The biometric space is evolving speedily. The advent of the pandemic has also given it a push because of contact-free security solutions. The demand for sensor-based tech-savvy biometric security solutions is expanding with each passing day. The use of a cloud-based control platform, which allows smartphone, or access cards to unlock doors, is heavily in demand.
One company that counts in giving ace level biometric services is Spintly. The company provides biometric verification solutions using two-factor authentication on the user’s smartphone.
Rohin, Co-founder and CEO of Spintly, sheds some light on how the firm works and how it is finding innovative solutions to add up to the biometric service space. Following are the highlights of the interview.
Please describe us about Spintly in detail.
Spintly is a cloud-based access control platform that allows users to unlock doors with smartphones, wearable devices, or access cards. The current access control systems in the market use primitive technology, which was developed decades ago. Existing systems require a massive amount of wiring and a large number of controllers. Almost 70% of the cost of access control systems goes into wiring, controllers, and labor.
We have developed the world’s first fully wireless access control system, allowing access control readers to communicate with each other over a wireless mesh technology. Hence, it eliminates the need for wiring and bulky controllers. This saves the cost in terms of hardware and saves a tremendous amount of time and effort, which goes into laying down the cables and wires. Being a cloud-based system allows easy integration with other software, which your company may be using.
What made Rohin venture into the field of biometric services?
The idea for Spintly was born in a building management room full of door controllers, fire alarm panels, lighting control panels, and many wires to connect all systems. The hardware was occupying an entire room in the building, and cables ran all across the building floors.
I, along with Malcolm D’souza, conceptualized a controller-less and fully wireless building automation platform. It would allow all devices like access control readers, smoke detectors, lights, etc., to communicate over a mesh network allowing these devices to make their own decisions. Thus, Spintly was developed as a unified wireless platform for building automation. We decided to focus on the physical security aspect of the buildings and made a complete end-to-end solution for access control.
What kind of offerings does Spintly provide to its clients?
We make hardware devices like wireless smart locks, readers, and edge gateways that communicate with the Spintly cloud platforms. It brings affordable access control to every door. We also offer cloud-based software modules for access control, time and attendance, and contactless visitor management.
What kind of challenges have you faced while entering the biometric services sector?
The biometric services sector is crowded with manufacturers from China and Korea, and other countries. Selling hardware in an already crowded market was a challenge. Competing with these existing products on price was not worth it. So, we decided to focus on software and technology. We used our key differentiators, wireless mesh technology and cloud software, to enter the biometric access control space.
How was your firm/business affected in these pandemic times, and what were the steps you took to curb the damages while helping your clients and maintaining the safety of your employees?
One of the significant challenges we faced when COVID-19 struck India was when our business got adversely affected due to the lockdown. We quickly were able to change our messaging to a contact-less system and attract customer attention. But for 2-3 months, going without revenues was a difficult phase in the business.
Every start-up faces challenges of having a good cash flow so it can stay afloat towards becoming profitable. One of the other challenges we faced was the lack of a manufacturing ecosystem due to prolonged dependency on China. So, we are building an infrastructure and capability ground-up that will enable us to deliver our products in the future.
What would you like to advise the young generation of entrepreneurs and enthusiasts who want to venture into the field of biometric services?
For any entrepreneurs trying to enter into the biometric field or any other business, it is essential that they identify the crucial problem in the industry that can be effectively solved. We should also focus on having a key differentiator either in technology, software, or business model. And in general, every entrepreneur should have big dreams and a passion for learning and solving problems.
Where do you envision your firm/business in the long run, and what are your future goals? How do you plan to embrace the changes happening in your industry?
Our vision is to build a world more intelligent and more straightforward by providing a frictionless access control experience to users. We want to make the building smarter with our fully wireless mesh platform for intelligent building devices.
The industry is changing at a rapid pace. The only way to stay ahead of the curve is to keep innovating. And we do this by participating in various organizations that define new technology standards and hiring smart people who can keep working on new technologies.
What is the current industrial scenario of the biometric services sector?
The current scenario is highly affected by the COVID-19 Pandemic. The biometric industry has been heavily influenced by this pandemic. The use of fingerprint-based biometric devices was completely halted throughout the pandemic, and we see this trend continuing.
Demand for face recognition based biometric solutions has increased. New ways of providing biometrics solutions have emerged. One of them is giving biometric solutions using smartphones.
Visionary Leader
Rohin started his career as a scientist working for Bhabha Atomic Research Centre and then worked in the USA for 12 years at Motorola, Nokia, Broadcom and RF DSP. He returned to India in 2017 intending to build a company that would develop technology-based products to solve critical problems in the building automation space.
Rohin is a visionary leader with extensive experience in technology, hardware, and product development. Rohin Co-founded Spintly in Sep-2017 intending to develop innovative wireless products and technologies for the IoT (Internet of Things) market.
Rohin Launched a fully wireless access control IoT Platform that allows users to unlock doors with their smartphones. The Spintly technology helps reduce more than 70% of the wired infrastructure cost needed for building automation. This has created a paradigm shift in the access control and building automation world globally.
