Helium Partners with CareBand During COVID-19 to Offer Affordable Contact Tracing Wearables; Protecting People of All Ages

San Francisco, September 17, 2020 — Helium, the company behind one of the world’s first peer-to-peer wireless networks, The People’s Network, today announced a partnership with CareBand Inc. a location-based health and safety company. CareBand’s end-to-end solutions combine patent-pending wearables, web and mobile software, and machine learning technology to save lives and improve health outcomes. Through this partnership, The People’s Network is providing CareBand solutions with much-needed wireless connectivity to keep seniors living with dementia safe and enable organizations to safely reopen and stay open while managing the risk of COVID-19. 
   
CareBand started as a solution to improve the quality of life and standard of care for those living with dementia and Alzheimer’s. Its innovative wearable technology keeps people safe through real-time indoor and outdoor location tracking and geofences and analyzes daily activity and behavior patterns to recognize and alert caregivers to early changes in condition. With the onset of COVID-19, CareBand expanded its solutions with the introduction of SafeTrack to address population health management and pandemic response for the general population. 

Utilizing The People’s Network, a growing wireless network exclusively for IoT devices, SafeTrack wearable devices are currently being used to help organizations automatically track and trace interactions in their communities to slow the transmission of the virus, quickly identify contacts, and stop the transmission early. The People’s Network supplies the scalability and affordability that allows CareBand’s SafeTrack solution to provide universities, manufacturers, and senior living communities with a simple way to monitor social distancing compliance and automate contact tracing. 

“We needed a secure and reliable IoT network partner that could scale, and it had to work seamlessly with our technology. There was no question that it was going to be Helium,” said Adam Sobol, CEO, CareBand. “So much of what we are doing today is possible because of them and The People’s Network. Together, we are giving employers, administrators, and caregivers the much-needed tools they need to help protect their teams, students, and loved ones.”
 
“Using The People’s Network for the greater good is part of Helium’s mission,” said Amir Haleem, Helium’s CEO, and co-founder. “We are pleased to partner with CareBand to help those in need — through this uncertain time and in the years to come.”

The People’s Network is powered by the Helium Hotspot, a hardware device that enables anyone to own and operate a wireless network for IoT devices. With Helium’s open-source blockchain technology, individuals are incentivized to deploy Hotspots, which simultaneously mine cryptocurrency ($HNT) and provide network coverage for hundreds of square miles. When connected with other nearby Hotspots, this acts as the backbone of the network, which is often referred to as The People’s Network. The growth of The People’s Network is also made possible by Helium Patrons, who deploy coverage at scale and have helped supply coverage for important use cases such as CareBand. Helium’s community has created networks across 1,800+ cities throughout North America and recently expanded to Europe.

About CareBand
Based in Chicago, CareBand is a location-based health and safety company. CareBand’s flagship solution, designed for people living with dementia, provides real-time indoor and outdoor location tracking to reduce wandering events and monitors behaviors for early changes in health condition. Backed by the US National Institute of Aging (NIA) and Canada’s Age-Well, CareBand has been recognized as a leader in aging research and innovative methods of care delivery. Leveraging their flagship solution CareBand recently developed the SafeTrack solution to help mitigate the risks associated with COVID-19. More information can be found at 
https://www.carebandremembers.com. 

About Helium
Co-founded by Shawn Fanning and Amir Haleem in 2013, Helium is building the world’s first peer-to-peer wireless network to simplify connecting devices to the internet by rewarding anyone to become a network operator with a new cryptocurrency ($HNT). CEO Amir Haleem comes from an extensive background in triple-A video games. Helium is backed by GV (formerly Google Ventures), Khosla Ventures, Union Square Ventures, Multicoin Capital, FirstMark, Marc Benioff, Shawn Fanning, and other top VCs. The network is live in more than 1,800 cities throughout North America, Europe, and coming soon to Asia. More information can be found at https://www.helium.com.

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