Existing platforms in this space are largely focused on pushing content (with a bias towards marketing); our platform is focused on bi-directional experiences between users and hot-spots of interaction represented by beacons. Apps running on Sōhōkō can share users, beacons, and content, which helps app discovery.

Instead of launching the platform directly, we plan to build it through internal dog-fooding as we build the first set of applications available on the platform. These first apps will be focused around letting individual users create experiences with a single beacon.

The first app we are building is Sōhōkō Messenger, a messaging app where BLE beacons are used to deliver messages contextually. Instead of a message being sent when composed, delivery is triggered when either the sender or the recipient enter or exit the region of a beacon they have shared with each other. In the single-user use-case, this could be used to send contextual reminders; when sharing a beacon with friends, family, or co-workers, this provides a new way to receive messages in the right context and we feel this creates a little nicer feeling compared to the current state of affairs where we send messages regardless of the recipient's context. We feel such a personal use-case is a great place to start because messaging in the home is a place where we will be forced to be very careful about protecting user privacy.

400M beacons are estimated to be deployed by 2020[1], creating a revenue opportunity from micro-transactions for user interactions payed by developers on the platform.

Short term, there will be some revenue from premium app features and in-app beacon sales, but will mainly be from SDK licensing and developer partnerships with early adopters.

http://sohoko.io

1. http://www.reuters.com/article/ny-unacast-idUSnBw265779a+100+BSW20160126