture. Such a cloud computing architecture is a structure of the system, which comprises cloud resources, services, middleware, and software components and so on. The control device or the identification means of this application could be located on an edge computer, a smart gateway or have a communication interface to link the elevator to the cloud computing architecture.

[0019] At least one of the afore-mentioned implementation examples offers one or more solutions to the problems and disadvantages of the known prior art. Other technological benefits of the present invention become evident to a person skilled in the art from the following description and the claims. The numerous examples of implementing the present invention achieve only a part of the presented advantages. None of the advantages is critical to the examples of implementation. Any required embodiment can technically be combined with any other required embodiment. The examples represent only a few advantageous embodiments and they do not limit the idea of the invention that can be implemented even in other manners within the framework of the claims presented further below.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0020] Below embodiments of the present invention are described in more detail with reference to the attached drawings. The accompanying drawings, which are included to provide a further understanding of the invention and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention and together with the description help to explain the principles of the invention. In the drawings:

Fig. 1

shows a schematic view of one example of the elevator system.

Fig. 2

shows a schematic illustration of one example of the functionality of the elevator system.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0021] Fig. 1 is a schematic view of one example of an elevator system 1 disclosed herein. The elevator system 1 comprises at least one output device 2. During an elevator ride, a passenger 8 may get information provided by the output device 2 automatically so that this passenger 8 doesn't need to take e.g. her/his smart phone or laptop out of a bag or a pocket and looking for the information which this passenger is interested in receiving. Although if a passenger 8 has forgotten to take her/his smart phone, it is still possible to display pre-personalized and -customized information.

[0022] The elevator system 1 comprises a control device 5 which is operatively connected to the data source 4 and the output device 2. The control device 5 and the output device 2 can be integrated together in one device, e.g. a car operation panel (COP). If the control device 5 is a mobile device, e.g. a smartphone or a smart watch, the output device 2 could be the COP which comprises a display and/or a loudspeaker. This control device 5 is connectable to a network 10 and configured to run application programs or APP (Application software).

[0023] The output device 2 could be a display and/or a loudspeaker and is able to communicate with the control device 5 and a data source 4 to provide information such as sound, images, figures and entertainment information etc. The communication with the data source 4 can be via a network 10. The control device 5 is configured to requesting the information of the data source 4. Such a data source 4 is e.g. a storage unit, a server/client-server, a server cluster or a social media service etc. The server or the server cluster could be also a cloud server or a clustered cloud servers based on a cloud technology. A cloud server is a virtual machine that locates on a single physical server, while a clustered cloud servers sits on top of a cluster of more than one physical machine (also called nodes).

[0024] The elevator system 1 comprises further a detection means 7 which is responsive to recognize an entry or a presence of a passenger 8 in the elevator car 3. Such a detection means 7 could be a weighing device, a camera, an optic sensor or a WLAN-hotspots through which the passenger 8 is logged in. And an identification means 6 of the elevator system 1 will assign a unique identifier for a passenger 8 and identify the assigned unique identifier. The identification means 6 and the detection means 7 could be an application program or APP. Such a APP could be performed by a device or by the control device 5. The passenger 8 may download this APP to his personal control device 5, e.g. smartphone or smartwatch, to build a communication between the output device 2 and the data source 4 to pre-define information of her/his own interest to output. The passenger's reactions with the pre-definition may be reported to herself/himself that what and how the information will be outputted later.

[0025] The identification means 6 is configured to assign a unique identifier as user profile for a passenger 8. The unique identifier may be constructed from a code, a serial number of a personal device or an identity card (ID-card) of the passenger 8. The passenger 8 may use the control device 5 (e.g. smart phone, smart watch) interacting with the identification means 6. The control device 5 may receive the unique identifier. The unique identifier can be also created through a registration before an elevator ride. When the passenger 8 has got the unique identifier, this passenger 8 may look for and define the available information what is interesting. The unique identifier will be just assigned when the passenger e.g. has paid a fee though a payment mechanism 11.

[0026] This passenger 8 can also change and modify the information displayed by the output device 2 at any time, e.g. during an elevator ride. Then the modified new unique identifier will be formatted and saved in the identification means 6 for this passenger 8 and then sent to the control device (5). At the same time, a new personalized user profile for information displaying is established too, indicating the categories, types or contents of information that the passenger 8 desires to receive.

[0027] Fig. 2 shows a schematic illustration of one example of the functionality of the above-mentioned elevator system 1.

[0028] Once a passenger 8 who has been assigned with a unique identifier gets into an elevator car 3 of the elevator system 1, this passenger is detected by the detection means 7. Then the detection means 7 will be activated and send a signal 9 to the identification means 6 automatically. The identification means 6 will assign a unique identifier for this passenger 8 and send this unique identifier the control device 5. The unique identifier may be also sent when the passenger 8 calls the elevator car 3 by pressing the call register button on a control device 5, e.g. a COP, or by any other call method, e.g. a smart phone. Is this passenger 8 identified and an authorization given, the control device 5 sent a request to the data source 4 according to the unique identifier. Then the pre-defined display content will be transmitted from the data source 4 to the output device 2. The output device 2 can be also configurated by the passenger 8 using the control device 5. The passenger 8 can either modify the display attributes of the default or saved views or create a new-defined view. After this passenger 8 leaves the elevator car 3, the detection means 7 will send a signal 9 to the identification means 6 again. Then the output device 2 will be switched either back to the standard arrangement or to display the information defined by another passenger.

[0029] It is obvious to a person skilled in the art that with the advancement of technology, the basic idea of the invention may be implemented in various ways. The invention and its embodiments are thus not limited to the examples described above; instead they may vary within the scope of the claims.

List of reference symbols

[0030] 

1

Elevator system

2

Output device

3

Elevator car

4

Data source interface

5

Control device

6

Identification means

7

Detection means

8

Passenger(s)

9

Signal

10

Network

11

payment mechanism

Claims

1. An elevator system (1), comprising:

- at least one output device (2) disposed in an elevator car (3) of this elevator system (1) capable of communicating with a data source (4) and of providing personalized information for an elevator passenger;

- a detection means (7) to detect an entry of a passenger (8) into the elevator car (3);

- an identification means (6) to assign a unique identifier for this passenger (8) and identify the assigned unique identifier; and

- at least one control device (5) to personalize the information provided by the data source (4) depending on the identified unique identifier; said control device (5) being operatively connected to the said data source (4) and/or the said output device (2);

- said output device (2) being capable of outputting the personalized information from the data source (4); and

- said outputted personalized information being configurable by the elevator passenger (8) using said control device (5).

2. An elevator system (1) according to claim 1, wherein
the control device (5) and/or the identification means (7) can save the assigned unique identifier at least for a time period, and
the unique identifier applies for one or more elevator cars (3) of the elevator system (1) and/or for a group of elevator systems (1).

3. An elevator system (1) according to claim 1 or 2, wherein
the identification means (6) and/or the detection means (7) are a device and/or an application program.

4. An elevator system (1) according to any of the claims 1 to 3, wherein
the identification means (6), the detection means (7) and/or output device (2) are integrated in one device or are separate as more than one device.

5. An elevator system (1) according to any of the claims 1 to 4, wherein
the at least one output device is a wearing equipment of a passenger (2) inside of the elevator car (3).

6. An elevator system (1) according to claim 1, wherein
the said identification means (6) is capable of cooperating with a payment mechanism (11).

7. An elevator system (1) according to any of the claims 1 to 6, wherein
the control device (5) is a car operation panel or a mobile device.

8. Method to provide personalized information displaying for an elevator system (1) as claimed in one of claims 1 to 7, the method comprising the steps of:

- detecting a passenger entering in an elevator car (3) of the elevator system (1);

- assigning a unique identifier for this passenger (8) and identifying the assigned unique identifier;

- authorizing the elevator passenger (8) to acquire an information from a data source (4);

- personalizing the acquirable information according to the unique identifier of the passenger;

- obtaining and outputting the said personalized acquirable information with at least one output device (2) disposed in an elevator car (3) of this elevator system (1).

9. Method of claim 8, further comprising the step of:

saving the assigned unique identifier in the control device (5) and/or in the identification means (7) at least for a time period, whereas

the unique identifier is available for one or more elevator cars (3) of the elevator system (1) and/or for more elevator systems (1).

10. Method of claim 8 or 9, further comprising the step of:

outputting information depending on the number of the output device (2), the number of the passengers (8) and/or the wearing equipment of the passengers (2) inside of the elevator car (3).

11. Method of any of the claims 8 to 10, further comprising the step of:

configuring the outputted information by using a control device (5).

12. Method of any of the claims 8 to 11, wherein
said identification means (6) cooperates with a payment mechanism (11).

Drawing