Heads of supermarkets, conference centres and museums will be able to find out more about their customers with the help of new business intelligence technology.

The hi-tech 3dCRM (Customer Relationship Management) product was developed by York-based company Pepik as a 'non-intrusive' method of monitoring people.

It uses 'location aware' technology to follow customers around a building.

In most cases, the sole requirement of visitors to places such as museums, art galleries, supermarkets or the gym will be to carry a mini card or gadget while they are moving around.

Their movements within the venue will be picked up by small sensors, fed in to a database, and will ultimately appear on a monitor in a mapped replica of the particular venue.

By studying the movements and locations of their customers, venue organisers can build a picture of the length of their customers' visits, what they did, where they lingered and what they ignored.

Pepik used a SMART Feasibility award of £45,000 to design the technology.

They were helped in applying for the grant by Business Link York and North Yorkshire innovation and technology adviser Roger Benson.

The SMART awards, available from the Department of Trade and Industry, provide 75 per cent of eligible project costs for a technical and commercial feasibility study into highly innovative technology.

Mr Benson said: "This is a fascinating twenty-first century monitoring product which can be anonymous but at the same time provides museums, art galleries and the like with a mammoth amount of information."