B’zT (Beacon Zone Technology) is an award-winning smart clothing solution combining apparel with a smartphone tracking app to prevent children and other vulnerable individuals from becoming lost or missing. B’zT produces machine-washable clothing embedded with tracking technology that works in conjunction with a six-person family app or a 30-person group app.

The company was founded in 2017 by Kiyeon Nam, Fashion Design ’02, who came up with the concept after her daughter went missing at a shopping mall. Nam found that existing tracking products were easy for children to remove, uncomfortable to wear, vulnerable to water damage, and required recharging and monthly fees. With her training from FIT, she designed comfortable apparel that harnessed technology to ensure a wearer’s safety.

She created B’zT, a clothing company that offered the world’s first machine-washable, pre-embedded proximity tracking device. The high-tech patches and apparel are comfortable, do not require recharging, and are affordable up front and without monthly fees. Her innovative clothing is embedded with waterproof chipsets that communicate with the B’zT app, which sends alerts to a parent’s or caregiver’s smartphone when an individual wearing B’zT wanders beyond the geo-fence. Her patented invention helps reduce the risk of lost and missing children and adults worldwide. 

Nam originally created B’zT for parents who have young children and wanted a discreet and cost-effective way of protecting them without using bracelets, leashes, or expensive GPS trackers. While she is seeing growing demand from families all over the world, her ultimate goal is to connect with institutions such as traditional and special needs schools, hospitals and health centers, nursing homes, and assisted-care facilities.