Google launches Eddystone

In mid-July, Google launched Eddystone, an open source and cross-platform Bluetooth LE beacon standard. The Eddystone specification includes a number of broadcast frame types, including Eddystone-URL, the backbone of the Physical Web.

Beacons are an important piece of the IoT puzzle, and have the potential to enable vastly more contextual services in the physical world. Beacon technology essentially allows low-power Bluetooth devices to transmit information to smart devices.

Eddystone is a brand new format for BLE beacon advertising, created by Google, that adds up interesting features with respect to iBeacon technology, opening to interesting extension towards the Internet of Things. Beacons with support for Eddystone can broadcast three different advertising packets, called frame types:
- Eddystone-UID: a beacon’s unique ID number, composed by a 10-byte namespace ID and a 6-byte instance ID.
- Eddystone-URL (UriBeacon’s successor): an URL that can be broadcasted by a beacon.
- Eddystone-TLM (telemetry): for monitoring beacon status, including data obtained by sensors.

Additionally, Google offers a complete beacon management platform, including the Proximity Beacon API.

All BLE beacons of BlueBeacon series support Eddystone format specifications.