AT&T Smart Luggage: Want to Find Your Luggage? Contact It!

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It is a traveler's nightmare when his luggage goes missing upon arrival in his destination. Tracking where it landed is a major annoyance and time-consuming, but what else can a traveler do to find it? Why not 'contact' the luggage itself?

AT&T makes this possible by introducing an innovative luggage, dubbed "smart luggage" during the AT&T Innovation Showcase held just recently.

The AT&T Smart Luggage routes away from the ordinary baggage as it has a GPS tracking chip attached to it, capable of sending location data to their owners and alerting the airline carriers when they (luggage) are lost. The luggage can be tracked using a smartphone app, and is rechargeable through USB, which lasts for up to three days. Tracking of the smart luggage is done in real-time, and the GPS tracking hardware embedded on the luggage is set to be included in standard bags or suitcases.

Meanwhile, other features are incorporated to the smart luggage, such as that the luggage can send an alert if it has reached the boundaries of a set geo-fence or has been taken off the plane and visual light indicators embedded on the bags controlled by just tapping a button on a smartphone app. "If your bag is in the carousel, you can even press a button, to trigger a flashing blue light to help identify it," says Craig Lee, Director of the Machine-to-Machine Foundry of AT&T.

The cost of an AT&T smart luggage is still unknown, though, or it may either come as a one-time or a pay-everytime-you-fly payment scheme. Also, further tests are being performed to make the smart luggage compliant to airline carrier policies and Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regulations.

The Smart Luggage is part of the rapid prototyping demonstrations performed by AT&T that aim to bring useful and consumer-friendly technology to the market.

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