IoT Now: ISSN 2397-2793
J U N E /J U LY 2 0 1 6 • VO LU M E 6 • I S S U E 3
TALKING HEADS Tackling IIoT’s costs of acquiring, integrating and managing devices
SMART CITIES Drivers, challenges, developments & ecosystems
SMART UTILITIES
SMART HEALTH
INDUSTRIAL IoT
SMART CITIES
IoT GLOBAL NETWORK
Delivering intelligent utilities to ever-smarter homes. See our Analyst Report at www.iot-now.com
Improving healthcare and quality of life. Read our exclusive Analyst Report in the Nov/Dec issue.
The new interconnected manufacturing environment. See our Analyst Report at www.iot-now.com
New spaces for living, working and playing. See our Analyst Report inside this issue
Log on at www.iotglobalnetwork.com to discover our new portal for products, services and insight
PLUS: 8-PAGE SMART CITIES INSIGHT REPORT • Tributes to Alun Lewis • Special Supplement: IoT Platforms • What’s eUICC and Why is it Important? • How to Monetise the Internet of Things • Exclusive AT&T Interview • Fog brings clarity to Data Analytics • Wearables Update • USA IoT Supplement • News at www.iot-now.com
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CONTENTS
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27
TALKING HEADS
45
22
PLATFORMS SUPPLEMENT
MONETISING IoT
IN THIS ISSUE
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IoT NOW INSIGHT REPORT – SMART CITIES In the latest of our ongoing series of speciallycommissioned, independent, analyst-written Insight Reports, Andrew Brown of Strategy Analytics examines the drivers, challenges, developments and ecosystems in Smart Cities worldwide.
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WHAT’S THE FUTURE FOR eUICC? Benoit Jouffrey of Gemalto tells Jeremy Cowan of the role for embedded Universal Integrated Circuit Cards in IoT
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AT&T INTERVIEW Mike Troiano of AT&T’s IoT Solutions business unit talks to Analysys Mason’s Tom Rebbeck about connectivity options beyond cellular and how to work with 14,000 IoT developers
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IoT PLATFORMS Our Special 10-Page Supplement asks, What is an IoT Platform? Bob Emmerson takes a left-field look at platforms, while Nigel Chadwick cuts to the chase on their benefits
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DEVICE MANAGEMENT Wind River has a vision for the Device Cloud. Santhosh Nair shares it with Saverio Romeo of Beecham Research
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DATA ANALYTICS As George Malim finds, fog computing organic search and edge intelligence will all be needed to make full use of IoT’s vast data
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A WORK OF ARTS Antony Savvas reports on Telenor Connexion’s new IoT data analytics and management tool
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EMBEDDED UICC eUICC is delivering simplicity and more to accelerate IoT, says Machina’s Godfrey Chua
ALTAIR UNDER SONY New ownership, new lower power, lower cost, smaller LTE chipsets – same strategy, says Robin Duke-Woolley
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WHAT IS eUICC? Sierra Wireless’s Cyril Hullin describes eUICC and its importance
MALAYSIA’S IoT Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) describes recent successful use cases and tells us what’s next
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BIG IN JAPAN Rapid expansion in Japan’s Wearables market; Plus global growth of 67%, says IDC
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EVENT DIARY Never miss another key IoT event
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EDITOR’S COMMENT Farewell to Alun Lewis, communicator, thinker and friend
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TRIBUTES TO ALUN LEWIS Alun’s friends from around the communications sector pay tribute to the Editor of IoT Now Magazine who sadly died in May
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MARKET NEWS Actility launches ThingPark China with Foxconn; Digi’s solution for no/low power locations
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COMPANY NEWS Cyan acquires Connode to extend reach and portfolio; ARM buys Apical for vision tech
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CONTRACT HOT LIST & OPINION A round-up of the latest Internet of Things contracts, plus Opinion: Accept no substitutes
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WHAT’S HOT ONLINE What are people reading on www.iot-now.com? And on Page 12, see what’s most popular on www.iotglobalnetwork.com
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PRODUCT NEWS Benefits of an open IoT ecosystem, and of NB-IoT; Plus lone workers’ safety
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TALKING HEADS How should you tackle the costs of acquiring, integrating and managing devices in the Industrial Internet of Things? Nick Booth talks to Ubicquia
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IoT MONETISATION Saverio Romeo of Beecham Research asks Amdocs’ Shahar Yaacobi how IoT can deliver value and monetise services
Ubicquia – The smart city IoT market is awash with pilot applications looking for a business case, Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) wireless networks waiting for a critical mass of devices, and vendors hoping for a path to profit. It doesn’t have to be like this. With Ubicquia’s ‘Kairo’ there are no network rental charges and the whole city is covered in days – not just the downtown areas. Best of all, it is the city that retains control of the network and its long-term monetisation. www.ubicquia.com
IoT Now - June / July 2016
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COMMENT
EDITORIAL ADVISORS
Farewell to Alun Lewis – Communicator, thinker, friend I’m not sure who it was, but I still owe them a big thank you for introducing me to Alun Lewis 20 years ago. Initially, he wrote a number of articles for magazines I managed and immediately distinguished himself Jeremy Cowan, by his depth of editorial director & telecoms industry publisher knowledge (both business and technical), his intellect and insight, his witty turn of phrase and laid-back style. He soon became a friend and was, as Americans might say, a ‘go-to’ choice for advice when we started Prestige Media Ltd in 1998. He gently steered my thoughts about VanillaPlus towards a more coherent package and continued to do so for all of us at VanillaPlus and IoT Now for the next two decades. Since his sad and premature death aged 59 we have all missed him, and opposite you can read some of the many fond recollections we have received about the best information & communications technology editor and writer of his
generation. Alun would, however, have blushed and insisted that “The Show Must Go On”. So it does. We are pleased to bring you the largest ever issue of IoT Now, incorporating not one but three special sections; on Smart Cities (see pages 27-37), IoT Platforms (pages 45-54), and the Internet of Things USA-style (see our separate 20-page Supplement with this issue). I am also genuinely delighted that the editorship of IoT Now Magazine (in print and a digital edition – see www.iotnow.com) is passing to the care of George Malim, one of a younger generation of editorial talent. George takes over from my interim editorship in the September/October issue. Many of you will know him already from his strong stewardship of sister title, VanillaPlus magazine (www.vanillaplus.com ) which continues to innovate, inform, lead and entertain in its coverage of the world’s fastevolving communications business. Jeremy Cowan editorial director & publisher
Olivier Beaujard, vice-president Market Development, Sierra Wireless
Erik Brenneis, Vodafone
Robin DukeWoolley, CEO, Beecham Research
Andrew Parker, project marketing director, Connected Living, GSMA
Gert Pauwels, M2M marketing director, Orange Business
Contributors in this issue of IoT Now We are always proud to bring you the best writers and commentators in M2M and IoT. In this issue they include: Andrew Brown is executive director, Enterprise and IoT Research at Strategy Analytics
EDITORIAL DIRECTOR & PUBLISHER Jeremy Cowan Tel: +44 (0) 1420 588638 j.cowan@wkm-global.com DIGITAL SERVICES DIRECTOR Nathalie Millar Tel: +44 (0) 1732 808690 n.millarr@wkm-global.com BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR Cherisse Jameson Tel: +44 (0) 1732 807410 c.jameson@wkm-global.com
Saverio Romeo Principal analyst at Beecham Research, Saverio shares his insights on IoT initiatives from the EC and future plans and investments
DIRECTOR OF STRATEGIC PLANNING Charlie Bisnar Tel: +44 (0) 1732 807411 c.bisnar@wkm-global.com
PUBLISHED BY WeKnow Media Ltd. Suite 138, 70 Churchill Square, Kings Hill, West Malling, Kent ME19 4YU, UK Tel: +44 (0) 1732 807411
IoT Now is distributed free to selected named individuals worldwide who meet the Publisher's terms of Circulation Control. If you would like to apply for a regular free copy supplied at the Publisher's discretion visit www.iot-now.com If you do not qualify for a free subscription, paid subscriptions can be obtained. Subscriptions for 5 issues per year cost £125.00 worldwide (or US$210 / €160) including post and packing.
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Tom Rebbeck Tom leads Analysys Mason’s Digital Economy research practice, drawing on more than 15 years of experience in the telecoms sector
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© WeKnow Media Ltd 2016
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be copied, stored, published or in any way reproduced without the prior written consent of the Publisher.
Robert Brunbäck, CMO, Telenor Connexion
Aileen Smith, head of Ecosystem Development, Huawei Technologies
David Taylor, managing director, M2M, Telefónica UK
Bill Zujewski, SVP, IoT Marketing & Strategy, PTC
IoT Now - June / July 2016
IN MEMORIAM
In memory of Alun Lewis It is with the greatest regret that we report that Alun Lewis, editor of IoT Now Magazine, has passed away. You can read our tribute to him at www.IoT-Now.com (Search: Alun.) Here are some of the many warm tributes paid to him following his unexpected death, others are on our website. Stuart Sharrock, ICIN Events Alun was doing PR for Nortel when I first met him. He seemed to know more about his client's business and products than those who worked there. He was not only more interesting and entertaining than his client but also, as it turned out, far more ethical and honest. I learned a lot from our first meetings and continued to be educated in numerous encounters since then. A remarkable professional who knew his subject matter, put it in context and thought through the consequences. But above all a warm human being and one I feel privileged to have known as a good friend. Martyn Warwick, TelecomTV Alun and I met in 1991 and were the best of friends and beer drinking companions for 25 years. We once spent a very strange week together in Sarajevo on a press trip to look at plans for the reconstruction of the telecoms network. I will never forget drinking warm bottled beer by candlelight with him in the sand-bagged ruins of the only partially functioning hotel in the city. He was a remarkably intelligent, hugely wellread, imaginative, inventive, inquisitive, amusing and above all, gentle man. A great loss. I'm missing him already. Tim Guest, Atropos PR Alun’s mind retained pretty much everything he read and experienced. He often spoke of his war-poet uncle, also one Alun Lewis, of whom he was extremely proud. With his own supreme writing skills, it was unsurprising he was related to a famous poet; he could weave an intelligently informative story about all things telecoms, incorporating threads gathered from the realms of physics, biology, the Cosmos and more, making a potentially dull read, fascinating. Can't believe he's gone. Sarah Lafferty, freelance journalist I recently had such a warm, funny and mind-expanding conversation with Alun covering everything from telecoms to quantum physics to old school science fiction writers. Alun was so full of life and wonder and humour, it seems impossible that he has passed. Alun was a one-off, truly special man and everyone who met him shall remember him fondly.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
Bob Machin, CSG International Alun was a man of wisdom, knowledge and experience, but he wore all that very lightly and, as I well recall, had great patience with the slower of thought. More than that he was a very nice guy and this is a great loss. Keith Brody, DigitalRoute For a man who commanded respect himself, his starting point in any interaction always seemed to be his respect for others. And in a world where drawing attention to yourself is a (sadly) over-valued commodity, Alun was understated and happy to let his work do his talking for him. The worlds of telco infrastructure and publishing are poorer places for his absence. Rob Ettridge, Red Lorry Yellow Lorry I met him once on a train down to Farnborough when he stopped talking for a minute, smiled and said, “Watch this!” From a big black bag he pulled out this weird contraption. “What’s that?” I asked. “Watch!” he said. He twizzled a few buttons and one by one we watched the bemused and angry look on fellow commuters’ faces as their phone conversations started to break up and cut out. All down to Alun, who’d somehow got his hands on a mobile phone signal jammer as he thought it was extremely funny to stop phone conversations on public transport. Which it was. He was chuckling like a good ‘un. Kevin Taylor, Robertson Taylor PR Whichever role he was cast in, journalist or PR, he understood the needs of the readers – and they didn’t change. Alun was driven by the need to educate and inform, in his writing and in his conversation. If Alun went off on a tangent, there was always a point at the end of the diversion. He had an uncommon mind, and it will be sorely missed. Artur Kwiatkowski, Ciena Sad, sad news. I will always remember Alun as one of the warmest, wittiest and most intelligent people in the industry. "Let us hurry to love people they depart so quickly Leaving only their shoes and silence on the phone" – J. Twardowski
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MARKET NEWS NEWS IN BRIEF Adelaide to become first Gig City in Australia as it bids to join global smart city ranks The South Australian government has pledged AUS$4.65 million to connect the state’s capital city’s technological workspaces with a 1-gigabit-per-second fibre internet service this year. Speeds of up to 10 gigabits per second would be achievable if businesses invested in additional end-user technology. The project supports the Adelaide City Council plan to become one of the world’s first Smart Cities. Lord Mayor Martin Haese said building a stronger internet service would be a key step towards Adelaide realising its smart city ambition.nts.”
Actility launches ThingPark China with Foxconn to tap opportunities in China’s IoT market Actility, has announced that it is partnering with Foxconn Technology Group (Foxconn) to launch ThingPark China, a collaborative initiative to deliver a comprehensive suite of Internet of Things (IoT) solutions to the Chinese market. By integrating Actility’s innovative ThingPark IoT platform and Foxconn’s leading vertical information and communications technology services and solutions, ThingPark China will offer endto-end IoT services from sensors and gateways to network management and SaaS solutions. ThingPark China will begin business operations in the third quarter of 2016. “China is an opportunity like no other IoT market,” said Actility CEO, Mike Mulica. “It’s growing 30% a year, and a third of the world’s 15 billion connected things in 2020 will be in China. Foxconn is the perfect partner for Actility, because it is a company with world-class expertise to drive innovation at scale, as well as unrivaled market access to industrial and urban China. ThingPark China delivers on our goal to serve the vast Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) IoT markets across China.”
Shipments of cellular M2M modules reached 96m units in 2015 Berg Insight has estimated that global cellular M2M module shipments increased by 19.4% in 2015 to a new record level of 96.0 million. A somewhat higher growth rate is expected for 2016. Until 2020, shipments of cellular M2M devices are forecasted to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 21.7% to reach 256.0 million units. East Asia, North America and Western Europe were the main geographical markets in 2015, accounting for around 75% of the total demand. The regions are similar in size measured by volume.
Johan Fagerberg, CEO at Swedenbased M2M/IoT analyst firm Berg Insight
Berg Insight projects that the relationship in relative market shares between the three regions will remain relatively stable in the coming five years. The latest 3GPP standards for LTE – Cat 1, Cat M1, and Cat M2 – will contribute substantially to growth in the next coming five years. These new standards are designed to be less complex to limit power consumption and are priced more favorably to address the mass market and make it viable to connect entirely new applications.
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“We are delighted to be collaborating with Actility on this exciting initiative,
which is another step in our ongoing efforts to create an Internet of Things ecosystem that supports our strategic focus on providing innovative products and solutions to realise smarter lives,” said FangMing Lu, executive vice president of Foxconn.
Mike Mulica, CEO Actility
ThingPark China will initially focus on delivering solutions to customers in China. In addition to deploying ThingPark Wireless connectivity, network operations and data management, both as SaaS and “on-premise” services, ThinkPark China will also resell LPWA gateways, which serve as essential hubs connecting sensors in the field to public or private communications networks. China’s rapidly-growing IoT market is supported by partnerships between industry and government at the national and local levels, and some of the first customers for ThingPark China will be “smart cities”, using LPWA technology to connect sensors measuring air and water pollution, and traffic flows, and noise metering, among other uses.
Digi International introduces cellular gateway solution for no or low power locations Digi International® has introduced Digi Connect Sensor, a battery-powered, enterprise-ready, cellular gateway solution for wireless connectivity at locations with either no power or low power. In offering a plug-and-play solution, Connect Sensor allows for remote sensor monitoring to be deployed in environments previously considered too harsh, remote or not economically viable. With versatility and flexibility to accommodate off-the-shelf sensors, such as flow, level, pressure and environmental conditions, the newly announced cellular gateway solution will help make sensor use ubiquitous. Because it provides remote monitoring without the need for additional infrastructure, power supplies or thirdparty applications, Digi Connect Sensor is ideal for energy, water, industrial and government installations that need to expand monitoring capabilities due to oversight requirements, or to increase operational efficiencies, as well as implement Industry 4.0 or Smart City initiatives. Featuring integration with Digi Device Cloud, Connect Sensor allows individual
companies, systems integrators and IoT solution providers to easily offer vastly expanded monitoring capabilities and deliver new levels of visibility. With cellular connectivity at each sensor and low cellular data usage rates, Connect Sensor also eliminates the need to configure local wireless networks and makes it cost effective for data backhaul. Connect Sensor also works with Digi’s Connect Wizard, a first-of-its-kind mobile application for this type of batterypowered gateway. The application uses a Bluetooth connection to provide local installers, technicians or drivers with instant feedback on sensor values via Android and iOS smartphones or tablets. This provides local personnel with immediate status on possible actions and replaces the need for outdated LCD displays. Endress+Hauser, a supplier of industrial measurement and automation equipment, recently selected Digi Connect Sensor for its inventory management solutions to offer a complete solution for connectivity of industrial sensors in remote locations.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
COMPANY NEWS Cyan acquires Connode to expand global reach and portfolio Cyan has announced its intention to acquire Sweden’s standardsbased software company Connode for an undisclosed sum, subject to shareholder approval. Headquartered in Stockholm, Connode is a supplier of wireless John Cronin, communication products executive chairman of for IoT and has deployed Cyan more than 650,000 legacy units with utilities. Connode provides a standards-based IPv6 6LoWPAN solution for developed markets in Europe and Asia including a £25 million ($35.43 million) software licence and support contract for the UK smart meter rollout to provide the radio network for households where there is no cellular network coverage. Connode has also recently partnered with Reliance Energy, part of Reliance Industries Ltd the Indian conglomerate with more than 6.4 million customers, to
build a smart sustainable city network pilot in Mumbai. In the first pilot project, smart meters, streetlights and distribution automation equipment will be connected using Intel® IoT Gateways and Connode’s IPv6-based wireless solution. This will be the first rollout in India of smart meters fully compliant with the communication standards recently adopted in the machine-tomachine roadmap by the government of India. John Cronin, executive chairman of Cyan commented: “Convergent networks require a standards-based core language to enable the rapid development integration and consolidation of applications. The acquisition of Connode will … give us the capability to build these functions into our core products, enabling us to future proof our customer solutions and provide standards-based interfaces for additional connectivity as required for the Internet of Things (IoT) and smart cities.”
Nuage and Accelerite collaborate on platform for private and hybrid clouds Accelerite, has announced that Nuage Networks, the Nokia venture focused on software-defined networking (SDN) solutions, has become an Accelerite CloudPlatform Technology Partner. The Nuage Networks Virtualised Services Platform (VSP) platform is certified for the Accelerite CloudPlatform.
The company says that the rigorous process of certifying VSP interoperability with the Accelerite CloudPlatform provides service providers and enterprise customers the confidence in a joint solution to maximise the effectiveness of their public, private or hybrid cloud infrastructure.
The Nuage Networks Virtualised Services Platform (VSP) is a nondisruptive overlay that fully virtualises and automates data centre networks with full control, security and microsegmentation. VSP provides network virtualisation capabilities for clouds of all sizes – from small private clouds to the largest public clouds in the world – making the network as readily consumable as compute resources.
The Accelerite CloudPlatform is being used by some of the largest service providers to offer their public clouds, as well as enterprises running clouds of over 20,000 physical nodes. Accelerite CloudPlatform enables customers to deploy and scale clouds easily, resulting in time-to-value advantages.
Libelium IoT ecosystem grows with new cloud partners Libelium has announced new integration agreements with software partners and new kits for The IoT Marketplace. The company is still expanding interoperability of Meshlium IoT gateway and facilitating the access to end solutions in the IoT. “Our Waspmote IoT ecosystem is designed for interoperability, giving developers access to the widest range of sensors, communication protocols and cloud systems to build IoT applications quickly and safely,” said Alicia Asín, CEO at Libelium.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
Libelium’s new Cloud partners include seven worldwide software providers: Amazon Web Services (AWS), Amplía, Eagle.io, Extunda, IoT-Ticket.com, Simfony and Smart City Platform. They join the existing 15 cloud partners ecosystem like Azure by Microsoft, Esri, IBM Bluemix, Indra, Telefonica or Thingworx. The cloud integrations in the Meshlium IoT gateway allow easy configuration of solutions without further integration and reducing timeto-market for IoT and Smart Cities solutions.
NEWS IN BRIEF ARM acquires Apical for embedded computer vision tech ARM has acquired Apical, a global provider of imaging and embedded computer vision technology that will allow next generation devices to understand and act intelligently on information from their environment. UK-based Apical’s advanced imaging products are used in more than 1.5 billion smartphones and approximately 300 million other consumer / industrial devices including IP cameras, digital stills cameras and tablets. The acquisition, closed for a cash consideration of US$350 million, supports ARM’s long-term growth strategy by enabling new imaging products for next generation vehicles, security systems, robotics, mobile and any consumer, smart building, industrial or retail application where intelligent image processing is needed.
Semtech joins IMC to boost business cases with LoRaWAN tech Semtech, a supplier of analogue and mixed-signal semiconductors and provider of end-to-end solutions for low-power wide-area network (LPWAN) connectivity known as LoRa, has joined the Board of Governors of the IoT M2M Council (IMC). The IMC is said to be the world’s largest and fastest-growing trade association serving the IoT sector, with more than 18,000 members worldwide that self-identify as IoT buyers from 25 different verticalmarket segments. “The IMC is an excellent platform to connect with companies that are integrating IoT and those that are actually deploying IoT solutions in the field,” said Mike Wong, VP of Marketing and Applications for Semtech’s Wireless and Sensing Product Group.
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THE CONTRACT HOT LIST IoT Now June/July 2016 It's free to be included in The Contract Hot List, which shows the companies announcing recent contract wins, acquisitions or deployments. Email your contract details to us now, marked "Hot List" at <j.cowan@wkm-global.com> Vendor/Partners Accelerite
Client, Country JMG Systems, Ireland
Product / Service (Duration & Value) Selection of Accelerite’s Aepona IoT platform to connect modules in the field enabling revenue generating services for electrical manufacturing and services company
Awarded 5.16
Aeris
Lorentz, global
Integration of Aeris IoT Solutions Platform with Lorentz solar powered water pumping systems
5.16
Atari
Sigfox, global
Deal agreed for Sigfox to manufacture new portfolio of Atari-branded IoT devices
5.16
AT&T
Otis, USA
Lift maker to use AT&T IoT technology to aggregate data from cellular networks and analyse real-time equipment performance data in an enhanced cloud environment
4.16
AT&T
SunPower, USA
Agreement for AT&T to wirelessly connect at least 100,000 solar electric systems in the U.S. in near real-time
4.16
Ayla Networks
Ozner Water, China
Ayla IoT cloud platform chosen to help manage and maintain smart connected water filtration system
4.16
Bell Canada
IBM and Cisco, Canada
Deal to deliver IBM Watson IoT and Cisco Edge over Canada’s largest and fastest LTE network
6.16
Boston Engineering
Callaway Cars, USA
Design and implementation of PTC’s ThingWorx IoT platform to collect performance data over secure wireless connection to Callaway Corvette Z06 vehicles
6.16
Cubic Telecom
Audi, Europe
Cubic Telecom selected to supply its embedded SIM (eSIM) and global platform to support Audi connect in new Audi models in 13 European countries
6.16
Cumulocity
Sonera, Finland
Cumulocity IoT platform to be installed in Sonera’s cloud environment to enable high security, high-speed customer solutions
5.16
Eurotech
King Country Metro Transit, USA
12 month, US$1.4m deal agreed to deliver mobile access routers to business in the greater Seattle area
4.16
Gemalto
Verizon, USA
Gemalto selected to migrate carrier to next generation over the air (OTA) technology for LTE services
5.16
Globecomm
AT&T, USA
Satellite provider selected by AT&T to offer IoT customers fallback satellite connectivity
4.16
Ingenu
Riverside Public Utilities, USA
Ingenu Machine Network chosen to support public RPMA (random phase multiple access) low power network to serve as connectivity backbone for Californian city’s electricity distribution infrastructure
4.16
mnubo
ROC-Connect, USA
mnubo Smart Object data analytics platform selected to generate insights for home insurance and security service provider
5.16
PTC
Telefónica
PTC’s ThingWorx IoT platform to be utilised by Telefónica to advance connected product and service development under the carrier’s Smart Device Services offering
6.16
Samsung
SK Telecom, South Korea
Deployment of commercial IoT-dedicated LoRa network across South Korea using 900Mhz band
5.16
Sequans
Thales, Europe
Sequans LTE chipset chosen to enable in-flight connectivity for the European Aviation Network
5.16
Sigfox
Connected Finland, Finland Deal agreed to extend Sigfox’s global network throughout Finland by 2017
Silver Spring Networks
Pacific Power, USA
Silver Spring smart grid platform selected to enable Pacific Power to improve reliability and increase operational efficiency
Tele2
1-Fleet Alliance, Europe
Carrier to provide connectivity services to 1-Fleet Alliance, a grouping of 17 telematics service providers
5.16
Telefónica Business Solutions
Ores, Belgium
Telefónica selected to support smart metering project in the Wallonia region of Belgium
4.16
Telekom Austria Group & CEplus
PORR, Austria
Implementation of international asset tracking project for PORR Equipment Services involving 1,000 vendors in 30 locations in Austria, Germany and Czech Republic
5.16
Telia Carrier
Ericsson, global
Telia Carrier to provide backhaul and interconnect solutions to Ericsson’s device connection platform via a dedicated IoT backbone
6.16
Telit
Kron Medidores, Brazil
Telit IoT Platform deployed to accelerate time to market for Kron’s new Konect smart metering and management systems offering
6.16
Telit
John Deere, USA
Telit chosen to implement deviceWISE industrial IoT platform at John Deere’s factory operations
5.16
T-Mobile
Twilio, USA
Carrier to provide Twilio with wireless connections to enable it to embed connectivity into devices and sensors
5.16
Vodafone
Ekso Bionics, USA, Mexico, Contract awarded for Vodafone to connect a new series of robotic exoskeletons, providing Canada, South Africa, Europe communications for diagnostics and improved access to patient data
6.16
WND
Sigfox, Brazil
4.16
Sigfox IoT network deployment initiated in Brazil with WND as local partner
6.16 5.16
SPONSORED COLUMN
Accept no substitutes for the flexible agility of a true IoT platform A platform approach enables organisations to reduce risk, time to market, cost and complexity; but not all platforms are truly comprehensive and customers should not accept incomplete platform propositions, says Jack Indekeu, the chief marketing officer of Telit.
If you look at the market there are probably about 400 vendors out there claiming to provide comprehensive IoT platforms. It’s understandable that technology providers want to align themselves with the IoT platform concept of selling proven, already deployed technologies that can accelerate their customers’ IoT deployments and save them money. However, the reality is that Jack Indekeu, CMO, Telit only about a dozen pure-play, comprehensive IoT platforms that provide the complete package from connectivity management to application development exist. The idea of an IoT platform is simple but the execution is difficult. There are man-decades of development that go into creating the complete suite of technologies, software and
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support that make up a comprehensive IoT platform and just addressing a functional group within an over-arching platform doesn’t make a vendor a true platform provider. Fragmentation also makes it harder for companies to reap platform benefits. Once they start having to deal with multiple companies and perform integration work between the different functions, delay and cost increases and the platform promise erodes. A true IoT platform means you can start with five units for a proof of concept and scale up from there to many millions of units. In addition, platforms address the need for organisations to future-proof their investments so they are ready when the value of different inputs and outputs emerges. Platforms mean you don’t have to have a fullyworked out business case for future offerings because you don’t pay for capability you don’t use. IoT Now - June / July 2016
WHAT’S HOT ONLINE
www.iot-now.com Ask not what we can do for the Things, but what the Things can do for us If you believe the hype and optimistic predictions, the number of connected devices will be anywhere between 10 billion and 50 billion by 2020, with potential to generate up to $19 trillion of value. While the reality is likely to be somewhat different, the Internet of Things (IoT) is certainly driving investment in new applications to harness opportunities in a new connected world. The danger is that companies will focus too much on the technology and not on how to monetise it. Unlike the ‘Internet of Computers’, which offers low deployment costs and even lower scaling costs, the Internet of Things comes
at material cost: components, manufacturing, distribution, commissioning, management and maintenance. It is not sufficient to hope that value will emerge if we, ‘do some exciting IoT stuff’. Rather, to paraphrase John F Kennedy, ‘we have to ask not what we can do for the Things, but what the Things can do for us’, says Steve Baker of The Technology Partnership (TTP). To read the rest of Steve’s blog visit www.iot-now.com. Search Keyword: Steve Baker
The three growth factors of the Smart Home market The largest share of the IoT pie is taken up by Smart Home devices, writes Anatoly Lebedev, the CEO and co-founder, Cesanta. Products like Nest and Hue are seen as pioneers, and we see new innovations following suit every day. For anyone eager to explore this market, it’s Anatoly important to understand the factors behind this Lebedev: Skyrocketing growth and how to solve for this segment.
estimated to be smart in Europe and North America by 2019. These numbers are only two small examples of the skyrocketing growth in home automation and smart products.
growth in home In Europe alone, smart home thermostat sales automation increased by 96% in 2014. 68 million homes are
Read the entire article at www.iot-now,com. Search Keyword: Anatoly Lebedev
Lebedev says growth comes from replacements, new markets and millennials.
What is the future of wearables in the enterprise? Wearable devices like fitness bands, digital glasses, medical devices, smart watches, smart clothes and various other devices that augment our reality promise to radically change the manner in which information is collected, stored, processed, delivered and used, writes Tushar Bhatnagar, an IoT project manager with TechMahindra. These devices are helping people in tracking their physical
activities, sleep pattern, location, check emails on the go, listen to music etc. The potential benefits of wearable devices are manifold, as they make our life more connected, hands-free and efficient. To read the rest of Tushar’s article, visit www.iot-now.com. Search Keyword: Tushar Bhatnagar
How the IoT will impact today’s product strategies
Carrie Nauyalis: Software and sensors driving unprecedented innovation
Products are getting smarter and more connected every day, writes Carrie Nauyalis a solution evangelist at Planview. Software and sensors are being embedded in everything from thermostats to cars, driving unprecedented innovation. Tesla has already added a “selfdriving feature” that can be implemented via a software update; it’s now possible to send texts by simply pushing up the sleeves on one’s hoodie sweatshirt; and washing machines are
IoT Now - June / July 2016
connected to the manufacturer’s help desk. All of this automation is great for the consumer, but is causing quite a stir at most product development companies. How can today’s companies bring together product development with IT infrastructure projects to ensure they are able to attain the coveted first-mover advantage? Read the rest of Carrie’s blog at www.iot-now.com. Search Keyword: Carrie Nauyalis
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PRODUCT NEWS
NEWS IN BRIEF
Three companies demo the ‘benefits of an Open IoT ecosystem’
Cellular NB-IoT module offers global connectivity with 10 year battery life
Three Internet of Things (IoT) companies have demonstrated what they report is the first end-to-end IoT ecosystem designed with re-usable infrastructure and open industry standards for industrial and commercial applications at scale.
u-blox has announced the forthcoming availability of its SARA-N2 Narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) module, the world’s first cellular radio module compliant to the 3GPP Release 13, Narrowband IoT (LTE Cat. NB1) standard. Designed for use in applications such as smart buildings and cities, utilities metering, white goods, asset tracking, and agricultural and environmental monitoring, the module will operate for between 10 and 20 years from a single-cell primary battery. Its 16 mm x 26 mm LGA form factor, using u-blox nested architecture, facilitates simple upgrades from u-blox GSM, HSPA or CDMA modules and ensures future-proof, seamless mechanical scalability across technologies. The SARA-N2 module provides secure, private communications over licensed spectrum with guaranteed quality of service. It supports peak downlink rates of up to 227 kbps and uplink rates of up to 21 kbps. Simultaneous support for three RF bands means that the same module may be used in most geographic regions. The benefits of NB-IoT over other cellular radio technologies include lower device complexity, ultra-low power operation and support for up to 150,000 devices per single cellular cell. Most significantly, the technology offers a 20 dB link budget improvement over GPRS to give excellent performance under poor coverage conditions such as underground or inside buildings.
Advantech B+B SmartWorx, Connect2 Systems and DevicePilot delivered automatic remote monitoring and management of industrial ultra-low power IoT sensor devices using constrained wireless networks and open IoT standards developed by the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA) and Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). The demonstration featured WzzardTM Wireless Sensor Nodes from Advantech B+B SmartWorx and Inclinometer Wireless Sensor Nodes from Connect2 Systems. The WzzardTM Wireless Sensor Nodes are typically used to monitor the energy consumption and the condition of equipment and facilities. Examples where they have been used include data centre temperature monitoring to reduce energy consumption; construction aggregate plant monitoring of ‘crusher’ drive motors and conveyor belts to enable predictive maintenance and reduce unexpected failures; and for use in creameries to keep everything at exactly the right
The Inclinometer Wireless Sensor Nodes are designed for near vertical borehole applications and are used to Pilgrim Beart, measure lateral movement in CEO, DevicePilot the ground or in a structure for applications such as detecting slopes and landslides; monitoring dams, retaining walls and bending in piles; detecting and recording ground movement due to tunneling operations; and measuring settlement and deformation of concrete slabs and tank bases. The end-to-end solution, demonstrated at the recent Internet of Things Thames Valley Meetup in the UK, showed the benefits of true interoperability, extensibility and reuse from using industry standards including: • 802.15.4e for the air interface • 6LoWPAN – IPv6 over Low power Wireless Personal Area Networks • IETF CoAP for a RESTful API • OMA Lightweight M2M (LWM2M) device management standard • Internet Protocol for the transport to the Cloud
ANT provides Paralloy with lone worker solution for staff safety Automated communications provider, ANT Telecom is working with Paralloy, a manufacturer of specialist cast tubes and fittings for use in high temperature and corrosive environments, to provide a lone worker solution that will enhance the safety of its ‘at risk’ workforce. These include those working at height and with hazardous materials, as well as those working unsociable hours and on their own for long periods of time. Paralloy is part of a global company that operates across the UK, manufacturing precision components and assemblies for different markets including aerospace, industrial gas turbine and petrochemical. Prior to its work with ANT Telecom, it was operating a buddy system for its employees at its Billingham, UK site. ANT Telecom’s Alarm Messaging Server (AMS) offers a flexible approach to lone worker solutions. Alarms from lone workers can be delivered to the AMS by SMS, voice call, WiFi, Two-way radio,
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temperature and the correct humidity to protect flavour and control bacterial growth.
contact switch or over an LAN/WAN IP connection. As part of the AMS, ANT Telecom has provided Paralloy with six GSM mobile lone worker safety devices, equipped with a panic button and tilt sensors, and fitted with GPS. Now, if staff have an accident they can immediately raise an alarm by pressing the panic button. Similarly the tilt sensor triggers an alarm automatically if the user is rendered unconscious. Alarms are then distributed to assigned responders, with the first person who responds accepting the “task” and notifying the remaining responders that the alarm is being managed. Philip Rees, EHS manager, Paralloy commented, “The nature of the job involves our employees working with molten metal and furnaces, which are highly hazardous. It is very physical work and many work unsociable hours. We want to be able to give them peace of mind that if they have an accident or fall ill whilst on their own, processes are in place so that help will arrive quickly and efficiently.”
IoT Now - June / July 2016
TELENOR ARTS
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WHAT’S HOT ONLINE
www.iotglobalnetwork.com Blockchain and its meaning for the IoT community In the first of a new series of articles on emerging IoT trends by Beecham Research, Phill Pexton, senior analyst, and Saverio Romeo, principal analyst, with the firm examine blockchain.
Beecham Research’s Phill Pexton explores the impact of blockchain on IoT
Many people will be aware of Bitcoin, but only a few will be aware of the underlying technology that fuelled the rise of cryptocurrencies, namely, the blockchain. Simply put, a blockchain is an open distributed database of every transaction involving value.
Historically, when performing a transaction between two entities, the exchange of goods, services and more is handled and verified by a middleman. A blockchain transaction removes the middleman. Instead, this process of verification is carried out by some members of the network, called ‘miners’, who check the trade against all past records held within the network to ensure that what is being traded actually exists and is owned by the respective parties. This makes it very hard to simply create something out of mid-air.
Read the rest of Phill and Saverio’s article. Search Articles with Keyword: Blockchain
How IoT growth is revolutionising the field service market As the Internet of Things widens its wings and becomes increasingly sophisticated it is helping businesses and professionals in all manner of industries to redefine and reshape their communications and customer service models, writes Dr. Natasha Tamaskar, the vice president and head of cloud and mobile strategy and ecosystem at Genband. Dr. Natasha Tamaskar: IoT is truly disrupting field service
One of the industries garnering the most benefit from these advances in technology is the field service market. The IoT is truly disrupting field service, enabling businesses to solve problems and refine their
working practices through diagnostics, which provide them with greater insight into exactly how things are working. For example, companies that ship staff out to sites to deal with ethernet problems often don’t have the correct information to resolve these issues. It’s also frequently the case that they experience truck rolls, whereby the issue was caused by the customer, didn’t require specialist work and/or could have been solved remotely without incurring travel costs.
Read Natasha’s article in full at www.iotglobalnetwork.com. Search Articles with Keyword: Natasha Tamaskar
Make the case for true IoT interoperability At the heart of the Internet of Things are connectivity and the ability for the device to interact with other devices. Yet, so many companies out there are developing so-called IoT devices with closed or proprietary components or make them dependent on captive cloud services to provide any real value to the consumer, writes Cesare Garlati, the chief security strategist at the prpl Foundation.
designs and manufactures programmable thermostats and smoke detectors. It recently announced that it is no longer supporting the Revolv smart hub as of May 2015. Because the Revolv hub depends on the service in the cloud from Nest, discontinuing the service effectively leaves a host of users with a useless device. This incident brings up a number of issues when we look at the progression of IoT and smart hubs in the home, with interoperability at the core.
Take for example Nest, a home automation company that
Read Cesare’s latest article in full at www.iotglobalnetwork.com. Search Articles with Keyword: Cesare Garlati
To create the smart city, we must help residents make smart decisions
Richard Harris: Smart cities are about providing information to residents
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We all want to see our cities functioning better. With urban populations increasing rapidly, and 70% of the global population expected to be living in cities by 2050, we have to come up with better ways of making our cities more liveable, writes Richard Harris, solutions director for international public sector at Xerox.
Amsterdam and London, to name a few, have already implemented ITS to deliver city wide mobility services and are reaping the benefits. London was recently listed as the UK’s smartest city by Huawei’s UK Smart Cities Index, the city’s transport innovations called out for driving growth and delivering a better quality of life.
In short, a smart city is the meeting of urban planning, with technology. A fundamental requirement is an Intelligent Transportation System (ITS). Singapore,
Creating a smart city begins with understanding the behaviours of city residents, before providing them with the information they need to make smart decisions.
Read Richard’s article in full at www.iotglobalnetwork.com. Search Articles with Keyword: Richard Harris
IoT Now - June / July 2016
TALKING HEADS
Tackling IIoT’s costs of acquiring, integrating and managing devices Florida-based start-up Ubicquia aims to gives operators an industrial strength platform for the Internet of Things. Nick Booth talks to its chief technology officer, Tre Zimmerman (pictured left) who has a mission to create an Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) that’s easy to design, set up and manage without breaking the bank. The plan is to integrate software and hardware so that it can work big data over any cloud platform, whether it belongs to a telco, a customer or third party. To this end Ubicquia has invented a new way to fine-tune the movement of information while locking it in. To the end user it seems simple, but under the bonnet there is a sophisticated chain of checks and counter checks that will confound even the most devious ‘man in the middle’ intruder. Ubicquia’s strategy, both in its Kairo products and its sales channels, is to devolve power and intelligence to all the millions of places where decisions need to be made. We asked Zimmerman to explain how the company has created a secure single gateway that connects to the cloud, and indeed, how it intends to bring this to market. IoT Now: You started by making micro-controllers and sensors. Did you suddenly have a ‘eureka’ moment, when you realised that smart cities desperately need a miniature router, storage and comms device (the Kairo) that could get out into more places? Tre Zimmerman: Our first thought was easy: connectivity is pervasive in the city. Our second thought was more challenging: distributed power is less accessible than you might think. In the end we were driven by our goal, which we achieved, to capture data pervasively and persistently.
neighbourhood it is perfect for revolutionising the light pole outside your window. IoT Now: So is Kairo about keeping on top of all the vast amounts of data, so that the important issues are spotted immediately and acted upon? Should we think of the data as some vast, unmanageable herd and the Kairo devices as tiny shepherds, controlling the herd? TZ: Yes. Putting all those intelligent devices out there is expensive so Ubicquia developed a more affordable way to do it. Over several months we designed and built a wide range of microcontroller boards with various sensors and actuators. The dimensions of the photoelectric nacelle located on top of a cobrahead street light is governed by a strict standard. Basically, we reenacted the scene from Apollo 13 when the engineers had to create an unorthodox solution to rising CO2 levels. Our team had to stuff all of our creative designs and sensors into a form factor smaller than a soda can. IoT Now: You only have ten employees. Presumably that means you have plans for a channel of partners? TZ: Yes, we are following a channel partner strategy. To start, we are working with Ericsson and Avnet. With more than 120,000 combined employees globally we get good leverage, about 12,000 to 1. And we’ll continue to grow our team.
TZ: Kairo does exactly that. It was built to live and promulgate at the very edge of the Internet. This is why 802.11 is ideal for many smart city applications. It is an unlicensed, wireless protocol that supports low cost devices around the
We also want to work with other partners to develop their own IIoT solutions. Because Kairo interoperates with all of the channels, as well as with most of our competitors, our platform can be used by nearly everyone. ▼
IoT Now: Both your product and channel policy seem to be about devolving power out to agents (both human and automated) that can act on it.
IN ASSOCIATION WITH UBICQUIA IoT Now - June / July 2016
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TALKING HEADS
There is not enough capacity to accommodate 20 billion devices. The arrival of 5G may help, but IIoT demand is staggering. This is why we have focused so intently on the LAN side of the equation
We can provide whatever is needed, whether it’s the hardware, the software or the cloud technology that the OEMs require.
IoT Now: Talking of scalability and teaming up, how easy is it to make your systems work with others? How do you ensure interoperability?
IoT Now: You are offering the hardware at ‘giveaway prices’ in favour of a subscription-based model. Is that risky? Or is this a better long term model than selling hardware then withdrawing?
TZ: We follow all data exchange protocols and use standard, commodity hardware. The result is JSON data arriving in an ELK stack anywhere. In addition to cellular networks, Kairo supports Wi-Fi, LPWAN (Sigfox and LoRa), satellite and Ethernet.
Instead of creating a point solution like thermostats or nanny cams, we focused on a platform to capture data pervasively and persistently and to deliver it to the cloud of choice in the industrial portion of the Internet of Things. A stable platform that can support thousands of IIoT applications, we think, lends itself to a recurring revenue model. We’ll see. IoT Now: Can you explain, in simple terms how the Enviira operating system can ingest data and visualise it on the ORCA stack? TZ: We think of Enviira as a Universal Data API for nearly all data collection devices. Once the data arrives in the Cloud, whether it’s ours, the customer’s or their preferred vendor’s, the data is organised, presented visually and routed to various users wherever they are and in the formats they prefer. Given these rich data sets, some of the new, leading edge virtual reality technologies are visually stunning. Again, it’s the captured data that makes all of this possible. IoT Now: Each Kairo is a self-contained unit. Can these units be easily aggregated in order to create a massive network? TZ: Kairo devices automatically connect and interconnect with each other securely. For example, Kairo units deployed over several city blocks can LAN into a single Kairo unit that aggregates the data and then launches it over a single WAN connection. Installing a Kairo device on an existing cobrahead takes about 15 minutes. Twist and remove the legacy photoelectric cell unit. Insert the Kairo unit in its place and twist to secure. This engages the power supply. Then the device calls home to its cloud, authenticates, receives its instructions and data starts to flow. Scaling is easy.
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We accommodate nearly all standards because we are inspired by the unity, efficiency and affordability they bring. They are just one more manifestation of Moore’s Law that we embrace. IoT Now: Your plans for eSIM sound quite liberating, since they seem to allow users of cellular networks to get a better deal by being more adaptable. How did you develop this? TZ: We are simply leaning into the eSIM opportunity along with others. The architecture of our Enviira operating system allows us to take advantage of new advances in the IoT space quickly. IoT Now: One of your applications involves gunshot detection. Do you need special sensors that recognize the unique sound footprint of a gunshot? TZ: A generic HD acoustic sensor captures the data from several Kairo devices. The software triangulates and analyzes the acoustic data to locate the event and determine the signature of the type of firearm - often down to the make and model. IoT Now: Before we have an IIoT surely we need an industrial strength Internet and wide area coverage? Does today’s wireless broadband fall short? TZ: Yes, it does. There is not enough capacity to accommodate 20 billion devices. The arrival of 5G may help, but IIoT demand is staggering. This is why we have focused so intently on the LAN side of the equation. At a minimum we need low cost connectivity and low cost devices to collect data pervasively and persistently. IIoT Data Off-load addresses the problems. We knew we wanted low cost interconnected devices using a low cost ISN chipset run by Enviira, our small, tightly integrated operating system. IoT Now: How will you galvanize all the moving parts of the IIoT into one cohesive body? TZ: Our customers and the users don’t experience the moving parts. Kairo is a seamlessly integrated, scalable and robust ▼
TZ: So far, Kairo’s evolution has been closest to the iPhone. We focused on creating a platform that could support a wide range of IoT applications in all sorts of environments and with all sorts of technologies. We made it low cost, positioned lower than the iPhone, tightly integrated, hugely scalable and secure. All like the iPhone.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
platform that includes all of the components. It’s fully integrated and not a pieces and parts approach. IoT Now: By 2050, we will have at least 70% of the population concentrated in cities. That could lead to very intense, almost apocalyptic competition for resources. How is Ubiquia going to save us? TZ: This is where Ubicquia excels. Any IIoT system must resolve two significant constraints: the costs of both acquiring the devices and of their integration and management. The cost of ownership is directly related to the ease of management. Most IIoT solution providers do not provide all of the devices and components required to provide a comprehensive, fully integrated solution. They rely upon OEM hardware or development kits from thi.rd parties creating a pieces and parts approach. Significant programming and development is required on the part of the operator or the customer. This makes these solutions expensive to deploy at scale. Ubicquia provides all of the required devices, which are purpose developed, integrated and built for our platform at a cost that is, at scale, 60% lower than other solutions. Ubicquia provides Actionable Big Data in real time so people can respond intelligently. Kairo handles digital image sensors (cameras) of all types: HD stills suitable for facial recognition, HD streaming video at 24 FPS, PTZ and more.
Tre Zimmerman, chief technology officer, Ubicquia
If the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse do arrive their images will be captured!
The author is Nick Booth, freelance IT & Communications writer
IoT Now - June / July 2016
www.ubicquia.com
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CONNECTIVITY
eUICC is delivering simplicity – and more – to accelerate IoT The Internet of Things (IoT) remains the pervasive theme in today’s technology industry, says Godfrey Chua, principal analyst at Machina Research. With its promise to transform the day-to-day life of the consumer, it has now become the essential topic at important global industry events such as CES in Las Vegas. IoT market accelerates
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There will naturally be a combination of supply and demand-side factors that will drive the expansion of the cellular IoT business. On the supply-side, one such technology factor that is enhancing the relevance and capability of cellular systems ability to deliver more streamlined and efficient IoT connectivity services, especially to customers requiring cross-border capabilities, is the embedded universal integrated circuit card (eUICC).
eUICC delivers simplified provisioning and much more
When it comes to the cellular world, IoT represents an important market opportunity and means to expand relevance to customers. In fact, leading global cellular service providers (CSPs), such as Vodafone and AT&T, already have a sizeable IoT business today. For an even greater set of players, IoT has emerged as an important engine for revenue growth.
The eUICC is a smart card contained within a machine device that is connected to the cellular network. While there are subtle variations between GSM, UMTS and CDMA, the key function of the eUICC is to provide the subscriber identity management (SIM) application. This allows for the secure, remote management of multiple CSP subscriptions on a single device.
The market is, however, early and we anticipate there will be a sizeable expansion in the cellular IoT business in the coming decade. From just under 330 million cellular M2M connections in 2015, Machina Research expects the industry to see a nearly sevenfold expansion to over 2.1 billion connections by 2025.
On the surface, the benefit of eUICC is to streamline the provisioning process and simplify the means by which cellular connectivity can be ‘embedded’ into a device (allowing this to occur at the outset of the manufacturing process). However, we feel eUICC offers more than just the benefit of driving supply chain simplicity. ▼
The author is Godfrey Chua, principal analyst at Machina Research
When it comes to enterprises, our recent surveys reveal the majority of enterprises are either already using IoT, planning to implement it or actively exploring and learning more about it. A very small portion (well below 10%) express no interest in IoT. This is because IoT, when done right, can enable the enterprise to accomplish a variety of business goals as well as enhance the capabilities of every functional group within a firm (i.e. operations, finance, customer service, product development, etc.). IoT is increasingly seen as a tool for building competitive advantage.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
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Not surprisingly, another challenge is that devices with eUICC capability are more expensive (eUICC requires greater memory and a more sophisticated OS)
It also helps to guarantee redundancy and thus reliability, enables the commercial expediency for renegotiating contracts during the life of the device, and helps to address the complex and varied regulatory environments that are a very real challenge in providing cross-border cellular IoT connectivity services. First is the redundancy and commercial expediency enabled by the eUICC. Take, for example, the 2G and 3G switch off phenomenon now taking place in the global cellular market. There is likely to be a flurry of 2G and 3G network sunsets, particularly in developed markets, over the next 5 to 10 years. It will be beneficial to those implementing 2G or 3G based IoT solutions to have a fall-back option to another CSP in the event that the initially chosen provider decides to shut down their 2G or 3G network sooner than expected. Additionally, eUICC allows a customer to avoid being locked into a single provider (versus a locked SIM). It gives them the benefit of being able to negotiate connectivity contracts for the device during the course of its lifecycle â&#x20AC;&#x201C; versus just one contract for the life of the product. For the same reason, value added resellers (VARs) also embrace eUICC. It gives them the flexibility and an efficient means to manage connectivity among a portfolio of carrier companies, versus a single, locked-in CSP partner. At the end of the day, eUICC is very much about enabling efficient customer choice in IoT cellular connectivity. Finally, eUICC also presents a means to solve potential regulatory challenges, especially as they relate to issues around permanent roaming. A CSP providing cross-border IoT connectivity via roaming may run the risk that regulation will prohibit the practice. For example, In Brazil permanent roaming is prohibited so localising a SIM has tremendous value. The choice is between localisation, breaking the rules, or physically inserting a dedicated SIM for Brazil at some point in the production chain (this would add quite a bit of cost to the solution). There are other countries in which the prohibition of permanent roaming is well established, so this is
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Figure 1: Cellular M2M connections 2015 â&#x20AC;&#x201C; 2025 (Source: Machina Research)
not a one-country issue. To be sure, regulation will continue to change and evolve. Given the growing awareness of IoT in general, regulators are likely to take a more active role in regulating it. These efforts may or may not further complicate the process of providing cross-border IoT cellular connectivity services. Either way, eUICC provides a safety net for both IoT customers and their CSP partners alike.
Accelerating the connected car and looking beyond While the benefits of eUICC are clear, the reality of market adoption is that it remains nascent. It was only recently made available with early variants being proprietary in nature. As with any recent technological introduction, market awareness around the benefits as well as the simple knowledge of its availability need to expand further. Not surprisingly, another challenge is that devices with eUICC capability are more expensive (eUICC requires greater memory and a more sophisticated OS). Initiatives such as those by the GSMA to coordinate on the standardisation of an approach to eUICC will help to scale the segment and thus drive costs down. They will also help to improve market awareness. Early demand for eUICC has so far been driven by the automotive manufacturing segment with several even including requirements for over-the-air switching of CSPs in their connected car RFPs (requests for proposals). This makes sense as amongst the plethora of cellular IoT use cases, the connected car represents one that is especially challenged by cross-border coverage and provisioning-related issues. To this end, eUICC has been an important element in the expansion of what is one of the more dynamic and faster growing IoT segments today. Stimulating demand beyond the connected car will however be critical. Greater scale, reduced costs, and more awareness amongst customers of the availability and benefits of eUICC will be the key levers for making this happen.
https://machinaresearch.com/ IoT Now - June / July 2016
17
INTERVIEW
What is eUICC and why is it important? eUICC (Embedded Universal Integrated Circuit Card) has been dubbed the next evolution of the SIM card, because it offers users the ability to change service provider over-the-air (OTA), without needing to physically change the embedded SIM card itself. eUICC represents the most radical change in over two decades of GSM connectivity, in terms of how customers can select and change service provider profiles based on the criteria or business rules of their choosing. Andy Brown reports.
Andrew Brown, executive director of Enterprise and IoT Research at Strategy Analytics, recently spoke with Cyril Hullin, VP, Product Marketing, Cloud & Connectivity Services at Sierra Wireless,
the leading provider of IoT connectivity modules globally for six years running, according to Strategy Analytics. Hullin was a co-founder and CEO of MobiquiThings, a company at the forefront of IoT connectivity using multi-operator SIM cards, which was acquired by Sierra Wireless in June 2015. AB: Cyril, eUICC has become a hot topic in 2016. What is the status of the eUICC technology/ market and why have we not seen much in the way of eUICC solutions yet? CH: We are at a crossroads in terms of technology and markets. eUICC has really been around for at least four years. The GSMA, its carrier partners and carmakers were discussing how to bring multiple operator profiles effectively to the vehicle back in 2012. Up until now we have only really seen prestandard versions of eUICC, which we term GSMA versions 1 and 2. They lacked interoperability between SIM vendors, the operating systems of UICC, the infrastructure vendors, and vendors of eUICC subscription management nodes, such as Gemalto, G&D, Oberthur and Morpho. Nevertheless, there have been around 20-30
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Cyril Hullin, Sierra Wireless
When talking about eUICC, people often mistakenly associate it with a SIM form factor (MFF or M2M Form Factor, i.e. chip embedded SIM), but the real value of eUICC is not a hardware concept, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s around the software in terms of how operator profiles (electrical SIM profiles) are managed. A traditional SIM is provisioned with a single profile that usually has 64KB or 128KB of memory. An eUICC SIM (or MIM-Machine Identification Module) can host multiple profiles, features a very rich OS and requires a minimum memory of 512KB. While eUICC has been around for a number of years in areas such as the connected car market, it has lacked standardisation, making it difficult to change subscriptions over the air across a broad ecosystem of operators. It has become a more popular topic due to the growing popularity of embedded IoT devices and connected consumer electronics devices and, in particular, the Apple SIM, which is allowing consumers to switch from a set of providers, without needing to physically change the SIM card itself.
IN ASSOCIATION WITH SIERRA WIRELESS 18
IoT Now - June / July 2016
million eUICC SIMS shipped globally, however, they do not really constitute true eUICC, in the sense that MNO profile swaps have not really happened because the technology was too immature. Several main issues hampered adoption of eUICC services: • eUICC is still maturing as a standard and as a technology. Until recently the solutions on the market were based on the early GSMA v1 and v2 standards. These solutions were not very interoperable between SIMs and platforms, making it difficult for customers to achieve the flexibility that OEMs were looking for without very large up front investments.
As eUICC continues to mature as a standard, the GSMA v3 and most recently the 3.1 standard will make all eUICC SIMs and platforms interoperable. This will enable much higher levels of adoption of eUICC, as well as a range of eUICC solutions in different markets, including payment terminals, vehicles, consumer electronics, smart metering and more.
• MNOs have been reluctant to adopt the new technology since it threatens their existing locked-in contracts that come from owning the SIM card.
The future of eUICC is promising as it offers real interoperability for each component of eUICC, as we will be able to deploy any SIM from any SIM provider (e.g. Gemalto, G&D, Oberthur, Morpho). Once an eUICC device has been deployed, two new network nodes have been defined to remotely manage eUICC cards that are deployed in the field in a secure and efficient way: • Subscription Manager Data Preparation (SMDP): This is the entity that operators use to securely encrypt their operator credentials for over the air installation within the SIM. • Subscription Manager Secure Routing (SM-SR): This entity securely delivers the encrypted operator credentials to the SIM and then, once the credentials are installed, remotely manages the SIM thereafter (enable, disable and delete the credentials as necessary during the product’s lifetime). This provides the customer and the industry with a lot more flexibility going forward. They will be able to deploy an eUICC SIM from any manufacturer as the eUICC SIM uses a Subscription Management Data Profile and a Subscription Manager Secure Routing service from several operators. In future, a local agent could also be used for a consumer version of eUICC from another vendor or development house. This will prove to be a catalyst, as SIMs will come from different providers. Some MNOS will stipulate their SM-DP for preparation of a profile, which could be loaded by the SM-SR of another party (e.g. Sierra Wireless or others). It opens up choice and ensures interoperability, which is vital for customers.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
SIM
Figure 1: Split & Roles of the GSMA Architecture‘s Subscription Manager Source: http://www.gsma.com/connectedliving/embedded-sim/how-it-works/
AB: It strikes me that some of the large OEMs have been driving adoption of eUICC because they want to control the end user experience. What is the business case for these types of customers? CH: As I mentioned, eUICC offers flexibility for OEMs in terms of their business models, given that many embedded products have a very long lifetime of up to 15-25 years in some cases. To stay on top of the best offerings and technology (2G, 3G and 4G etc.), eUICC is vital in ensuring an acceptable ROI for many IoT projects and to de-risk long life span deployments (TCO wise and technology wise). Large OEMs, especially automotive OEMs, have traditionally had the resources to drive this forward. They also see the larger ROI potential associated with being able to remotely update subscriptions after vehicles are delivered to end customers. The main drivers of these business cases to date have been: • Desire to have to one single SIM product for manufacturing and supply chain simplicity; and
▼
• In general, adoption by the large MNOs has been slow and there was little pull from the customer side because of the above issues.
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INTERVIEW
There are both pros and cons for MNOs in the immediate future. eUICC allows for disintermediation that will open new addressable markets
• A requirement to have local subscriptions in place because of specific local market needs ((broadband traffic profiles, regulatory constraints, etc.). • Plus a requirement to allow the end customer to take over the subscription after a certain period.
There are a number of examples that we all see today: • Connected automobiles – telematics
AB: What will eUICC enable for IoT customers now and in future?
• Connected automobiles – Wi-Fi in the vehicle OEMs are creating their own eUICC solutions, which can be costly, requiring important upfront and operational expense. AB: Why are the MNOs going to adopt eUICC? What is in it for them? CH: It is true that MNOs have been an impediment to the growth of eUICC in the past. This is why between 20 and 30 million devices with prestandard versions of eUICC have not truly had open carrier switching capabilities. However, we are gradually seeing MNOs opening up their policies to allow the use of eUICC. This will not only provide the ability to generate incoming provisioning profiles (where a carrier profile is set on the device) but more importantly, outgoing profiles, that allow for decommissioning MNO profiles. There are both pros and cons for MNOs in the immediate future. eUICC allows for disintermediation that will open new addressable markets. It also enables customers to switch providers overnight, such as a large fleet of commercial vehicles. This obviously presents a massive opportunity, but also a risk for MNOs, who will need to find new ways to keep customers, for example offering a stronger suite of services. The market adoption is there. We see traction in multiple vertical markets, from consumer electronics and wearables to automotive, and more traditional industrial IoT use cases, from payment terminals, security systems, and metering applications. In general, the industry is moving away from locking customers in, to providing value that customers reward with loyalty. These new
CH: In general, with the new fully interoperable eUICC solutions coming to market in 2016 with GSMA embedded specification 3.1, we see three main use cases: • Bootstrapping/Universal Profile: This provides OEMs that are shipping products globally with the ability to design a SIM into their equipment without necessarily knowing exactly which country it will operate in when delivered. The eUICC SIM activates once delivered, communicates with the platform using a bootstrap profile, and then receives the correct production subscription based on the region, country and /or use case. Broadband use cases in particular are really driving this as global roaming SIMs, while excellent for many M2M use cases, generally are not cost-effective at very high data usage levels. Some of our large OEM customers who are now connecting their machines globally are asking for eUICC services to simplify their logistics to a single SIM SKU (Stock Keeping Unit) while still maintaining cost-effective data plans globally. (We also see adoption in the payment terminal industry as terminal providers look to centrally standardise the connectivity services being used by their terminals instead of leaving that to each customer. • Batch or Insurance mode: This tends to be specific to the M2M industry and large OEMs. Machines are often deployed for many years. That lifespan is often longer than the connectivity contract. By necessity, customers are looking for flexibility to move from one connectivity provider to another at the end of this contract or offer a new RFQ at the end of a contract term. In most cases, physically replacing SIM cards is not possible, so the ideal solution is a subscription that can be updated remotely. We are seeing customers in the ▼
The author of this exclusive report is Andrew Brown, executive director, Enterprise and IoT Research, Strategy Analytics
These are two very measurable drivers and, in large scale deployments (automotive), can result in significant cost savings over time.
technologies will benefit and grow the telecom industry as a whole and the MNOs who embrace them will likely have more potential business. Another big driver here is the consumer industry. Apple and other handset OEMs are pushing for consumers to have the ability to select the subscription that will be activated on an embedded SIM. They are looking at eUICC to be the technology that allows this. This will dramatically increase the volumes for eUICCrelated products (eUICC cards, eUICC management/platform services, compatible modules) and thereby drive down costs.
IN ASSOCIATION WITH SIERRA WIRELESS 20
IoT Now - June / July 2016
Sierra Wireless is transforming its AirVantage service, the IoT platform with pre-integrated device and connectivity management services for management of both Sierra Wireless Smart SIMs and other operator SIMs
utilities space increasingly asking for this. Smart meters, for example, will be in the field for 10 to 20 years or more, and it is crucial for the utility to be able to update that subscription remotely over time. â&#x20AC;˘ Dynamic use cases: An extension of the bootstrap use case is a more dynamic version. There are many use cases where broadband use is required while the machine changes location. More broadly, the active SIM profile will be loaded / changed according to specific business rules, which will drive the profile selection logic. For example, it could require an update of the subscription when a geographic change occurs. As a user moves globally, they will need to use different subscriptions to get a cost-effective broadband service from their connected laptop.
Conclusion As Cyril indicated, eUICC has matured as a standard and will grow the IoT market and by creating a world empowered to facilitate the deployment of systems that enable remote, over the air provisioning and management of the M2M SIM. Watch for more news from Sierra Wireless about eUICC later this year. To learn more about eUICC, register for the IoT Now Webinar on Demystifying eUICC. Go to: http://www.iot-now.com/sierra-wireless-webinar-2016/
AB: Why is Sierra Wireless well positioned to leverage eUICC? CH: Sierra Wireless has been operating at the forefront of eUICC initiatives since its inception, including through acquisitions. For example, Wireless Maingate, acquired by Sierra Wireless in 2014, was already offering an eUICC service and with deployments in Scandinavia. eUICC is simply a technology that democratises the SIM and really puts control (over the connectivity) in the hands of the customer. In the short term this will provide efficiencies for many large companies to better manage their connected products across geographies and over time. Sierra Wireless is transforming its AirVantage service, the IoT platform with pre-integrated device and connectivity management services for management of both Sierra Wireless Smart SIMs and other operator SIMs. Customers that have legacy SIMs and operator relationships can have Sierra Wireless administrate those SIMs under one user interface. As the leader in the global cellular embedded module market, we also have the opportunity to see longer term benefits with eUICC. Sierra Wireless ships millions of wireless modules and gateways and we believe eUICC will enable the customer to control the activation on the cellular networks. This would provide customers with the freedom of choice and enable them to control of how their product communicates during its entire life cycle.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
21
INTERVIEW
Shahar Yaacobi, head of IoT Marketing at Amdocs
Delivering value and monetisation in an Internet of Things environment The design of Internet of Things (IoT) solutions are strongly context aware, service-oriented focused, and multidisciplinary. This makes designing IoT solutions complex, often crafted for the specific context in terms of technological choices and business models. From the point of view of IoT solution providers and the IoT community as a whole, the strategic dilemma is about defining an offer flexible enough to respond to the specific needs and the specific objectives of different contexts. The definition of the offer can also require strategic partnerships with specialised players. It is not an easy journey, but a necessary one in order to be an enabler of value-generated IoT solutions. Here, Saverio Romeo, principal analyst at Beecham Research, talks to one of these travellers, Amdocs, to understand the hurdles and the tools for making that journey successful.
Saverio Romeo [SR]: We see Amdocs becoming more active in the M2M and IoT markets. What is
driving this and how do you see it developing further? Shahar Yaacobi [SY]: Until recently, many service providers viewed M2M and IoT as a small business - not significant enough to invest in - so they used external, third party boutique solutions to manage their M2M/IoT business. But these solutions provided only connectivity. This approach proved to be costly with time, and also suffered from customer ownership issues. With the market growing and expanding to hundreds of vertical solutions, the level of complexity is growing. When complexity grows, and the scale expands with it,
â&#x2013;ź
Amdocs has been very active in the M2M and IoT markets for a few years. Two years ago, the company launched an M2M Connected Device Platform and its cloud-based Connected Home Solution. And this momentum of innovation and attention towards the adopters and potential adopters of the IoT continues. Saverio met with Shahar Yaacobi, head of IoT Marketing at Amdocs, to discover how Amdocs is enabling users in designing value-driven IoT solutions and monetising those solutions.
IN ASSOCIATION WITH AMDOCS 22
IoT Now - June / July 2016
SR: What dynamics do you see in the IoT market and where do you expect it to move to in the coming years? SY: During the first wave of IoT, which is referred to as Machine-to-Machine (M2M), enterprises and original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) focused on improving operational technologies and optimising cost. This is an enterprise/industrial wave. Today we’re witnessing the second wave of IoT growth with enterprises and OEMs shifting their focus and moving beyond efficiency. They’re offering business and consumer customers IoT services and the enabling connectivity, in addition to products. This wave is focused more on the consumer, but not only. Within the second wave, there are a number of issues to face such as the complexity of the value chain and the need for an ecosystem for delivering IoT solutions and how those ecosystems are managed. There is an interesting debate on how value can be enhanced such as the one-stop-shop experience. There is also a more mature debate on the plethora of connected devices. We have moved from the hype of a large number of devices to question how those numbers can be supported and managed. We also see a lot of attention
IoT Now - June / July 2016
around re-defining customer experience management in light of all those devices. In a nutshell, we see this wave as concentrated on the generation of new value, on the enhancement of existing value and how those can be achieved through innovative business models and new forms of customer engagements. There will be a third wave of IoT and it will revolve primarily around artificial intelligence (AI), where decisions will be made autonomously by machines based on real-time information, machine learning and advanced real-time Big Data technologies. SR: The IoT seems to need consumers less than enterprise customers. How does Amdocs see the consumer IoT evolving? And what role is Amdocs playing? SY: The business shift I described earlier in the second wave, where OEMs are starting to offer smart products and services instead of physical products only, opens the door for new business, engagement models and monetisation opportunities. Every OEM out there will need to evolve into a service provider in order to succeed in the IoT world. This process will take time, but we’re already seeing evidence for it. The largest OEMs are already offering smart devices, collecting data and creating value added services which improve quality of life. We see the consumer IoT wave as having much greater potential than the current industrial one. It will be more diverse with greater complexity and it will require every single player in the value chain to work together to
Saverio Romeo, Beecham Research
Today we’re witnessing the second wave of IoT growth with enterprises and OEMs shifting their focus and moving beyond efficiency
▼
service providers look to proven solutions to help them take their lead back and generate more revenues. Notwithstanding, they also need to control their customers’ experience and provide value to the entire ecosystem.
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INTERVIEW
produce a superior customer experience. Amdocs support our customers in monetising this wave, by providing the most flexible and enterprise-oriented platform, supporting the most complex engagement models. We call it the ‘servitisation’ wave. SR: What is the ‘Servitisation’ model and what opportunity do you think it brings with it? SY: By turning products into services, IoT enables enterprises and OEMs to undergo a fundamental business model change. The essence of the servitisation wave is that enterprises and OEMs must evolve to become IoT service providers to secure recurring revenue and develop deeper ongoing relationships with customers, beyond the one time sale. They’ll need to offer services that fundamentally change the customer experience, allowing the end user to enjoy the visibility, transparency and insights produced from the flow of information generated by smart, connected devices. However, supporting IoT services comes with complex challenges and the problem is that enterprises and OEMs of all sizes lack the expertise, capabilities, knowledge and resources to make the servitisation shift. SR: What particular value are you providing to communications service providers for connectivity management? SY: Amdocs offers a connectivity device platform (CDP) which enables service providers to onboard partners quickly and efficiently, let them manage their own business operations and enjoy the most flexible business and engagement models. This solution is genuinely unique because it enables a secured business operation in contrast to the cloud third party solutions out there which force service providers to share revenues from connectivity management. It also can be a tightly coupled addon to Amdocs’ CES portfolio, which would facilitate the utilisation of existing Amdocs B/OSS solutions with minimal setup. It’s an open platform and it’s available as a cloud service or on-premise, addressing mainly the wholesale segment, which today generates the majority of IoT revenues. SR: Current communication service providers’ BSS are not really designed for IoT environments. How does Amdocs help CSPs in re-designing BSS systems for IoT requirements? SY: As I mentioned earlier, IoT is driving enterprises and OEMs to move from product to service business models. In order to do that, they need help with billing, providing care and support, and
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most importantly they need to leverage the new data gathered to provide a better experience. IoT evolution is also leading the market to a potentially more complex value chain. So taking all of this into account, service providers have a real opportunity to monetise their assets by providing a solution for complex wholesale settlement between OEMs and enterprises and their business partners and complex consumer billing. For example, they can bill on behalf of a third party and facilitate white label billing, bifurcated billing, and consolidated billing. To help service providers fully monetise this opportunity, Amdocs launched the IoT Monetisation Platform, which is a BSS specifically designed platform to address current and future IoT needs. SR: In what way is BSS for IoT different? How did you approach the development of your IoT monetisation platform? SY: BSS for IoT is different from traditional telco solutions in many ways. First, IoT is essentially an enterprise play. So, when we were designing our IoT platform, we put the focus on the enterprise and the OEM to create a system which gives them a 360-degree view of their business and the ability to manage it independently. Second, the IoT data model and metrics are much different from those used by telecoms providers today. We also need to remember that many devices will have SIM cards, some of them will have eSIM but many will not have SIMs at all. In addition, because the value chain in the world of IoT is much more complex, we built the system to support many types of engagement models. I would also point out that we have addressed the need for a real-time system which supports wholesale and retail, in addition to prepaid and postpaid, and the ability to work globally, with numerous global players as well as customers roaming with their connected devices. We have created a strong product using cutting edge technologies, which provides a lot of value to customers, with dozens of prebuilt business processes, using configuration only. It enables enterprises and OEMs to bill consumers for the purchase of IoT products and services directly, or via the consumer’s service provider bill. And let’s not forget seamless activation which allows customers to enjoy a wide range of connected devices anytime and anywhere. SR: Apart from CSPs, what types of customers do you support in the IoT market? SY: “Who is the customer?” and “What is the value we can bring them?” are two questions that lie at
▼
By turning products into services, IoT enables enterprises and OEMs to undergo a fundamental business model change
IoT Now - June / July 2016
the heart of everything we do in this market. In the complex IoT ecosystem there are many different customers and each type has different needs. The trick is to identify relevant customers that Amdocs can provide value to by addressing their unique needs. Various forms of service providers are our main customers and many of them are relatively ahead of the market in understanding and applying the servitisation model. Nevertheless, there are many enterprises and OEMs who have already acknowledged the huge opportunity created by IoT and have reach out to us for help in realising revenues either directly or through our service provider customers. There are other giant players such as Samsung which has moved strongly into the world of IoT and understands the importance of providing a superior consumer experience. Samsung works with Amdocs to build global IoT solutions. These kind of cooperative partnerships are focused on providing an end-to-end (E2E) customer experience in activation, provisioning, billing and more. Finally, IoT application developers often are the innovators in various sectors. They have great ideas and cutting-edge technology, but are struggling in distributing those ideas worldwide. We help those organisations to transform their ideas into ready-to-market solutions and bring them in front of relevant market players. SR: Partnerships are key in the Internet of Things. How do you see these evolving and impacting successful monetisation of the IoT? SY: I think you have touched on a great point! The IoT spans thousands of vertical solutions and hundreds of thousands of players joining forces to provide those solutions. We are talking about application developers, content providers, app stores, connectivity providers, enablers for Big Data, application management, device management, SIM management, OEMs, enterprises, and their channels and distributors. And the list goes on in the very complex and fragmented IoT value chain. It is obvious that the business models in need of support and the settlements among all these players are very complex. Our IoT Monetisation Platform manages all this complexity for both the wholesale and retail world, for hybrid solutions, for all industries, network types, both globally and locally.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
SR: And, finally, how is it being part of an organisation that wants to be a protagonist in the IoT community? And, what do you expect to achieve in the next 2-4 years? SY: Working on IoT in a global leader like Amdocs is both exciting and challenging. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s great to be part of a group of enormously talented and experienced professionals who are focused on developing new technological solutions that will have a great impact on our lives. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s exciting because the innovative technologies make this domain dynamic and fascinating across many other domains. It is also challenging because we try to predict huge changes in consumer, business and ecosystem behaviour and there are many unknowns. But our service provider customers continue to count on us to keep innovating and developing in this domain so they can leapfrog the competition.
It is obvious that the business models in need of support and the settlements among all these players are very complex Shahar Yaacobi, Amdocs
At the end of the day, the one thing I am sure of is that Amdocs will remain among the leaders shaping this new IoT world and personally, I am excited to play a key role in it.
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ANALYST REPORT
SMART CITIES Drivers, challenges, developments & ecosystems
CONTENTS
30
CITY PARAMETERS
32
URBANISATION AND THE APAC CIRCLE
30
33
SMART CITY COMPONENTS
SMART CITIES IN LATIN AMERICA
ANALYST REPORT 1.
Defining the Smart City 1.1 What is a City?
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2.
Smart City Components
30
3.
Smart City Applications 3.1 Smart Energy and Smart Grids 3.2 Smart Water 3.3 Smart Transportation 3.4 Smart Buildings 3.5 Smart Government
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Regional Smart City Developments 4.1 Asia-Pacific 4.2 Central and Latin America 4.3 North America 4.4 Europe 4.5 Middle East and Africa
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4.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
5.
Smart City Drivers
34
6.
Smart City Challenges 6.1 New Services Disrupting Existing Infrastructure 6.2 Sharing Economy and Smart Cities 6.3 Safety and Security
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7.
Smart City Ecosystems 7.1 C40Cities Climate Leadership Group 7.2 Connecting Europe
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8.
Smart City Evolution 8.1 Standardisation 8.2 Standardised Measurement 8.3 Standardised Platforms 8.3.1 FIWARE
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9.
Conclusions
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ANALYST REPORT
The author of this exclusive report is Andrew Brown, executive director, Enterprise and IoT Research, Strategy Analytics
Smart Cities: Drivers, challenges, developments and ecosystems
1. Defining the Smart City 1.1 What is a City?
2. Smart City Components At a system level, the smart city can be considered as a classic system ‘sandwich’:
A city is an organic system that enables trade between people and helps meet their needs. Cities in general are more than a pure concentration of dwellings or workplaces. Cities have economies of scale. Positive parameters, such as wages, patients and hospitals, scale at a ratio of 1.5 for a doubling of city size. Negative parameters such as crime and some diseases also tend to follow the same rule – if the infrastructure of the city can manage the scale.
Source: Strategy Analytics Source: Strategy Analytics
Figure 2: Smart City Components Figure 1: City Parameters Increase 1.5X as City Size Doubles
Historically, cities have had three important characteristics that set them apart from other forms of human dwelling: • Places of trade – built around businesses and/or industries, with a social and commercial centre. Location plays a strong role. • Resilient – many cities have survived and even regenerated after war and disaster. Again, the role of physical location is very important. • Evolutionary - cities adopt and adapt to social and technological changes, sometimes over thousands of years. Technologies (and the companies who provide solutions) have tiny lifespans in comparison. A Smart Sustainable City is a city that “Meets the needs of its present inhabitants without compromising the ability for other people or future generations to meet their needs, and does not exceed local or planetary environmental limitations and where this is supported by ICT”
The key to giving local governance visibility and control of the available connections to and sensing / actuation at the city infrastructure is some sort of service platform, often dubbed the CityOS:
Source: Bristol is Open
Figure 3: CityOS Architecture
Valencia City Council plans to centralise all of its municipal information through a smart cityOS solution. The open platform is provided by Telefonica, and
1 http://www.santafe.edu/research/cities-scaling-and-sustainability 2 Smart Sustainable Cities- Definition and Challenges by Mattias Höjer and Josefin Wangel, Centre for Sustainable Communications CESC / Division of Environmental Strategies Research, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden 3 http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/newsroom/image/smart_cities_-_valencia_-_ramon_ferri_7819.pdf 4 http://www.oracle.com/us/industries/public-sector/national-local-government/city-platform/index.html
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IoT Now - June / July 2016
based on the European FI-WARE standard. The initial scope is simple, with 350 sensors monitored over the city. Several cities have taken a more traditional approach to the smart city platform, building on an enterprise resource planning (ERP) suite. Oracle provides a tailored ERP as a City Platform Solution, with components implemented in cities including Espoo, Finland; Edinburgh, Scotland; St. Petersburg; and Oakland, California.
3. Smart City Applications
• • • •
Conserving resources, detecting and managing leaks Managing disruptions in supply Improving customer service Managing consumption proactively.
Many water authorities lack an effective end-to-end monitoring and control system for an increasingly valuable resource. In the UK, Thames Water forecasts that the water supply shortfall for London will be equivalent to the consumption of two million people by 2040 . In addition, the water nets in many mature markets need extensive renewal over the next three decades.
Smart answers to city challenges can be grouped around the following application areas:
Water utility companies using smarter solutions could save between $7.1 billion and $12.5 billion each year.
• • • • •
California has severe water restrictions (lawn watering limited to 10 minutes per week). The Long Beach, California district started a smart water meter pilot programme in March 2015. Water meter add-ons were provided by T2, and the solution uses Verizon cellular wireless communication, web-based analytics use Microsoft Azure Cloud.
Smart Energy and Smart Grids Smart Water Smart Transportation Smart Buildings, and Smart Government.
3.1
Smart Energy and Smart Grids
Of the world’s total energy consumption (currently about 20 terawatts continuous), electricity production and consumption accounts for about a third of that energy. In 2008, the world consumed over 20 terawatt hours of electricity. Consumption is forecast to rise to over 35 terawatt hours in 2035. Smart grids combine IoT (smart meters) with ICT to sense and respond with electricity supply that meets the demands of consumers and industries. In the US market, where many meters are over fifty years old, a combination of smart meter and smart grid technology can save almost 10% of the electricity consumed nationwide. Smart grids have three main characteristics: • Smart power systems that have remote monitoring and control, are automated, and that are self-healing. • Networking power systems that communicate and cooperate with smaller networks, or microgrids. • Interactive power systems that inform and educate users about how best to use the networks. Cities are favourable places to exploit all three characteristics of smart grids. Smart buildings can become both storers and suppliers of electricity, as part of a microgrid. Smart grid projects differ in nature from city to city, dependent upon the maturity of the ‘old’ electricity network, and the desired goals of the project.
3.2
Smart Water
Disrupted water supplies can have a rapid, negative effect on many cities. Smart water controls include: • Continuously monitoring and diagnosing supply issues and applying maintenance measures • Optimising performance
3.3
Smart Transportation
A transportation network and its evolution is unique to its city. Road vehicle congestion management is a problem common to almost all cities, and IoT sensors will play an increasingly important role in connecting traffic management. Cheap, low-power sensors built into the road or kerb can detect free kerbside parking spaces in cities, and the information can be analysed in a road traffic management system. The system outputs can then be relayed to cars directly via smartphone apps, or to street signs. Wireless mesh networks are suited to efficiently deploy regularly spaced parking sensors in an urban environment, and hundreds of parking sensors can be handled by a single cellular backhaul. Crowd-sourced citizen applications such as Waze successfully help citizens navigate traffic congestion optimally. However, if this solution is disconnected from central traffic management, it can create other problems. Los Angeles has a million active Waze users, and the backlash is reported to be hazardous traffic flows along small residential roads.
3.4
Smart Buildings
Buildings account for about 40% of energy consumption worldwide. Smart energy management of buildings across their life cycle can reduce this figure by at least 20%. Building monitoring and control covers multimedia (video surveillance), and basic alerts such as: do the fire sensor batteries need to be changed, is the office temperature lowered after office hours, etc. IoT can make a major contribution to building automation in cities: • Contingency solutions for connected safety sensors that will continue to work if the building broadband (or cellular) fails. Broadband outages reduce ‘triple-play’ to ‘zero-play’,
5 National Geographic, World Electricity Outlook http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/energy/great-energy-challenge/worldelectricity-mix/ 6 Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative (US) http://www.whatissmartgrid.org/ 7 Thames Water, http://www.thameswater.co.uk/media/press-releases/17391.htm 8 Water 20/20 Bringing Smart Water Networks into Focus, SENSUS 2012 IoT Now - June / July 2016
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ANALYST REPORT
and contingency plans and solutions will be needed as society relies more on online security monitoring and alerts. Contingency solutions need to have a low incremental cost per connection, and will combine low sensor cost with lowcost wireless that needs to penetrate the thick walls of energy-efficient buildings (e.g., LPWA wireless solutions). • Affordable solutions for wide deployment by local authorities. Home and office security solutions can be paid for publicly, but there is an interest for public authorities to monitor fire and safety alarm health.
• Bureaucratic Cooperation • Conflict Management, and • Innovation.
Buildings are being rethought from their total net energy deficit (and even contribution), over their life cycle. This needs solutions for energy generation, storage and management, combined with optimised services and material usage.
4. Regional Smart City Developments
Building systems have traditionally existed as ‘silos’ (Elevator systems, HVAC, lighting) with separate protocols, and one of the most important steps for a smart building is to have a common data policy, for managing data across systems.
Trust enablers may include sites such as the US government’s Data.gov which makes government data visible, and publicly available through APIs for new applications. Another site is The UK’s TheyWorkForYou.com which makes personal data of local government representatives visible.
The most rapid urban growth is forecast in the APAC region. By 2050, the U.N. predicted last year, 3.3 billion people will live just in Asia's cities.
Microsoft has implemented an Energy-Smart Buildings (ESB) initiative to benefit from best smart building practice at its Redmond campus. The solution includes centralised faultfinding and management of building systems, and the full deployment had a payback period of about two years. Microsoft’s campus consists of over 120 buildings with a total floor area of over 1,4 square km. Microsoft chose to focus on the Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC), a total of 35,000 components which accounted for over 40% of energy usage.
3.5
Smart Government
Governance (including at city level) involves managing hard factors (information, command and control of the city environment) and soft factors (citizen-government relationships).
Source: Valerie Pieris
Figure 4: Urbanisation and the APAC Circle
Governments are presented with IoT and ICT as means to increase awareness, command and control of the city environment, and to increase the flow of information between government and citizen. The biggest challenges are, however, in the soft factors. Citizens of today’s information society are aware of the sphere outside their local and national government on an unprecedented scale. This puts new demands on the citizen-government relationship.
The three most urbanised regions (as percentage of population living urban) are: • North America (82% in 2014), • Latin America and the Caribbean (80%), • Europe (73%).
Citizen trust in government, as measured by Eurobarometer, has huge regional variations (62% in Finland to 7% in Greece). In the USA, the citizen trust metric has fallen from 75% in 1964, to 25% the last decade.
Smart city activity does not map uniformly to regions, since: • A smart city may exist in isolation to the surrounding region. This is especially true for ‘scratch-built’ pilot smart cities, such as Songdo, Korea and Masar, Abu Dhabi. • The greatest urban growth may be happening in towns that will become cities. The UN Economic and Social Affairs noted in 2014 that many of the world’s fastest growing urban agglomerations are in Asia and Africa, and have less than 1 million inhabitants.
The World Economic Forum ‘Future Government Smart Toolbox’ identifies the following areas where IoT/ICT can make a difference in future governments: • Trust in government • Leadership • Service Delivery • Political Representation • Anti-Corruption
Africa is the least urban continent (40%), but urbanisation can be rapid - this is forecast to rise to 56% by 2050.
9 LA’s Love-Hate Relationship with Waze continues: http://www.citylab.com/commute/2015/04/las-lovehate-relationship-with-wazecontinues/391832/ 10 Source: Intelligent Buildings Institute (IBI) 11 http://www.weforum.org/reports/future-government-smart-toolbox 12 http://esa.un.org/unpd/wup/Highlights/WUP2014-Highlights.pdf
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IoT Now - June / July 2016
Source: Elegant Embellishments
Figure 5: Smog Dispersing Building, Mexico City
4.1
Asia-Pacific
APAC as a region has the greatest accumulation of people, and the world’s three largest cities: • Tokyo with 38 million inhabitants • Delhi with 25 million • Shanghai with 23 million • Mumbai is a shared fourth place with 21 million people. Tokyo is projected to shrink to 37 million by 2030. This is because more than 22% of Japanese are already 65 or older. Delhi will remain number two, but rise to 36 million people by 2030. Delhi will need smart, new infrastructure whilst Tokyo’s needs will focus more on rationalised and renewed infrastructure (new infrastructure needed for the 2020 Olympics being an exception). Japan’s has several Smart Community pilots which are focused on smart residential home technology (e.g. smart meters) and are heavily dependent on subsidies from central government. Japan’s biggest city challenge (after the Fukushima accident) is securing electricity supply vs demand, as Japan imports about 84% of its energy requirements. Japan will install 80 million smart meters by 2025, with Toshiba and Landis+Gyr among the vendors.
4.3
North America
US infrastructure faces a challenge of flat-rate net infrastructure spending – the money spend on infrastructure maintains the old, with little left over for the new. IoT can help break the deadlock. Smart city projects initiated in New York City and Chicago have together a projected benefit of $20 billion in savings by 2020. In New York, the Hudson Yards development project is the largest private development building project in US history, planned to cater for 5,000 residences, 100 shops, and offices in a high-rise complex with over 1,5 square km of floor area. Smart infrastructure investments include: • Fibre loop throughout the area, and Distributed Antenna (DAS) solution for cellular communication • A centralised, vacuum-tube system for waste management • Micro grid, allowing building systems to be selectively powered up and down • Building data capture and environmental sensors.
The Indian government has allocated over $15 billion over five years for the creation of 100 new smart cities, and renewal of the infrastructure for 500 other towns and cities. This is in addition to a smart transportation budget of $7 billion for ports, and additional financing for 200 new railway stations and upgrades for another 1000.
In Chicago, the Array of Things project is a pilot network of sensor nodes. The project has been running for a year, funded by the Argonne National Laboratory. The proposal is to deploy 500 additional nodes in the city of Chicago, with public funding, by 2017. In July 2015, the project received $300,000 in additional funding (50/50 from the Argonne National Laboratory, and the Chicago Innovation fund). The funding will cover the next 50 nodes in the city.
Chinese cities have millions of rural immigrants per year. The environmental challenges are among those at the top of the list (eight of 74 major Chinese cities meeting government basic air quality standards in 2014).
4.4
There are over 50 smart city projects defined for Chinese cities, with energy management and transport management at the top of the needs list.
4.2
Central and Latin America
The CALA region contains the joint fourth most populated cities in the world - Mexico City, and São Paulo, each with around 21 million inhabitants. Mexico City has pioneered activities in digital governance and smart buildings. The ‘Torre de Especialidades´ tower at Mexico City Hospital can disperse the smog equivalent to 1000 cars per day. It does this by using a titanium dioxide coating on a honeycombed structure, catalysing air particles. The design is one of the first products of Elegant Embellishments, a German firm. Rio de Janeiro was early to adopt a centralised city Operations Centre, built by IBM in 2010. It can manage traffic control and emergencies in real time, by coordinating data from 30 municipal and state agencies. Central and Latin American cities have several initiatives to ‘smarten’ traffic. Mexico City has a car-sharing scheme that includes Electric Vehicles, whilst Bogota has introduced both an Electric Vehicle taxi fleet and a bike share programme.
Europe
Many European cities have historically had a focus on energy control and sustainability. For example, Copenhagen has the most aggressive carbon reduction plan, aspiring to achieve carbon neutrality by 2025. In addition, there is a high number of local authorities willing to cooperate with local start-ups with smart solutions. The cities of London, Stockholm and Paris are rated among the top start-up ecosystems in the world. In addition there are many cities with open data sets. The result is a strong innovative environment for new projects: • The city of Helsinki has more than 1,000 open datasets. The local government has been actively promoting engagement with developers through hackathons. • HafenCity in Hamburg is Europe’s largest urban regeneration project. The project budget is €414 billion to 2025, to create a port, a university, residential and commercial areas with modern transit. • Stockholm Royal Seaport is a major urban development project to provide 10,000 homes and 30,000 workspaces, with an emphasis on smart energy solutions.
4.5
Middle East and Africa
The Middle East has several high-profile city projects: • Dubai (with the World Expo 2020 as catalyst), • Saudi Arabia –The government has invested in four city projects worth $70 billion, and • Bahrain Bay, in the planning stage. The IoT focus per project has been mixed – cellular M2M is
13 Elegant Embellishments homepage http://www.prosolve370e.com/pr_torre1.htm
IoT Now - June / July 2016
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ANALYST REPORT
available through the region, but focus is shifting to IoT middleware and sensors. Etisalat has launched (July 2015) what it claims is the region’s first IoT development and device management platform. Etisalat partners with Oberthur Technologies and ThingWorx, to build and manage the platform.
which often serve both as ICT player technology demonstrators and showcases for the local/national government. The smart city definition in a multi-stakeholder world is not found at one point, but between three points:
Africa has the lowest level of urbanisation, and is forecast to experience the highest urban growth, percent-wise. Africa traditionally has a rapid adoption rate of ICT and is the launchpad for pragmatic and innovative solutions.
5. Smart City Drivers Smart ICT solutions as a part of city development are driven from several different directions: • Government: Local and/or national authorities see smart city solutions as: – A means of awareness, command and control of the city environment. – As showcases of local development, and/or as a means to secure sustainable city development. Sustainable city development may entail new economic / trade models, improving local conditions or making them more sustainable. – Governments also can see ‘Smart Government’ as a means of evolving the actual governance model, and increasing citizen interaction and trust. • ICT Players: As enterprise and consumer markets have matured in developed markets, vendors and service providers have seen the evolution of cities as: – A potentially stable and growing business for the ‘Internet of Things’ – A test bed for advances in computing, connectivity and sensors • Citizens: A citizen with a smartphone has access to more computing power today than NASA had for the first moon landings. 2.7 billion smartphone subscriptions worldwide today can more than double by 2020. Citizens will: • Seek personal and community benefits (productivity, security). Communities can apply ICT to change aspects of a city faster than a local authority or large ICT player can. • Be service providers themselves. • Be empowered. Citizens have an increasingly digital part of their identity. Services that have been historically tied to the local authorities such as justice and health can (in part) be delivered independently of location and time. The European Commission eGovernment Action Plan 20112015 is one attempt to provide new eGovernment services on a wider scale. A common digital citizen identification is a key enabler to services such as eProcurement, eJustice, eHealth, and mobility (i.e. enabling personal mobility independent of age and physical ability). The goal is that the services will deliver net benefits to businesses and governments in Europe, as well as the citizens themselves. There may be a dominant driver or driver combination for a particular smart city solution, e.g. ‘scratch-built’ smart cities
14 15 16 17
Source: Strategy Analytics
Figure 6: Smart City Triangle of Opportunity - Three corners of Challenge
The ’smartness’ of a city is extended from its governance, the infrastructure and its people. City solutions can legitimately address one corner – but the ’smartness’ will be measured in relation to the other two corners of the triangle (e.g. infrastructure-centric solutions will have to show innovation in its interfaces towards the citizens of the city and the governance of the city (policies and trade). Focused smart city projects show early potential, and the pioneers are cities where government prioritises a clear control infrastructure, e.g. Dubai, Singapore. Wider, long-term benefits may come from ’empowered citizen’ models where services and control may be more distributed. That will need an applied local government, with a readiness to remove legal and regulatory barriers for potential benefits.
6. Smart City Challenges In addition to the traditional city challenges such as sustainability, safety and security, smart cities face two specific challenges: • New city services coming from an independent player with expansive business drivers can change the city landscape, sometimes to the detriment of other infrastructure or players. • Safety and security concerns cross over from cyber to critical, physical infrastructure. A connected city is potentially a hackable city.
6.1 New Services Disrupting Existing Infrastructure The mobile internet paradigm has moved from disruption of
http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Smartphone-Users-Worldwide-Will-Total-175-Billion-2014/1010536 http://www.phonearena.com/news/A-modern-smartphone-or-a-vintage-supercomputer-which-is-more-%20powerful_id57149 Ericsson Mobility Report http://www1.ericsson.com/news/1872291 http://;:eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=COM:2010:0743:FIN:EN:PDF
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traditional IT providers (e.g., telecommunications) to almost every service industry. Then term ‘Uber-for-X’ has been coined to describe the brokerage of services in verticals, as a tribute to Uber seen as a pioneer of the model. Disruptive service brokering has been enabled by three important ICT trends: • On-demand, elastic and scalable (Cloud) computing through companies like Amazon. • High performance mail services at low cost, through e.g. SendGrid and MailChimp. • Simple digital payment enablers like PayPal.
Source: Strategy Analytics
Figure 7: Connected Infrastructure Security Concerns
Common trends for disruptive services are: • They usually leverage users’ smartphones. • They are attractive to users by offering a low-price, convenient service that replaces one or more ‘middle men’ in a service chain – hence the disruption. • They scale regionally, nationally and sometimes internationally.
IT security infrastructure spending is expected to accelerate in growth to counter the breadth and depth of new threats. Recent hacker attacks on heavy industrial plants have underlined that enterprise networks must be separated from control systems: • Firewalling is essential. • Deep Packet Inspection is recommended. • Physically separate networks may be necessary in some cases.
The disruptive aspect means that local and national legislation has changed in response to new services to protect the interest of workers in a certain vertical.
Ultimately, critical data needs situational awareness that is almost real-time. This is something that could be provided as an ICT service, together with data forensics.
The services often thrive in urban environments with high service demand. The most highly adopted services (e.g. Uber and AirBnB) have shown themselves able to change an environment before service providers and vendors can respond.
6.2
Smart City Ecosystems
Given the disparate nature of cities and the temptation for many cities to “go it alone”, a number of bodies are seeking to drive standardised ecosystems to assist with the development of smart cities.
Sharing Economy and Smart Cities
The pioneers of ‘sharing economy’ businesses have been on the market long enough to expand nationally or internationally, disrupt markets and have to cope with negative reactions such as legislation against their services. This is likely to lead to a maturing of ‘sharing economy’ services rather than a long-term backlash. The long-term effect of ‘sharing economy’ services on urban environments is likely to be positive: • The new services excel at sharing resources. The local government in Paris has curtailed some Uber operations. At the same time, Uber has shown it can reduce cars on the road, something that Paris like other cities want. • Sharing services are driven by user demand, and positive user experiences will also affect legislation. • New services rapidly adapt, get acquired or copied. It is not uncommon for a start-up company to change its business model within a two-year period. • They generally empower citizens. Future urban governance will in general need to reckon with citizens that are empowered through sharing services. Social interaction between government and citizens will become increasingly important.
6.3
7.
7.1
C40Cities Climate Leadership Group
C40Cities is an association of 75 cities seeking to collectively address climate change. Whilst the C40Cities group is as its name implies focused on climate control per city, the nature of the problem addressed requires smart urban solutions. The group is influential because: • The member cities account for 25% of the global GDP, or one in 12 people worldwide • The focus is on technical expertise and best practice, with designated ‘innovator cities’ and ‘observer cities’ • Over 8000 action shave been defined to combat climate change.
Safety and Security
ICT security is often a compromise, when combined with critical city infrastructure it can be something of a paradox. The more that critical infrastructure is connected for the sake of ‘smartness’, the more direct internet access needs to be avoided. The figure below is a selection of the more wellknown (reported) cyberattacks on infrastructure: Source: C40 Cities
Figure 8: C40Cities Overview IoT Now - June / July 2016
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ANALYST REPORT C40Cities facilitates a number of peer-to-peer networks between city staff members who have implementation responsibilities. The networks are used for knowledge sharing and joint problem solving. Solution areas include low-energy buildings, transit networks and city metrics. For players outside the network, the website c40.org provides common metrics for 75 cities. This includes a common measure of the investment power of local authorities – e.g., the chart below for the City of Copenhagen.
disrupt a city more overall than it's worth for the one area that it benefits). • The relative net benefits of smart ICT c.f. other 'smart' areas such as spatial planning. Emerging standardisation will shift the focus to 'what makes sense to do?' The ISO 37120 Standard is the first International standard on how to measure and compare different cities. It was launched 1 Dec 2014. The standard uses 100 indicators, specified fewer than 17 themes:
Source: Strategy Analytics
Figure 10: ISO 37120 Standardisation
8.3 Source: C40 Cities
Figure 9: C40Cities Profile, Copenhagen
7.2 Connecting Europe Connecting Europe is an initiative within the European Commission’s “Digital Agenda for Europe”. It targets the ICT correlation with regional and national growth” – for example, 10% of households connected to high-speed broadband are associated with 1.5% higher GDP by 2020. The initiative provides guidelines for local governments deploying broadband and digital service infrastructures. It has a budget of 1.14 billion euros; most of the budget is focused on Digital Service Infrastructures (DSIs), defined as crossborder services for governments, citizens and small enterprises.
8.
Smart City Evolution
8.1 Standardisation Several 'Smart' ICT investments have been focused on what can be done in terms of technology solutions, with an associated vendor-specific focus. Smart cities will need: • A standardised way to measure and compare smart solutions across cities. • A standardised way to implement them, i.e., common technology platforms. The British Standards Institute (BSI) has identified over 100 standards relevant to smart cities at technical, process and strategic levels.
8.2 Standardised Measurement
Standardised Platforms
A common technology platform can make it easier to share applications between cities. For example, Apple’s ecosystem for mobile application developers launched with the offer of a global market for application developers, was an opportunity that was much wider than that of the siloed business offerings from both telecom operators and other phone vendors at the time. Business thresholds were lowered. In the same way, smart city platforms will become a more attractive playing ground for smaller companies.
8.3.1 FIWARE FIWARE is a digital platform initiative based on: • An open-source software platform (the ‘CityOS’) with open APIs towards multiple industry verticals, and reference implementations. • A lab or non-commercial test environment. • Tools for platform deployment and operation. • An accelerator program targeting SMEs and entrepreneurs, with €80 million in funding. • A liaison programme towards local governments across the world. FIWARE offers several benefits for developers with smart city device solutions: • The lab reduces the needs for developer to have its own test environment. • The accelerator programme can help facilitate go-to-market. • The liaison programme can help with both go-to-market, and give access to specific R&D partner facilities. FIWARE lab offers cloud hosting based on OpenStack, so the enablers can be offered ‘as-a-Service’. The environment status is available in real-time over the public internet; the snapshot below shows a snapshot of lab node and OpenStack component availability:
Cities have lacked common parameters to measure: • The overall net benefit of smart ICT (e.g., a project may
18 http://www.ericsson.com/thinkingahead/the-networked-society-blog/2014/09/25/society-needs-security-data-needs-integrity/
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ANALYST REPORT • Truly smart cities will meet the needs of current and future generations – maximising benefits and minimising the negative aspects of daily living. • A variety of business models will be needed, especially where net public infrastructure investment is low or zero. There is a gap between investment needed for technology demonstrators and the mass market. • Standardisation and smart citizens will play a greater role in defining future smart cities. Solutions to visualise city data will become more important, as IoT solutions will greatly increase the data available. Urban ICT revenues are forecast to reach $977 billion by year 2022. North America and Europe will dominate urban ICT revenue by 2022, with Asia-Pacific the fastest growing market. Standard city metrics are emerging. They are needed to understand: • The net overall benefit of ICT projects, compared with other infrastructure investments. • The gaps between the public spend needed for infrastructure projects, and the ’grand vision’. • The sustainability aspect of new solutions (what will give the best net benefit for this generation and the next). Source: lab.fiware.org
Figure 11: FIWARE Lab Operational Node Snapshot
The initiative has vendor traction, with Telefonica, Orange, Engineering and Atos announcing joint development of the FIWARE standards. SIGFOX and FIWARE have announced a joint API, allowing SIGFOX developers to use the FIWARE platform with minimal additional development . SIGFOX is an existing standard for Low-Power, Wide-Area (LPWA) networking, with nationwide deployments in several European countries. The API deal gives FIWARE developer traction and makes it easier for the platform to connect to the ‘Things’ in IoT.
Cloud-based, ’CityOS’ solutions are good for addressing a range of solutions with standard, common frameworks but the major challenge will still lie in addressing and integrating legacy infrastructure systems. Projects addressing ‘scratch-built’ smart cities can demonstrate clear benefits from specific solutions. However, ‘mixed’ development as in 22@Barcelona may give better long-term answers in how to evolve a city, with resilience and with less exclusivity. The definition of a smart city will evolve over a long time, and ultimately the definition will come from the users (Government and Citizen) rather than a single ICT vendor or service provider.
FIWARE gives government’s access to over 500 participating companies (developers + vendors), a pan-European lab environment with over 2000 users, and a business network to engage developers to meet local needs. The city of Malaga uses the FIWARE platform to collect data from citizens using a smartphone app where they voluntarily submit anonymous data such as temperature, humidity, noise, and mobile signal. This is combined with the city’s own open data and information from hundreds of beacons deployed ion the city. The FIWARE platform allows the citizens to report and receive information on the city status in real time.
Andrew Brown is executive director, Enterprise and IoT Research. He leads a team that advises on all aspects of the enterprise ecosystem; from cloud computing to mobilising line-of-business applications, enterprise and mobile broadband devices, IoT, and M2M Communications.
FIWARE is used for small-scale deployments today, and it is unclear whether it will lend itself to large-scale, industrial internet applications. Its immediate value is that it gives local authorities and developer’s feedback on what makes sense to do in a smart city.
Prior to joining Strategy Analytics he was a program manager at IDC, where he was responsible for mobile computing research as well as the lead analyst on mobile computing, mobile devices, smart phone platform trends and developments and other key important issues in the mobile and wireless markets.
9. Conclusions
With over 19 years of experience, Andy is quoted in both trade publications and the wider national and international press. He also speaks frequently at conferences and acts as a judge for a number of prestigious awards. He is considered a thought leader in the wireless, IoT and enterprise domain.
Cities are resilient, evolving places of trade. Smart use of ICT and IoT can help cities maximise on their economies of scale whilst managing the risks associated with high urban growth. Urban living may encompass 86% of the developed world, and 64% of the developing world by 2050. About a million people are added each week to the world’s cities. Urban development and ICT evolution have a common ground for potential solutions, often dubbed ‘smart city’.
www.strategyanalytics.com
19 http://www.bsigroup.com/LocalFiles/en-GB/smart-cities/resources/BSI-smart-cities-report-Mapping-Smart-City-Standards-UK-EN.pdf IoT Now - June / July 2016
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INTERVIEW
What’s the future for eUICC? What is the role of eUICC (embedded Universal Integrated Circuit Cards) in advancing the Internet of Things. Jeremy Cowan, editor of IoT Now, asked an expert, Benoit Jouffrey, vice president, On-Demand Connectivity (pictured right) of Gemalto. IoT Now: Does the eUICC answer a real market need? If so, what exactly is this need? Benoit Jouffrey: Adoption of embedded SIMs1 is regarded as a key requirement for many M2M devices and allows, if required by the use case, the Choice to Change (C2C) the mobile connectivity. It is still at an early stage of development in mobile operators’ consumer market. Foreseeing benefits from embedded SIMs, some device manufacturers are likely to drive adoption of the technology. The first benefit is revenue development: Mobile operators see big business potential in connecting the Internet of Things (IoT) and the benefits of providing an independent connectivity to new categories of devices (e.g. wearables), but they do not want to disrupt their core market. The second benefit is regulatory compliance: Embedded SIMs can solve regulatory constraints, for instance by enabling the download of a local MNO2 profile, in countries where permanent roaming is not permitted or limited. Embedded SIMs are now a mainstream technology in the machine-to-machine (M2M) market, especially in the automotive/ connected cars arena, where the device is in the field for a long time and may require a change of connectivity. Adoption of embedded SIMs now appears a credible scenario in consumer markets, since some original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) are launching devices using this technology, like the Samsung Gear S2 smartwatch, while several mobile network operators are participating in commercial launches. 1. embedded Subscriber Identity Module 2. Mobile Network Operator
IoT Now: Can you describe the associated use cases? BJ: Globally we can define three main families of use cases. First, the initial provisioning of a
device. With this, we give the capability for device manufacturers to reduce the manufacturing variance (i.e. manufacturing done in one location and on one model only), with the target of dramatically simplifying the logistics: A single SIM for any type of customer profile and/or for all operations worldwide. In the consumer market, another use case consists in providing the required independent connectivity. Second, the contextual change. The eUICC and subscription manager platform give the capability to change the connectivity provider seamlessly during device lifecycle, for instance due to the particular context the device is in, without any complex operations. In the consumer market, it may allow an end-user to connect a consumer electronics device on cellular network, anytime, anywhere, with an adapted tariff plan. For example, a customer will be able to choose a local connectivity provider to get local tariff when travelling. Third, the lifecycle management. The lifecycle of a device is very different from a traditional consumer market device to smart meters, for example. In one case, the life of the device can be five years, with different owners. Subscription Management will enable the end-of-life of the subscription and the delivery of a new subscription for a new user. In M2M, the device may not move and may be alive for 10 or 15 years. We give the insurance to the OEM that if an unexpected event – related to the subscription – occurs during this lifecycle, we can manage. IoT Now: Can you give some examples of recent commercial deployments? BJ: Gemalto has been strongly involved in the adoption of the GSMA specifications for M2M and Consumer markets. We have participated in the main proof-of-concepts and contributed to the ▼
Foreseeing benefits from embedded SIMs, some device manufacturers are likely to drive adoption of the technology
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IoT Now - June / July 2016
specifications work. At the last Mobile World Congress we demonstrated with Samsung the pairing of a secondary device, a smartwatch, to a primary device, the smartphone, to download a subscription. Different operators have been involved and we are expecting further launches on this use case. In the M2M market, we are working with leading car makers to deliver subscription management solutions. IoT Now: How close is the industry to achieving standardisation? What would that mean for OEMs and MNOs? BJ: The story of the Remote Provisioning Subscription concept story started in 2010 when the GSMA decided to address this topic by issuing first a white paper (February 2011) and secondly by setting up a working group to issue a specification for the M2M segment. The referenced architecture of this M2M solution had been issued in July 2013 followed that December by a technical specification. Since then, several releases of this M2M specification have been issued, leading to a good level of specification maturity. Similarly, in the consumer market, major device manufacturers are willing to take advantage of the eUICC as adding great value to IoT devices such as wearables. Indeed, it lowers the footprint of the SIM component and offers a more fluid customer experience (fully digital, out of the box, on demand). During Mobile World Congress 2015 in Shanghai, the GSMA and its full members agreed on a reference architecture for the consumer market designed mainly by the main eUICC manufacturers, and launched the drafting of a technical specification. They had provided a first release on December 24 and a focus on activating secondary devices (such as a smart watch) through the connectivity of primary device (such as a smartphone). On February 22, the first demonstration of a GSMA eUICC product with the Samsung Gear S2 and Gemalto OSM V4 for consumer was done at Barcelona MWC. Version 2 of the GSMA specifications is expected to be released by mid-2016 to address additional use cases. The standardisation is essential for the companies in the mobile ecosystem to have a fullyinteroperable and future-proof solution, with a proven level of security. IoT Now: Are there any security challenges linked to eUICC? And how does Gemalto answer these? BJ: The first challenge for the eUICC is to securely generate and deliver subscriptions to the eUICC Over-The-Air, from the subscription management server. Security mechanisms ensure the integrity and the confidentiality of data, in addition to the mutual authentication of eUICC
IoT Now - June / July 2016
and server during operations such as the download of a new subscription on the eUICC. Gemalto has a unique experience in the development, deployment and operations of such systems remotely and securely managing the content of smart cards. The second challenge is more in the deployment itself and the capability to answer the regulators’ constraints on sensitive data such as a subscription. Those rules directly or indirectly impose the usage of the eUICC technology such as countries preventing the usage of permanent roaming requesting the download of a local subscription as soon as the device arrives in this country. But other rules will define the way to deploy the solution by requesting for example an installation localised in the country. Gemalto answers these diverse constraints with first a hosted solution that can be easily deployed in area where we have data centres and also a unique experience in deploying in-premises solutions to our customers.
In the M2M market, we are working with leading car makers to deliver subscription management solutions.
IoT Now: Are many devices now eUICCcompliant? BJ: The eUICC is developing in various market segments from consumer, enterprise to M2M. The eUICC will create new use cases, particularly those involving multi-country inventory management or mobile endpoints, such as connected cars. According to the IHS analysts 56% of the cars produced in 2016 have embedded connectivity (Cellular M2M in the Automotive market – Q4 2015). This share could grow up to 95% by 2020. M2M is the most mature market today for the eUICC with many different applications (smart grid, smart meter, etc.) potentially taking benefit from the eUICC beyond the connected cars. Embedded connectivity makes a lot of sense for the enterprise market equipped with laptops and tablets. The consumer market remains the more open, with different innovations in secondary devices, like the wearables, watches or cameras.
Jeremy Cowan, editorial director of IoT Now, was talking to Gemalto’s Benoit Jouffrey
The coming years are very promising. The challenge is not really on the number of devices launched by manufacturer but the quality of the use cases. Innovation is everywhere. Not all innovative projects are successful. The most innovative project can be blocked if consumer insights are not taken into account. We believe that Gemalto needs to accompany its customers, whether MNO or OEM, with high standards of market intelligence and innovation to meet their end-users’ complex and changing needs. In response, Gemalto provides a sophisticated service of research and collaboration, developing insights to ensure our clients’ offering meet with success: The Gemalto Ideas Hub, a “Co-creation Online Community” regrouping consumers, recruited according to certain criteria such as age, gender, occupation or any other features meaningful for a given market research project. In the end, the end-user decides.
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INTERVIEW
Adding value with a menu of connectivity and solution options Tom Rebbeck, research director at Analysys Mason, talks to Mike Troiano, Vice President of IoT Solutions at AT&T, to discuss how AT&T is supporting the Internet of Things (IoT) from providing connectivity through to end-to-end solutions. Tom Rebbeck: Can you outline AT&T’s approach to IoT?
connectivity types, like global contracts, satellite and low power.
Mike Troiano: AT&T provides solutions and a ‘menu’ of services to developers and customers across all elements of the stack. If a customer just needs connectivity, we can play that role. If they need help with application development, how to secure the data or deal with analytics, we can play that role.
MT: AT&T has been in the M2M (machine-tomachine communications) or IoT business for well over a dozen years, predominantly in the United States. We’re seeing more and more conversations about how to build and deploy international solutions.
TR: And specifically on connectivity, how do you see the market developing and what is your strategy? I’m thinking about the different
Maersk Line is a good example: We are providing the hardware, software, and professional services for them to monitor their refrigerated containers in over 140 different locations. TR: Why do you think that it has become more international? ▼
If they are looking for an end-to-end solution including hardware, software and professional services, we can play that role as well.
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We are extraordinarily excited about the advancements around LTE, in particular, LTE-M and NB-IoT
TR: What about connectivity options beyond cellular? MT: We need solutions that are communication ‘agnostic’. Customers need to connect devices with lots of networks; cellular, Wi-Fi, Low Power, Ethernet and others. They are saying to us: “I need one management platform. I need to be able to provision and procure the communication for each one of those paths.” That’s the direction that we are heading in with a ‘multi-network strategy’. Our customers are becoming more sophisticated with their needs, and they’re asking us to scale our systems and platforms accordingly. A good example is what we launched with our satellite offer. We lead with cellular connectivity as a mainstay, but where there is no cellular, or when the client needs an augmented technology, we’ll provide satellite connectivity. TR: Who do you see as using the big customers for satellite? MT: Shipping is the biggest use case right now, but it could be anybody in the asset management space. We’re also working on some interesting deals for oil companies that want to monitor pipelines. TR: It would be interesting to hear what you’re
IoT Now - June / July 2016
doing in the low power space. I understand AT&T’s quite heavily involved in LTE-M. MT: We are a standards-based organisation, and we are extraordinarily excited about the advancements around LTE, in particular, LTE-M and NB-IoT. If you believe that there will be 25 to 50 billion devices over the next number of years, there’ll be more likelihood of interference. Depending on the application, you want to think about using dedicated spectrum. Customers are also concerned about the longerterm prospects of non-standards based technology. A customer I met last week told me, “I have a warehouse of proprietary devices and stacks that we’ve played with over the last 10 years.” They’re in a warehouse because nobody uses them. They didn’t gain traction.
Mike Troiano, We’re working tightly with technology companies, including Cisco and GE, Qualcomm, Intel and Ericsson, as well as IBM and Deloitte
TR: LTE-M is one low power technology and NBIoT another. There seems to be a different role for NB-IoT versus LTE-M. Is it something you’re looking at as well? MT: Yes, so we’re looking at both. For NB-IoT, you’re talking about even lower module costs, less mobility support, and lower throughput. Tom Rebbeck, How are these smart city solutions being funded, given than most cities have limited resources? Are you doing a revenue or savings share?
I think the important point here is that you have to think long and hard about the use case. Let’s just assume, for the sake of argument, that you install a million widgets. What if the application profile changes dramatically in year two and throughput becomes an issue? Now you’re stuck with this little box that you can’t get out of. Again, there’s a lot of buzz in the industry about the potential, but you need to think carefully about the application and its roadmap. TR: Beyond connectivity, what else is AT&T offering to help developers build IoT solutions?
▼
MT: A few years ago, most of the conversations were with a mid-level person in an IT organisation who was tinkering with wireless technology. More recently, the conversations are not with an IT person but with the chief marketing or chief strategy officer suite. Some deals we’re working on involve board-level discussions. When the board and the C-suite are making decisions on global opportunities, they don’t want to deal with 32 different companies. They want one agreement for all geographies.
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INTERVIEW
If you believed you could just do this on your own, I think you’d get to one answer. If you want to maximise the opportunity, do it in cooperation
We’ve got about 14,000 active developers using M2X, Flow and the data services today. At our ‘Shape’ Conference in mid-July in California we’re expecting over 1,000 attendees and we’ll be doing a hackathon with about 500 people. Often, we’ll test ideas with those developers and that ecosystem first, and then decide if we want to productise it. Both M2X and Flow Designer went through that path. We saw the developers in the hackathons using our tools, and it gave us fantastic feedback. It’s been a great, great avenue for AT&T. TR: 14,000 is a lot of developers. Who are these developers? Can you give a sense of who they are and where they’re coming from? MT: They are a mix. What we have seen over the last two years is a pretty balanced mix of consumer and business-centric developers. Key sponsors for our Shape event include IBM, Cisco, Qualcomm, GE, Honda and Jaguar. Large enterprises and ecosystems are supporting our initiatives because they realise that this has become a good platform for them to tap into developers and, in some cases, get those developer ecosystems to work on some of their problems.
TR: Many organisations are competing for developer attention. How does AT&T, as a carrier, compete with all of the other developer environments? MT: That’s a good question. If you believed you could just do this on your own, I think you’d get to one answer. If you want to maximise the opportunity, do it in cooperation with other sponsors. I listed some of the sponsors that are assisting with our hackathon and Shape event. We do a lot of reciprocal stuff. You’ll see us at some of the other leading developer conferences and events. If you took the developer ecosystem of IBM, Microsoft, Salesforce and Amazon, and you started to look at that in the aggregate, you’re talking about millions and millions of developers that AT&T wouldn’t traditionally touch. You’re starting to see a lot more cooperation between technology companies that have access to different parts of the developer ecosystem and trying to figure out how to maximise that. TR: To finish, I’d like to hear more about what you’re doing in smart cities and the role you’re taking. MT: In January 2016, we announced a smart cities framework. We can help the ecosystem and governments with connectivity, platforms to build and deploy these solutions and vertically integrated solutions. We’ve announced six cities that we’re working with: Dallas, Atlanta, Chicago, Miami-Dade County in Florida, Montgomery County in Maryland, and Chapel Hill in North Carolina. ▼
MT: We have M2X and Flow. M2X is a time data storage environment we launched in 2015. Flow Designer is an application development platform – it has tools for developers to build and deploy IoT applications. We launched Flow Designer in January 2016, at our developers’ conferences in Las Vegas.
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IoT Now - June / July 2016
Michael Troiano is the Vice President of IoT Solutions, a business unit of AT&T Mobile & Business Solutions, where he is responsible for product management and channel distribution for Internet of Things solutions. He leads go to market strategy and execution for Internet of Things solutions designed to transform enterprises by mobilizing people, processes and assets. He was appointed to his current position in October 2015 from his previous leadership of Industrial IOT Solutions. Michael Troiano leads strategy, product management and channel enablement for AT&T’s IoT Solutions Organization. His team focuses on delivering solutions that range from basic machine to machine connectivity to highly integrated, end-to-end, solutions for business customers of all sizes. Michael and his team have been involved with some of the largest and most complex M2M deployments ever created, including those in Asset Tracking (Land, Sea, Air), Commercial Telematics and Energy. Mr. Troiano joined AT&T Wireless in 2003. Prior to AT&T he held Business Development and Marketing roles with Palm, BellSouth International Wireless Services and Sprint. Mr. Troiano is a graduate of Indiana University and lives in Dallas with his wife and three daughters.
The ecosystem is an important piece of what we’re doing. When we announced our framework in January, we also announced that we’re not doing this alone – we’re working tightly with technology companies, including Cisco and GE, Qualcomm, Intel and Ericsson, as well as IBM and Deloitte. More recently we announced additional partners, including Hitachi and Southern Company, which is a utility here in the United States. So, it’s among these technology companies, as well as these cities, that we’re starting to think through and implement solutions for cities. TR: How are these smart city solutions being funded, given than most cities have limited resources? Are you doing a revenue or savings share? MT: It’s a great question. In America, there are over 4,000 cities, and we decided not to go after every city. Many cities have a vision, but they don’t have the budget. The cities we’re going after have dedicated the resources, the capital and are pragmatic, starting with a couple of use cases – whether it’s route optimisation for buses or to monitor the water leaks. Some of these cities also own an electric utility, so smart metering, for example, becomes part of the purview of the city as well, and we’re doing a lot in that particular arena. TR: Are the cities looking for you to take on any of that risk? MT: We’ve had a couple of cities ask us to think about the business model to see if we can
IoT Now - June / July 2016
articulate that we’re going to save them X% in productivity, or fuel, or whatever it might be, and adopt a shared risk model. We have not entered into any these agreements yet, but it’s one of the reasons why the framework of additional technology companies at the table becomes interesting. Some of our partners are open to sharing the risk on applications and services. I believe you’ll see that trend in the future, but we haven’t used that model yet.
The most difficult part of any business venture is not necessarily the technology; it’s the rules and governance with other partners.
TR: For smart cities, you’ve got all of these different partners. How do you manage those partners? MT: What we did very deliberately was work with a handful of companies late last year to agree on the framework. This is often one of the most difficult parts of any business venture. It’s not necessarily the technology; it’s the rules and governance with other partners. We also spent a lot of time trying to ensure that we didn’t have too many partners in a given vertical, or industry, or part of the stack. That was done on purpose so that we didn’t have too much overlap. Because we’re a mini-consortium, there are going to be some companies that have deeper relationships than others with the cities. You have to respect that and fine-tune the relationship model based on who has a better propensity to win. We’re engaged with six cities and a number of trials, and the relationship model seems to be working well.
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Positioning for the Internet of Things (IoT) An obvious ambition for any IoT company is to earn a larger share of spend by moving along the value chain. However, the decision of exactly what to provide is not straightforward; companies may need to be flexible and support a variety of approaches.
Generic platform
GENERIC VALUE CHAIN FOR IOT SERVICES
Connectivity
Description
Approximate share of value
Approximate EBIT margin
Device
Application
Service provision
Offer the network for transmission of data from IoT services
Offer the end-user module, with an embedded M2M chipset
Provide the actual applications that manage the data collected by the device
Manage the distribution, supply chain, fulfilment, billing and support
5–30%
5–20%
30–60%
20–30%
Systems integration
Provide system integration services Design/ develop systems
<20%
100%
~10%
<5%
0–30%
0–10%
10%
Connectivity
Market n
Option C
Platform of generic capabilities (hosting, cloud computing, billing etc.)
Connectivity (2/3/4G, fixed, satellite, LPWA)
Analysys Mason helps clients in all geographies and parts of the value chain to develop their approach to IoT. Our assignments range from rapid reviews of existing plans to full strategy development. To discuss how we could help you, contact Tom Rebbeck at tom.rebbeck@analysysmason.com
analysysmason.com enquiries@analysysmason.com
Customer 4
Customer 3
Solution B
Customer 2
Option D
Solution A
Ford
Connected car
Customer 1
Healthcare
Audi
Vertical market platform
Jaguar
http://www.analysysmason.com/Trending-Topics/ Positioning-for-the-Internet-of-Things-IoT/
Car Solution B
Solution
BMW
Customer
Health Solution B
Telecoms operators have four basic options for their position on the value chain, ranging from basic connectivity (option A) to the provision of end-to-end solutions (option D). No single model will prevail; operators will need to be flexible and support a mix of approaches.
Car Solution A
GP
GP
Hospital
Hospital
OVERVIEW OF TELECOMS OPERATOR APPROACHES TO IOT
Health Solution A
By moving along the value chain, companies will face new competitors and may well dilute margins.
Option B
Option A
JUNE/JULY 2016 • VOLUME 6 • ISSUE 3
IoT PLATFORMS SUPPLEMENT Telit’s vital ingredients for a successful IoT platform
LATEST PLATFORM NEWS
www.iot-now.com PLUS: A 10-PAGE SUPPLEMENT • SOMETHING TO BUILD ON • A LEFT-FIELD LOOK
INTERVIEW
The vital ingredients for a successful IoT platform An IoT platform centres on a comprehensive suite of integrated technologies backed by extensive developer resources, engineering support and a thriving ecosystem of partners Many companies claim to offer an IoT platform but the majority of these represent just a small subset of the required functions or only address limited segments of the market. Jack Indekeu, the chief marketing officer of Telit, tells IoT Now that a platform should enable enterprises to put together a robust end-to-end IoT solution that can scale from a simple proof of concept to full commercial deployment across different markets and industries. IoT Now: There seems to be a conflict of definitions in terms of what constitutes an IoT platform. What does an IoT platform mean to Telit? Jack Indekeu: At a basic level, a platform centres on pieces of technology. However, we look at it in a more holistic way whereby a platform consists of purpose-built sophisticated software components and a cloud-based infrastructure that are seamlessly integrated to perform all the critical connection, management and integration functions for any end-to-end IoT deployment. In addition, a platform must come with all the necessary tools, resources and expert support to put together a scalable and secure end-to-end IoT solution. You can think of selecting an IoT platform as being similar to joining a business franchise, since it ultimately provides companies large and small with a proven path to success and reduces the risk, time to market, cost and complexity of onboarding to the Internet of Things. At the core, an enterprise-grade platform must include built-in capabilities for connectivity management, remote device management, edge intelligence, data management, enterprise integration, end-to-end security, custom app creation, dashboarding and big data analytics. More specifically, connectivity management, lets you provision, manage and analyse your IoT connections across multiple wireless networks to optimise data consumption and cost. Device management offers remote over-the-air updating and troubleshooting of hardware in the field because we recognise that accessing deployed IoT devices can be a challenge. Data management includes a broad range of functions related to data collection, data transport, data storage and data delivery. A module that is focused on collecting the data and has the capability to provide edge intelligence or knowledge to decide what gets sent, where it gets sent and when it gets sent is fundamental. Integrated with that should be a huge library of device drivers and APIs because in a platform you want a capability to connect almost anything that’s out there. That means you need the
capability to support any protocol and any connectivity. With data management, the key challenge is about what you do with the data once it goes into the cloud, not just the basic collection of data itself. The next constituent part of a platform is what we refer to as administration and security, providing extensive administrative functions from a single, intuitive web-based management portal and superior layered security against external and internal threats. This provides the capability to manage and track your deployments, especially where you set up your operations utilising a multi-tenant structure. This is essentially where you keep all your management tools. The final part of a platform is application development capabilities, which include multiple approaches to create dashboards, web-based and mobile apps and lets you integrate device data with your enterprise systems and cloudbased data analytics solutions. IoT Now: What are the key attributes of an IoT Platform? JI: A platform must have end-to-end capabilities to enable you to easily and quickly configure, connect and manage your own deployment. To put this in another context, when you hire an accountant, you’re not going to ask them to develop a new spreadsheet programme; you’ll expect him or her to use Excel or something comparable. We look at an IoT platform as an Excel for IoT that lets you input your needs. After all, no one knows your business better than you, therefore you should be able to control what information is captured, and when, where and how data is consumed and analysed. A platform makes all that very easy. Since every business is unique and no business is an island, by definition a platform must be horizontal so that it can be easily configured to integrate with any vertical market solution. Take for example the early days – of what was then still called M2M – when an owner of a small transportation business stitched together an inhouse method to locate his delivery trucks. It was probably satisfactory for improving vehicle routing and responding to unscheduled deliveries
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A platform must have end-to-end capabilities to enable you to easily and quickly configure, connect and manage your own deployment
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IoT Now - June / July 2016
From this simple example you can see how companies, once connected with IoT, can easily discover new ways to innovate beyond the initially intended scope or scale. Once again, this is where a platform provides scale and flexibility to securely connect any number of disparate unrelated things with
different interfaces and standards to virtually any app, database or enterprise system. The exciting thing is the list never ends and the potential for applications is almost unlimited. The only limitations are that the applications must have potential value for businesses to either save money, make money or achieve compliance. The great thing about platforms is they radically lower the barrier to entry so organisations can conduct more trials without having to make heavy upfront investments in projects which may not work. IoT Now: Why is the platform approach attractive to IoT companies? What do you see as the core benefits? JI: By adopting a platform approach, organisations reduce risk, time to market, cost and complexity because the platform is proven and already deployed. Benefits include the capability to use all â&#x2013;ź
and pick-ups but such a home-grown system could not easily be modified to also monitor vehicle engine performance and integrate relevant information into the companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s maintenance and repair database. The limits of this point-solution became even clearer when that company owner also wanted to monitor driver behaviour to take advantage of safe driver discounts his insurance company offered. Also, what about informing the shipper of the status of the delivery or monitoring the actual cargo on the truck so that the recipient can be assured that his perishable meats or produce were kept at the proper temperature and humidity along the entire journey?
Jack Indekeu, By adopting a platform approach organisations reduce risk, time to market, cost and complexity
IoT Now - June / July 2016
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INTERVIEW
Jack Indekeu, Applications must have potential value for businesses to either save money, make money or achieve compliance
There are now probably about 400 IoT platforms out there according to their providers but, in terms of the pure play, comprehensive solutions I described earlier there are only about a dozen. Very few platforms have true end-to-end capabilities. An end-to-end IoT platform is very comprehensive if you look at the complete package from connectivity management all the way to application development. There are mandecades of development that go into creating that completeness and companies that adopt a true platform will be able to leapfrog right to results. A platform is an enabling tool that as well as reducing cost, complexity and time to market brings an organisation into a proven, scalable solution with very little upfront investment. You can start with five units for a proof of concept and scale up from there and that’s great if you’re in an industry that has a lot of different
inputs and outputs. However, there’s a need for organisations where the multiple inputs are less apparent to future-proof their investments so they are ready when the value of different inputs and outputs emerges. The broader the use and the more diverse the inputs and outputs you have, the greater the reason for a platform. That holds true even if you haven’t worked out the business cases for some of the inputs and outputs when you first roll-out IoT capability. Platforms mean you don’t pay for capability you don’t use but that you are prepared for when you want to use the inherent capabilities of the platform. IoT Now: Could IoT platforms face issues as companies worry about vendor lock-in and over-reliance on a specific technical approach becoming a barrier to agility? JI: Not really, although I accept there could be a perception of overkill for people who are just starting out with a simple, single application. I understand why they would ask why they need such a sophisticated application for something like turning on a sprinkler. ▼
or part of the platform and that has seen the term platform abused as providers claim to offer a platform when they only offer a limited set of capabilities.
IN ASSOCIATION WITH TELIT
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IoT Now - June / July 2016
I don’t accept the vendor lock-in point. A platform approach doesn’t necessarily lock you into a vendor because it often comes with its own ecosystem. Telit has our deviceWISE and deviceWISE Ready ecosystem that means a lot of developers have deviceWISE software built-in. There are a couple of dozen companies we consider technology partners that use our platform. With the Telit platform, you’re buying into a proven architecture and you’re also getting access to a partner network of compatible gateway providers, leading enterprise system providers such as SAP, and global system integrators such as Tech Mahindra. You can work with any of these alone or together and you can leverage the expertise and support system of these like-minded companies. IoT Now: What is meant by end-to-end solutions and can these achieve many of the benefits of an IoT platform? JI: End-to-end solutions are often built around an IoT platform and we work with a number of technology companies and a variety of systems integrators and, in some cases, network operators that can collate or individually offer an end-to-end solution. These companies have the capabilities to put together a solution from the idea, through proof of concept to deployment. If they don’t, we, as a platform provider, can do that. For us, it’s all about enabling companies. In addition to the platform and subscription services we have the Telit Technical Forums where people go to learn more about what they can do. We have the deviceWISE University, which helps companies that want to develop solutions themselves become proficient at using the platform. It’s about building the franchise I described earlier; I don’t think of the platform as a piece of software. We also have our IoT App Zone, which enables you to find the resources you need to assist your solution. Finally, we have our competence centre which will be happy to take you through the whole service introduction process from A to Z or address a specific issue. IoT Now: How can Telit help organisations decide which approach to take and what platform elements they need? JI: Our vision is to provide a new way for companies to get on board the IoT. Come to us, present your challenge and we’ll find an end-toend solution that you can implement by yourself, with a partner or with us - across virtually any
IoT Now - June / July 2016
market or industry around the world. Our aim, with our network of partners, is to take companies through the entire process from concept ideation to systems architecting and concept development to commercial deployment. This is intended to help companies enhance their businesses by saving money, making money and achieving compliance. We enable end-to-end solutions but we are not competing with our ecosystem partners – the systems integrators and the network operators. We’re providing the tools and the building blocks and the mortar to make partners and customers successful. However, this is not a piecemeal approach – you get the blueprints to go with the building materials.
With the Telit platform, you’re buying into a proven architecture and you’re also getting access to a partner network of compatible gateway providers, leading enterprise system providers such as SAP, and global system integrators such as Tech Mahindra
IoT Now: How do you see the IoT platforms market developing over the next few years? JI: As the market matures and becomes more educated, I expect the use of platforms to increase as people realise the potential of IoT. For example, one of our customers that supplies cooking oil started out with an IoT app to monitor the inventory in their oil tanks at over 30,000 restaurants they serve across North America. They saw instant improvements in their logistics, just-in time deliveries and customer satisfaction. Once those restaurants were IoTenabled, that company realised it could also monitor fryers and other kitchen equipment, as well as other functions in the building, including the HVAC systems. Today, they are also monitoring entire restaurants and selling valuable operational insights directly to restaurants’ owners, suppliers and maintenance crews, resulting in improved performance, cost reductions and higher quality. If it had just built a tank monitoring solution it would have been very hard to go back in and use the same system to keep track of factors that influence operational efficiency and food compliance for its restaurant operator customers. What a platform allows a company to do is start with something and then discover there’s a lot more it can do. It’s scalable not just in adding new insights but also in increasing the scope of IoT. The ability to track not only a truck driver but the truck engine and the payload … but provide valuable insights to endless suppliers and customers, insurance companies, service organisations or management teams using the same platform changes the way you can do business and that’s the exciting potential an IoT platform can make real.
www.telit.com
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PLATFORMS
A left-field look at IoT platforms The term “IoT Platform” has been overused to such an extent that the meaning has been lost to the market. Different vendors, which range from chip set manufacturers through to systems integrators, use it to describe their offer. It has become a kind of catch-all term; it means what they want it to mean and right now there are over 300 interpretations. So, does this imply that we need an unambiguous definition? What is valid in today’s dynamic, complex environment? Bob Emmerson reports.
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integration of an intelligent, multi-service gateway approach with an IoT integration platform in the cloud. Telit does employ the term, but it is positioned as an Industrial IoT Platform. The left-field look comes from imec, which conducts world-leading research in nanoelectronics. The on going scaling of IC technology has enabled the development of chips that are offered as technology platforms
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I Googled around before starting this article and concluded that we have to resort to a lowest common definition: IoT platforms enable connectivity between devices, which in most cases are cloud-connected devices. I also concluded that it is important to see usage of the term in context. For example, Stream Technology markets their IoT-X offer as a technology agnostic connectivity platform. Eurotech’s holistic offer is based on the functional
IoT Now - June / July 2016
incorporating mechanical, chemical or optical functionality. For example, this chip has enabled the creation of hyperspectral image sensor solutions such as a compact, lightweight (27 grams) camera used on drones in order to make detailed inspections of agricultural fields.
The chip integrates hyperspectral filters monolithically on top of the line-scan image sensors at the wafer level.
â&#x2013;ź
Hyperspectral cameras capture the spectral fingerprint of an object, a unique spectral signature that provides very detailed information about its composition. The ability to bring the technology down to earth and enable costeffective systems for the emerging precision farming industry is a significant breakthrough.
The left-field look comes from imec, which conducts world-leading research in nanoelectronics
Photo courtesy Gamaya
IoT Now - June / July 2016
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PLATFORMS
By working closely with Safran, a SIM and security specialist, IoT-X can create a secure bridge and manage connectivity and subscriptions for the world of connected objects
Stream Technology’s IoT-X™ platform is packed with functionality, for example it solves the multinetwork problem. Now a carrier using IoT-X can treat satellite and low power wide area endpoints just like a SIM. The platform monitors, manages and monetises device end points and it includes connectivity management, data routing, billing and event decision-making.
The platform also lets users develop integration flows that connect applications residing in a private or public cloud and then deploy them without installing or managing any additional hardware or middleware. Once devices are deployed, users can connect, configure and manage devices over the whole lifecycle, from deployment through maintenance and eventually retirement.
The data routing capabilities include the ability to define network routing, create individual pivot points and route data to any application. IoT-X overlays and integrates with other legacy platforms. And it enables the addition of satellite, low power radio, Wi-Fi and other cellular network capabilities to obtain additional functionality. Billing services are seamless: users can bill on any traffic type, and the platform allows billing for complete solution bundles, for all hardware, applications, services and connectivity. But there’s more.
Telit markets the deviceWISE Industrial IoT Platform that connects and integrates production machines and processes with existing enterprise resource planning (ERP) and manufacturing resource planning (MRP) systems and SCADA applications. This platform minimises installation and maintenance costs by eliminating the use of intermediate technology and custom programming. The result is enhanced security and reduced system integration cycles. Compatible with virtually any database, message queuing and application server system available, deviceWISE breaks through complicated data transfer layers and the resulting connectivity reduces time to revenue.
By working closely with Safran, a SIM and security specialist, IoT-X can create a secure bridge and manage connectivity and subscriptions for the world of connected objects. This is enabled by Safran’s MorphoFlex SIM provisioning solution. Moreover support for eSIMs will allow IoT-X to play a pivotal role in enabling a new breed of Super-VNOs (Virtual Network Operators). Eurotech’s holistic offer focuses on creating and deploying Industrial IoT Solutions in Enterprise Environments. Intelligent devices, software defined multi-service gateways and an integration platform in the cloud constitute a de facto IoT platform, but this term is not employed: it would not do justice to the breadth and depth of the company’s offer. The baseline connectivity function of the gateways is to aggregate data from remote locations and transmit it to the cloud, either private or public. That is a relatively easy task. Everywhere Cloud, the integration M2M / IoT platform, enables integration within the cloud and between the cloud and enterprise, which involves the bidirectional seamless transfer of information between devices and business processes.
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Going from one service provider portal to another and another to accomplish daily management tasks for your IoT deployment is not only poor use of time, it is a process prone to errors and ultimately not scalable. The Telit IoT Portal, which is powered by the deviceWISE IoT platform, is a single-sourced solution of end-toend platform services conceived to help you launch and run complex multi-point IoT deployment. Conclusions: These three offers are all based on the basic concept of an IoT platform, but their diversity underlines the earlier point about the term having varied meanings, which is ironic given the importance of the functionality that is provided. One can make a comparison to this quote, which comes from “Through the Looking Glass” by Lewis Carroll. “When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.’ ’The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things.’
IoT Now - June / July 2016
INTERVIEW
A platform is simply something that is easy to build on “The IoT platform definition debate leads to a huge amount of confusion mixed with largely overlooking the critical importance of connectivity management platforms.” - Nigel Chadwick
Nigel Chadwick, founder and CEO, Stream Technologies
Alan Tait, CTO, Stream Technologies
It doesn’t matter how you define an IoT platform provided it enables you to eliminate complexities, accelerate time to market and future-proof your IoT solutions, says Stream Technologies chief executive Nigel Chadwick.
“The IoT platform definition debate leads to a huge amount of confusion mixed with largely overlooking the critical importance of connectivity management platforms,” says Nigel Chadwick, the chief executive of Stream Technologies. “Identifying the strategic and functional strengths of the relatively few platforms, such as Stream Technologies’ IoT-X,
IoT Now - June / July 2016
that can act as an operating environment for connecting IoT devices and transiting data in a resilient and easy way would add clarity.” For Alan Tait, the chief technology officer of Stream Technologies, a true platform is disruptive but actually creates simplicity. “We believe we are disrupting the traditional model of requiring customers to integrate hardware, protocols and connectivity by putting together a variety of technologies developed by a number of different companies, that can provide the solution from the edge device to the cloud,” he explains. “We’re not treating that as something overly-complicated to be able to do, in fact we are simplifying the end-to-end process, but what is important is that we’re taking care of the elements many have ▼
The term IoT platform is now being appended to everything from a module in a device to a connectivity plan and all points in between. This marketing blizzard is creating confused definitions of what constitutes an IoT platform and not helping providers communicate the benefits of the platform approach to enterprises and users.
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INTERVIEW
“Even 2G was too expensive for deployments involving billions of devices.”
found challenging by combining connections and hardware in a service delivery product which is providing something unique in the market.” Chadwick says Stream Technologies, with its IoTX connectivity, data routing, IoT service billing and event decision-making platform, is enabling customers to eliminate complexities. “We put all this functionality together so the customer doesn’t have to,” he says. “They can focus on their business and core solutions, which might be selling consumer white goods – they are not in the business of managing connected services. Effectively, we’re accelerating time to market for clients and increasing their visibility into what their devices are doing whilst also future proofing through continuing to ensure IoT-X remains wireless type agnostic.”
An operating environment for IoT “We’ve been working exclusively in IoT connectivity for 16 years and daily we’re figuring out and sifting through the offerings on the market to establish which combinations work best for each customer,” he adds. “Using IoT-X provides a glue to ensure data is routed from A to B to C. Effectively we’re an operating environment for IoT with service delivery on one side and connectivity management on the other side and a data routing module that sits at the heart of our platform”. Stream Technologies will use IoT-X to bring the best complimentary technologies to its customers. One example is eSIMs, which Tait says are making the process of getting a device set up and connected radically simplified. “eSIMs are remotely programmable SIMs that once installed wake up and know where they are and can request a downloadable subscription that is local and designed for high capacity,” he explains. “We have baseline connection options at more than 600 networks worldwide. This is an ideal solution for IoT companies that have product distribution on a global basis because eSIMs can be embedded at point of manufacture, shipped anywhere and then download a specific profile for the local market. This allows a build once, deploy anywhere model.” Customers and enterprises no longer need to maintain a large stock of SIMs or retain network agreements with multiple providers. “They know they’ll get excellent quality of service levels,” says Chadwick.
www.streamtechnologies.com
A provider that knows their way around the entire IoT ecosystem is likely to become of even greater value to enterprises as connectivity choices increase. In the US market we are already seeing
the retirement of 2G networks which have served the low-bandwidth requirement M2M market well for many years. The higher bandwidth offered by new 4G/LTE networks makes real capabilities such as sending pictures and other media for apps that require this but it is too costly to meet the business cases of many low bandwidth requirements. “Even 2G was too expensive for deployments involving billions of devices,” points out Chadwick. “The pricing of 2G by mobile operators was too high and pushed total cost of ownership (TCO) too high for many apps. Now with low bandwidth alternatives such as Narrowband-IoT (NB-IoT) and Low Power Wireless Access (LPWA) – in particular LoRa technologies, the lower end of the market has a choice.” “LPWA operators are likely to poach some of the customers that mobile operators would naturally have serviced and once they’re gone, they’re going to be difficult to win back,” says Chadwick. “The challenge for them is to figure out whether to go for LPWA or to wait for NB-IoT – both have advantages, it depends what the deployment is, LPWA allows users to take advantage of service now and on some technologies build their own network. NB-IoT will be backed by 3GPP but what the cost and deployment looks like is still unknown.”
Complete polarisation Even if that choice is resolved, Chadwick sees the IoT ecosystem dividing on bandwidth requirement lines. “For the first time, there’s a complete polarisation happening,” he says. “For services with high data requirements mobile operators’ 4G/LTE is great and the future upgrade path to 5G will work but the lower bandwidth services are challenged severely by LPWA. If an LPWA provider makes it cheaper and easier they will be successful – it’s always about economics.” The same is true in the IoT platform market. “IoT platforms in the truest sense are enablers for large global enterprise clients,” he concludes. “More than that, they’re a hook for service providers, including mobile operators, to win customers because they include all the elements of IoT – connectivity, data routing, IoT service billing and event decision-making – to help an enterprise roll out its IoT strategy. On top of this and perhaps most importantly, platforms such as IoT-X help retain some form of relationship with the end device, yielding a highly valuable ownership tether or link, with the data sending device and hence customer. This link I am certain will increasingly become recognised as a truly valuable requisite of those global IoT players that emerge to become the strategic winners.”
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IoT Now - June / July 2016
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DEVICE MANAGEMENT
Device Management in the Internet of Things Vision â&#x20AC;&#x201C; The approach of Wind River There have been several predictions about the increasing number of connected devices but, regardless of the disparity, it's clear the move is towards fully connected contexts. Those contexts are made up of diverse devices, sensors and machineries. The present and future will consist of a large number of devices with widely varying functions and objectives, along with the different data gathered and used from each. This volume and diversity creates several challenges for any type of organisation so device management capabilities remain a critical component for the robust deployment of IoT solutions in business and consumer-centric contexts. In order to explore the device management features and functionalities required to enable the IoT vision, Saverio Romeo, the principal analyst at Beecham Research, met Santhosh Nair, the general manager of Wind River's Helix Cloud. Here, Romeo reports on a conversation that explored device management in the Internet of Things and how the Helix Device Cloud, a device management system from Wind River, is positioned in the market.
Santhosh Nair: Wind River
Saverio Romeo [SR]: The Internet of Things vision is delivering a rich and diverse set of connected devices. How is that affecting device management? Santhosh Nair [SN]: Connected devices are not a new phenomenon. For decades companies have had remote access to deployed equipment. Consumer and retail markets have been early adopters of IT for e-commerce, leveraging ubiquitous connectivity and mobile devices. In contrast, industrial equipment has been historically deployed in controlled, regulated environments: what we call critical infrastructure. Recently industrial companies have begun to take note of the new revenue opportunities that are possible through managed services. Device management has transformed from monitoring of, and access to deployed assets, to higher value added activities like telemetry, device health management, remote services and updates to asset lifecycle management. Today, most of our customers have their own IoT groups and they are more open to adopting public SaaS infrastructure to manage their assets. SR: The device management layer was a key element of M2M (machine-to-machine)
platforms. How has that evolved in the context of IoT platforms where the approach seems to be increasingly data-centric? SN: Most IoT programmes today are driven by business goals to reduce or avoid costs, and to create new revenue generating services. The initial focus is on data collection, storage and analytics. As customers confront the realities of having critical enablement devices, such as gateways, located inside customer networks, they quickly realise there is more to IoT than just data collection. These edge devices need to be monitored, managed, serviced, and updated. IoT is a learning process. As you learn more about the devices, and push more intelligence to the edge, you discover there is a need to push updates. In some cases, there is also the need to be responsible for security protection. These are the things that Helix Device Cloud is focused on providing. SR: What are the key features and functions of the connected device management solutions that Wind River offers? SN: Wind River Helix Device Cloud supports telemetry, file transfer, OTA updates, and remote
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Connected devices are not a new phenomenon. For decades companies have had remote access to deployed equipment
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CASE STUDY
ENTERPRISE IT SECURE CONNECTIVITY CRM ERP SERVICE CLOUD
access and rules engines. Users access these capabilities through a browser-based interface. We have REST APIs that enable our customers to plug in applications that are specialised to their market/customer. Security, performance, and scale have been uppermost in our thoughts during our product development. We support multiple operating systems so that our customers can use one platform regardless of the devices they have already deployed or plan to deploy in the future. SR: What types of connected devices do your customers manage with your solution? Can you give us some examples? SN: With respect to Wind River Helix Device Cloud, we are focused on the industrial and healthcare markets â&#x20AC;&#x201C; connected buildings, transportation, energy, industrial automation and connected health. A few examples include smart lights, building energy management systems, PLCs, meters, SCADA systems and mobile health monitors. We are also working with key players in the automotive and retail markets. SR: Considering the increasing number of connected devices organisations have to deal with, scalability is becoming an important criteria of choice for device management platforms. How is Wind River responding to this need? SN: Our cloud consists of services that handle the various functions required for IoT device management. Our services scale elastically as demand increases. The amount of effort this requires cannot be underestimated. It is one of the things that companies who build their own solution often underestimate. SR: Which device management features and functions are most important to your customers today and during the next five years? SN: Our customers often have a build/partner/buy strategy and they usually partner with us for device management and connectivity. At this stage, there is no typical customer so the requirements vary. Secure connectivity, encrypted data transfer, end-to-end integration, and time to deployment are important today. The ability to distribute and
IoT Now - June / July 2016
manage software updates seems to be a part of every requirements list. Our customers have a long term strategy of building specialised applications for their markets leveraging our API framework. SR: Although the competitive environment of device management and IoT platforms is very rich, for some IoT adopters it is fragmented and confusing. How do you make your offering stand out from the noise and how do you see your platform evolving to respond to scenarios in which everything will be connected?
MARKETING CLOUD
The Helix Device Cloud enables organisations to easily collect, manage, and integrate data from different devices and machines
SN: Wind River has a long history in embedded software and highly reliable software solutions. We understand the industrial markets very well and have been partners with the key players in market segments like aerospace and defence, networking, automotive, industrial and healthcare. We have been a trusted partner for the last four decades. Now, with the disruption brought about by IoT, our customers are leaning on us to help them with this transformation. Being part of Intelâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Internet of Things Group, we have visibility into the evolving sensing and computing needs. This enables us to build relevant software solutions that will serve you well. By providing data forwarding and other extension points in the future, we can help integrate device information into the enterprise.
Conclusion With the help of Santhosh Nair, says Saverio Romeo, we have examined the Wind River Helix Device Cloud. The Helix Device Cloud enables organisations to easily collect, manage, and integrate data from different devices and machines. It protects data with a secure, scalable and adaptable on-demand infrastructure. It provides an easy to use remote console in order to configure, monitor, and control devices of any type. The solution enables the customer to do that in a scalable way, from a small number of devices to thousands of devices. Finally, it also provides tools for analysing the data and developing new revenue streams. The Helix Device Cloud is an enabler of service-centric IoT solutions that can go beyond operational objectives. With all these features, the Wind River Helix Device Cloud strongly represents the new generation of cloud-based device management solutions, sharply focused on the data and easily adaptable to the plethora of devices that organisations will increasingly deal with.
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Fog around the edges brings clarity to IoT data analytics Fog computing, organic search and edge intelligence approaches will all be required if organisations are to generate useful, timely insights from the vast data generated in the Internet of Things (IoT), writes George Malim
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concept and deployment business cases. "It is not enough to have a high volume of data; you have to do something with it,” says Greg Richards, the sales and marketing director at Connexica. “For many years, the understanding we gained from big data has required people with specialist skills, using time-consuming processes, to create analytical and actionable insights. The massively high volumes of data generated from IoT applications means the traditional approach to analytics is no longer
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Ian Hughes: Not all IoT responses need a human interaction; the business rules can adjust with analytics to tune themselves
Although Internet of Things (IoT) is developing in many different directions as more applications and services come to market, one thing that is certain is the volume of data associated with IoT will be enormous. How organisations will cope with the sheer volume of data generated by sensor – and other – networks that encompass everything from domestic white goods to industrial internet apps, telematics and personal fitness devices and then analyse it to generate useful insights is among the greatest challenges facing IoT as a
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effective. As a result, we will see more convergence of analytics and organic search software that gathers data from multiple sources allowing anyone, including nontechnical people, to search for actionable insights in real time.”
Machine learning Automation is inevitable as is the application of artificial intelligence, ideally applied at the edge, where the data originates, rather than in a centralised analytical engine. “We are seeing a rise in the use of machine learning and cognitive computing services consuming the vast amounts of data generated in IoT projects,” says Ian Hughes, an analyst for IoT at 451 Research. “In a recent report we identified over 50 companies focused on fog or edge of network computing, where analytics is widely distributed and moved closer to the end points not solely restricted to large cloud application processing.” It then becomes more about federating data points or insights from multiple sensors and systems rather than taking a linear approach to gathering data from individual sensors and then analysing it. “We see the IoT as making the streams of data deeper rather than wider,” says Simon Jordan, a senior physicist at Cambridge Consultants. “This means that rather than instrumenting lots of different machines, the technology allows factory managers to instrument a whole population of machines. Before, this couldn’t be done since the wiring costs and ability to deal with the data just wasn’t there.” “Why is it important to instrument a huge number of machines? To look after them effectively,” he explains. “If you have 1,000 spinning machines with an MTBF (mean time before fix) of 1,000,000 hours then you would expect about one failure per month. The changes in vibration or power consumption may be subtle – but being able to take a wide view of lots of machines can allow this to be spotted. In short, it’s about using the kind of statistical tools an epidemiologist or biologist would use to weed out exceptions and do something about them.” Hughes agrees: “Many IoT deployments, particularly in industrial IoT make constant streams of data available. A continuous flow of data differs from more traditional data sources that arrive in discrete time periods. Real-time trends may occur on a second-by-second basis as a piece of operational technology exceeds its fault tolerance envelope. Not all IoT responses need a human interaction, the business rules can
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adjust with analytics to tune themselves and take the best course of action. Allowing self-tuning of systems ushers in a new analytical approach to enable IoT data to be made sense of. “The problem isn’t really the analytics – these mathematical tools have been refined over decades – it's ensuring that the right analytics approach is selected,” says Jordan. “There are many places where there’s limited bandwidth – for instance it may be a steelworks where industrial wireless doesn’t work well and cables can’t easily be fitted, or it may be a factory in the developing world which has a single 3G modem to access the internet. The answer here is to do some data processing locally. Just like MP3 compression made audio files small enough for file sharing, we see having some smart data reduction – edge intelligence – at the sensor being the only way forward. The key thing is to send the information that matters to make best use of your network. In this way you can get a wide enough data stream to create decent statistics at the end.“
Simon Jordan: The problem isn’t really the analytics – these mathematical tools have been refined over decades
Analytics only the start Others see new approaches to data analytics as just the start of the capabilities required to make maximum use of IoT data. “The volume of IoT data is simply too large and the relationships too complex for any organisation to make sense of them without effective data analytics,” confirms Wael Elrifai, the director of enterprise solutions for EMEA at Pentaho. “Charles Babbage’s Difference Engine, designed in 1822, was a mechanical computer up to the task of calculating solutions to simple polynomial relationships which were beyond the capability of humans to do without a great deal of repetitive work which was prone to human error. The relationships between the things of the IoT are far more complex than those in Babbage’s polynomial equations, and there are billions of things perhaps each with multiple sensors. Separating the signal from the noise, the cause from the effect and discovering optimal solutions requires all of our modern ingenuity, and is in fact well beyond our current capabilities – modern data analytics are a start.” That makes data analytics fundamental. “Data analytics is fundamental, essential, crucial, imperative,” confirms Gordon Muehl, the vice president of industrial internet at Infosys. “The real value of IoT comes with advanced analytics – instead of just reporting on what has already happened, historical data becomes the basis to create algorithms to predict future events – and with this create more value out of your assets. Predictive and preventive maintenance are two of the most salient IoT use cases, and they hinge on effective data analytics.”
Wael Elrifai: Separating the signal from the noise, the cause from the effect and discovering optimal solutions requires ingenuity
Gordon Muehl: The real value of IoT comes with advanced analytics – data becomes the basis to create algorithms to predict future events
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DATA ANALYTICS
Telenor Connexion's IoT analytics and management is a work of ARTS Telenor Connexion is making a major play in the Internet of Things data analytics market, with the launch of a platform that makes sure IoT networks do the things they are supposed to do, Antony Savvas finds out more. An increasing number of major companies are concentrating on developing IoT platforms that allow companies to collect the big data generated by IoT sensors, and process it for the benefit of the business. Cisco has recently bought Japanese IoT startup Kii, Truphone acquired CoSwitched, IBM has agreed separate partnerships with both ARM and Cisco, and SAP made big noises at this year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona about making better use of IoT big data. But not many are majoring on the network analytics that can help improve the reliability of those IoT networks – before companies attempt to collect the data from them in the first place. This is where Telenor Connexion comes in. The Swedish-headquarted firm has developed its ARTS (Advanced Real-time troubleshooting ToolSet), a unique network connectivity analytics tool especially designed for widely connected IoT devices. Mats Lundquist, CEO of Telenor Connexion, says: “As the number of IoT devices rapidly increases across networks, so does the amount of network performance threats that can be experienced by all organisations.
The author is Antony Savvas, a freelance IT & communications journalist
“Congestion, signalling storms, security issues and other threats can all raise their ugly head, and all operators face the same issues in the IoT data collection space.” Lundquist says the company wanted to come up with a solution that would support the many different IoT devices that are continually being
introduced to an expanding patchwork of data networks. By developing ARTS for integrated IoT network control and data analysis, and not just paying attention to IoT data analysis like other companies, Telenor Connexion says it can serve customers much better. With ARTS, it can tell customers which networks have the best health, which manufactured IoT devices work to the best configurations, and what is the best software to use for particular IoT applications. “ARTS empowers customers with a tool to ensure efficient and optimised IoT service delivery globally, as well as giving them insights from their data on untapped market potential ,” says Telenor Connexion. The offering is delivered through Amazon Web Services and that cloud monolith can see the potential. Darren Mowry, head of Nordics, Amazon Web Services, said: “Telenor Connexion has embraced the benefits of big data in the cloud. ARTS has enabled Telenor Connexion to provide its customers with a secure, scalable solution for data-driven predictions, without the burden of customers having to run and manage their own infrastructure.” The ARTS toolset doesn't just turn IoT sensors on and off and provide basic management information, it collects and analyses big data and provides customers with actionable and detailed insights for troubleshooting and support, operations and business intelligence. Lundquist says: “As a company, we have around 400 partner operators and we can tell which ▼
ARTS empowers customers with a tool to ensure efficient and optimised IoT service delivery globally, as well as giving them insights from their data on untapped market potential
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ones can deliver the best performance when it comes to specific IoT deployments. All this information can be shared with our customers. “The way we have packaged ARTS means that we can provide a basic set of important services, and the customer can integrate their own functions and services into the package in response to their own specific needs,” he says. “Our ready-made offering could save some organisations a significant amount of dollars as it can be easily set up to work on multiple projects across their operations.” A year in the making and only released commercially in April this year, ARTS is targeted towards new and existing business customers in industries like automotive, fleet management, utilities, manufacturing, eHealth and other areas. Verisure Securitas Direct, a leading European provider of professionally monitored alarms and connected services for the home and small business, has already tested the beta version of ARTS. Johan Norén, project manager, connectivity, at Verisure Securitas Direct, said: “ARTS has enabled us to improve the quality of our service and to take proactive actions. Real-time insights have enabled us to predict the performance of our connected assets, allowing us to serve our customers even better and provide them with greater peace of mind.” Telenor Connexion says ARTS is of particular value to those organisations with a global reach, after all, think of all those many thousands of sensors sending out data, and the hundreds of networks that could be deployed by global businesses to carry the data.
Mats Lundquist, CEO of Telenor Connexion
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That data and those networks need to be monitored, managed and supported to make sure mission-critical data is efficiently transported to the right part of the organisation at the right time, avoiding bottlenecks.
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DATA ANALYTICS
Why ARTS? The ARTS platform supports and provides reliable operations and maintenance data, as well as troubleshooting support. It also allows users to benefit from proactive support in operations, and allows them to find new business opportunities through the business analysis of the data generated. “ARTS provides unique, real-time insights in the global mobile and traditional networks used, thereby empowering Telenor Connexion’s clients to deliver a better customer experience, improve their competitive positions and increase revenues,” says the company.
How does ARTS work? The platform provides real-time insights into the way devices and networks are working, and identifies issues in those networks and suggests solutions to any problems pinpointed. As well as this, the system identifies patterns of network behaviour and predicts potential problems. And it also identifies optimal hardware and software combinations for the user, to help make sure that data is collected and transported as efficiently as possible. Telenor Connexion says that as ARTS is based on real-time device behaviour and big data analytics, it can continuously analyse the IoT functions being supported and can predict an issue before it happens, enabling actions to be proactively taken and quality of service to be improved.
What comes with ARTS? The system comes with a customer web interface and key performance indicator (KPI) reports. Analysis can be provided by Telenor Connexion
experts - which is a unique selling point of the offering. The ARTS toolset is interfaced with Amazonbased cloud analytics. It provides operator level insights with instant alerts of when and what issues have occurred. This data is accompanied with actionable information and suggestions that can be used to overcome any network problems. If the customer cannot solve any problems themselves, when armed with the automatic information delivered, they can can contact a Telenor Connexion helpdesk which will help see them through the issue. Key performance indicator reports provide detailed insights on device performance, the best performing combinations of hardware, software and networks, as well as how to scale up your IoT operations as quickly as possible. ARTS also provides business intelligence and insights on the untapped potential of new and emerging markets, through using the data you have collected. The analytics tool can identify unattached devices that exist in new geographies, network quality, as well as the effectiveness of roaming profiles, for instance. It can also make sure that sensors do not go to waste. For example, a growing number of trucks and other vehicles are being fitted with IoT devices. Trucks can be replaced with newer models and sold on but those still equipped with the sensors can generate valuable data for the new owners. Telenor Connexion can use ARTS to help rediscover IoT-enabled vehicles and work with dealerships and the new owners to start taking advantage of the data generated again. ▼
Telenor Connexion can use ARTS to help rediscover IoT-enabled vehicles and work with dealerships and the new owners to start taking advantage of the data generated again.
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Security The security of data generated by IoT devices is a recurring issue in the market and Telenor Connexion says it is committed to driving the industry standards that can make IoT data as safe as possible. Jimmy Johansson was recently appointed information security and privacy officer at Telenor Connexion to help drive the security agenda for both the company and the industry as a whole. Johansson is responsible for the development, delivery and management of the Telenor information security programme. This incorporates policies, procedures and controls to effectively manage security risk and compliance with laws covering privacy regulations and best practises. Johansson says: “From a security standpoint, there are a lot of interesting challenges as the Internet of Things is now starting to mature. Connected units are no longer isolated from public access, while it needs to be easy for endusers to safely connect further sensors or units to their current solutions. “To continue providing secure solutions, Telenor Connexion must adapt to the new challenges that our customers are facing when launching IoT enabled services and products.”
Johansson says: “These guidelines will help both start-ups and established companies to implement security and privacy into their processes in order to provide secure services and products." Telenor Connexion is also involved in other GSMA standards groups, and other standards bodies too.
The price of ARTS As for the cost model of ARTS, Telenor Connexion sees the solution as an essential part of its effort to build up its whole IoT ecosystem, but not necessarily a large part of its overall sales. CEO Lundquist says: “CEO Lundquist says: “The price model is not intense, we view ARTS foremost as a way of enhancing our service proposition and adding value to our customers. This tool enables customers to take actions proactively and their quality of service to be improved.” He says: “Of course though, innovative products like ARTS also help to promote our other products, including our leading IoT and Cloud Connect solutions. We make money from having more devices being deployed across IoT networks, not from analyzing more data, as useful as that data is.”
Johansson was previously a technical architect at the company and was heavily involved in the development of the GSMA's IoT Security Guidelines, a framework for the secure design, development and deployment of IoT services. The GSMA IoT Security Guidelines provide IoT service providers and the wider IoT ecosystem practical advice on tackling common cybersecurity threats, as well as data privacy issues associated with IoT services. “As billions of devices become connected to the Internet of Things, offering innovative and interconnected new services, the possibility of potential vulnerabilities increases,” said Alex Sinclair, chief technology officer of the GSMA. “These can be overcome if the end-to-end security of an IoT service is carefully considered by the service provider when designing their service, and an appropriate mitigating technology is deployed. A proven and robust approach to security will create trusted, reliable services that scale as the market grows.” The GSMA’s IoT Security Guidelines establish the need for risk assessment of all components of an IoT service to ensure they are designed to securely collect, store and exchange data, and successfully mitigate cybersecurity attacks. The Guidelines recently came through a “thorough industry consultation” involving academics, analysts and other industry experts to ensure that “they are as robust as possible”, said the GSMA.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
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INTERVIEW
Altair under Sony continues strategy of lower power, lower cost, smaller LTE chipsets
RDW: What is Altair all about? Eran Eshed: Altair was established in 2005 and in February 2015 acquired by Sony and now a fullyowned subsidiary of Sony. The company specialises in developing LTE chipsets and has pursued the strategy from the start of developing products that were lower power, lower cost and smaller than others in the market that have always included a fallback to 2G or 3G. We have never targeted smartphones, which did require the fallback. Instead, the focus has been on data- centric applications. Until recently it has been mostly on broadband – millions of chipsets shipped for applications like fixed broadband, CPEs, gateways, routers, MiFis, dongles, and mostly in emerging markets. These are chipsets that started from Cat3 (100Mbit/s), now shipping Cat4, soon Cat6 and Cat10 under development. That product set is focused around the everincreasing use of broadband. About three years ago, we started a new product line in IoT. We identified there was a need for that, with the forecast high levels of connected devices. Unlicensed spectrum LPWA options such as SigFox, LoRa Alliance and Ingenu made all the early running and the cellular carrier answer to those is being standardised but started
from Cat1 (10Mbit/s) and now there are two new variants coming along and their names have kept changing. The new name for CatM2 is now CatNB1 and the aim of this is to make it actually less confusing than it would have been. This is a reflection of there now being two technologies that can progress along their own path – CatM1 can develop into CatM2 and beyond. CatNB1 can develop into CatNB2 and beyond. RDW: What is Altair’s approach to this? EE: Altair has firstly jumped into this market with a Cat1 chipset solution for IoT. Right now there are two key drivers in this market. First is the fact that the carriers do not want to take on new 2G customers. Every new customer that they have to offer 2G or even 3G to represents a commitment to maintain these and support the service for a number of years. Secondly, competitive pressure from the LPWA technologies. For example, in South Korea right now between LTE and LoRa. Our point is that Cat1 is the only solution right now for addressing these two issues. CatM1 and CatNB1 will not be available in volume for the mass market for a while yet. Until then, Cat1 is available now and shipping now and is a competitive solution for both of these issues at this stage of market development. Power consumption is very low – our solution offers
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Eran Eshed, Altair
Altair’s ownership has changed but its strategy for developing LTE products for IoT and broadband has not. Here, Robin Duke-Woolley, CEO of Beecham Research, talks to Eran Eshed, co-founder of Altair.
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Fundamentally, I have never seen a wireless technology that gained scale that was not standards-based. These different technologies have merit in some areas but the fact that they are not standards-based and there is no ecosystem is a huge issue
battery life of 10 years depending on the application. Much less than 2G and 3G and an already-available ecosystem to support that. Modules using our chip sets are currently in mass production and shipping. In terms of cost, this is also competitive with current LPWA costs. At present, these do not have volume so costs are higher and that is comparable to Cat1. Moving forward, we are very aggressively pursuing the next generation standards (M1 and NB1) and we have some game-changing products in our development roadmap not announced yet. This is clearly a disruption – these technologies offer opportunities to support applications that could not realistically be supported before for cost, power and size reasons. This is where we think the IoT market will actually start taking off in terms of mass volumes. RDW: Is there a realistic possibility of creating one module for the different variants?
RDW: How would you view the future potential for unlicensed spectrum alternatives compared with this solution? EE: Fundamentally, I have never seen a wireless technology that gained scale that was not standards-based. These different technologies have merit in some areas but the fact that they are not standards-based and there is no ecosystem is a huge issue. Also, the fact that they run over unlicensed spectrum means there is no quality of service that can be guaranteed is a big issue. The third thing is that the whole premise behind LPWA was there was no alternative. With 2G in decline, LTE is a broadband technology, so there was a market need. And now the 3GPP technologies have closed most of that gap and offer other benefits that LPWA cannot provide. This includes a wide ecosystem manufacturing to this standard, which will see scale, high volume supply and diversity of supply. RDW: What is the future for Altair?
EE: Absolutely, although including EC GSM is more involved. Comparing M1 and NB1, there is a market perception that NB1 is the “real” LPWA and M1 is a higher end, more feature-rich, yet more power-hungry and expensive version. We argue this is not the case. These two standards are very comparable and the fact that NB1 is narrowband does make it advantageous in some scenarios but makes it worse in others. M1 and NB1 have very similar performance, very similar cost structure and when you combine these two together – which is what Altair is doing – you do not actually end up with paying a penalty for that, at least not anything significant. Since all of our chips are based on Software Defined Radio Architecture, we will offer a combination of M1 and NB1 in a single chip and there will not be any cost penalty in doing that dual modality. We cannot afford in this market for a rerun of the CDMA versus GSM situation and in fact these two standards are much closer to each other then CDMA and GSM were. Most of the functions in the modem are common to both, the differences are not very significant and as the engineers like to say “it’s only software!”. It is a lot of work but that does not translate into higher cost.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
EE: We will continue to develop LTE products, both for IoT and for broadband. What we have not covered yet in this discussion is our relationship to Sony. We are part of Sony’s semiconductor company and this is a big business centred around catalogue semiconductors, not designing chips specifically for Sony but to the broad market. Sony image sensors are in virtually every smartphone, for example. There is a group within the company that develops IoT – solutions that have various technologies like positioning, sensors, audio, wearable products and we fit into that organisation with LTE connectivity.
The interviewer is Robin Duke-Woolley, founder and CEO of Beecham Research
The vision is that there is a lot of synergy between those different technology elements and LTE in this market. Looking at wearable products we will be able to offer a total platform rather than discrete components. We can combine many of these technologies to create something that is more attractive to the customer. Altair’s focus is LTE but you will see a broader scope of products and solutions from Altair and Sony combined from the integration of these different technologies into IoT solutions. Expect to see nice, innovative, game-changing products in the future.
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INTERVIEW
Building Malaysia’s digital future Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) is the government-owned agency launched in 1996 to pioneer the transformation of Malaysia’s digital economy. The agency is currently pursuing a strategy that unlocks significant economic, environmental, and social value. In this interview with MDEC’s Norhizam Abdul Kadir, vice president of the Infotech Division, freelance writer Bob Emmerson examines the progress and how this innovative agency stands as a catalyst in the development of the country’s digital innovation ecosystem. IoT Now: What is MDEC’s overall mandate and what specific initiatives are you taking? MDEC: The agency was incorporated in 1996 and mandated to provide strategic advice to the Malaysian Government on legislation, policies and standards for ICT as well as to oversee the development of the Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC) initiative, which was designed to nurture the growth of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in the IT industry. In addition, the agency is responsible for attracting global ICT companies to invest in and develop cutting edge digital and creative solutions in Malaysia.
through connectivity and intelligence. • Smart Agriculture: booting the sustainability and livelihood of farmers. We are also heavily looking into the Healthcare industry and of course, other verticals such as retail, energy, and logistics in line with demand and tangible benefits. IoT, along with Big Data Analytics, E-Commerce, Data Centres and the Cloud have been identified as catalysts that will kick-start and sustain an ecosystem of digital innovation and keep us in the forefront of technology. IoT Now: What have been the highlights so far?
IoT Now: What are your key vertical markets and the primary catalysts? MDEC: The verticals we selected were based on the size of the market, IoT-readiness of our local players, and the impact to society. They include the following: • Smart Manufacturing: elevating the competitive edge of Malaysian manufacturers. • Public Safety: expansion coming via private participation and collaboration. • Smart Transportation: transforming this sector
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MDEC: We’ve had a number of successful use cases. They include a smart parking project for Sunway Pyramid Shopping Mall, which is one of the largest in Malaysia. A smart apartment project for one of Malaysia’s leading property developers; a heavy vehicle monitoring system for Kuala Lumpur City Hall; a smart chilli irrigation system for a farming area in the state of Negeri Sembilan; an asset monitoring system for retail outlets in Australia; and a visual inspection solution that has been marketed to a number of international manufacturing customers worldwide. In addition, MDEC has a healthy IoT project pipeline that currently includes development in the areas of quality control and assurance, traffic management system, smart waste management and smart streetlights among others. IoT Now: How is MDEC nurturing its IoT companies? What programmes do you have for generating exposure in international markets? MDEC: Our agenda includes several programmes designed to support local champions in growing their business and expand globally. For example, we took some companies on business missions at
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Norhizam Abdul Kadir, MDEC
Zooming straight into the Internet of Things (IoT), we started with three main initiatives. One, to build a comprehensive pool of IoT solution providers in Malaysia. We want to raise critical mass and competitiveness of IoT companies to drive demand in the market. Two, to generate demand by identifying key end-users and facilitate the use of IoT through public-private partnerships involving government, businesses and citizens. Lastly, to build and sustain the IoT ecosystem and an enabling environment by securing global partnerships for best practices, encouraging start-ups, and nurturing a digital workforce.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
CASE STUDY
Norhizam Abdul Kadir is vice president of the Infotech Division for MDEC with over 15 years of experience in multi-market IT and energy industries across Asia Pacific. He is experienced in corporate marketing, end-customer sales, business development, communications and channel marketing and enablement.
regional events in Singapore like Interpol World, IoT Asia, ITEX and others. We have immersion programmes for other successful efforts within the ASEAN region, China and Japan. We are also planning to help companies participate at key events in Europe. This is facilitated through business missions, workshop series, as well as opportunities to showcase products and solutions. In addition, MDEC has the Global Acceleration & Innovation Network (GAIN) initiative that examines four key imperatives including market access, leadership development, technology disruption and scale-up capital. I’d like to point out that while we are helping the growth of local MSC companies, we already have ASEAN and global players, but of course we always want more. We also have MDEC Americas, which is located in Palo Alto, the heart of Silicon Valley. It has been operational since August 2015, driving the global expansion of our ICT industry and catalysing the interconnection of Silicon Valley and MSC Malaysia's ecosystems. The office acts as a gateway for high-growth companies to enter the American and global markets and facilitates foreign direct investments from US-based ICT multinational corporations. IoT Now: Can you summarise your objectives and indicate the key stakeholders who are driving the transition to a high-income knowledge-based digital economy? MDEC: The ever increasing need, demand and supply for Internet-related products and services is driving that transition. The opportunities forecasted by our National IoT Strategic Roadmap indicate revenues of RM9.5 Billion in 2020 (US$2.3bn) and RM42.5 Billion in 2025 (US$10.2bn).
IoT Now - June / July 2016
The roadmap was launched by the Ministry of Science, Innovation & Technology with key stakeholders, including government agencies like MIMOS, our national R&D ICT centre; MIDA, the Investment Development Authority; MIGHT, Malaysia Industry Government Group for High Technology, and a few others, which are driving the proliferation and adoption of IoT in Malaysia. The roadmap highlighted the need to boost innovation as well as nurture and grow IoT talent and business. The technology that enables IoT is out there and as organisations develop their partnerships and level of integration with each other we are set to see continued growth in our country. Malaysia can be the Regional Development Hub for IoT.
The roadmap highlighted the need to boost innovation as well as nurture and grow IoT talent and business
IoT Now: Let’s end with a topical development. How will the LoRa Alliance help strengthen your IoT ecosystem? MDEC: The Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation has recently joined the LoRa Alliance. We see LoRa as a groundbreaking technology that can bring tangible benefits, particularly in industry, transportation and agriculture, making it ideal for deployment in Malaysia. MDEC’s contributions to the LoRa Alliance include: • Awareness: Aligned to developing IoT as a new source of ICT growth. We will help the alliance to create nationwide awareness. • Adoption: Work with key stakeholders to create robust IoT implementations based on this technology. • Assistance: Support the entry of the LoRa Alliance and its members into the Malaysian environment and provide incentives for ICT companies to operate out of Malaysia as a new direct entrant to the Malaysian and South-East Asia marketplace.
67
WEARABLES
Wearable devices are a fast-growing market in Japan The wearable device market has increased tremendously. According to MM Research Institute, the number of wearable devices in Japan will increase from 400,000 in 2013 to more than 600,000 in 2020.
These are just a few examples of how these devices are being used. Besides uses in the workplace, consumers are also using the device in daily life. This clearly states the rapid growth of the wearable market and the potential of it becoming larger and larger. The author is Junna Sakamoto of event organisers, Reed Exhibitions Japan Ltd.
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Seeing its potential, Reed Exhibitions Japan Ltd. will be hosting its 3rd edition of the WEARABLE EXPO - Wearable Device & Technology Expo, from January 18 â&#x20AC;&#x201C; 20, 2017.
Launched in 2015, WEARABLE EXPO has been at the centre of all related technologies and products for wearables. Today, as we see many wearable devices interfering with our daily life, the workplace demands of creating and developing them are increasing. WEARABLE EXPO gathers manufacturers of wearable device, development technology such as electronic components, electronic material, battery, displays, IoT solutions, and AR/VR technologies. Earlier this year, the three-day exhibition gathered 17,600 visitors from all over the world who were eager to learn the latest technology and products.
What to expect at WEARABLE EXPO? The exhibition started with 103 exhibitors, but now it has grown to become an exhibition where welcoming an expected 200 exhibitors in 2017. The exhibition is divided into zones each featuring different topics related to wearables.
â&#x2013;ź
Smartwatch, smart glasses, smart clothes, you name it, says Yuhi Maezono, show director of WEARABLE EXPO, Reed Exhibitions Japan Ltd. The wide range of what wearable device and technology can provide is unlimited. For example, it can be used for remote technology support, operator guidance through glass panels, handsfree operation. Field engineers at airports have introduced smart glasses to be a tool to communicate with engineers inside the office for technical support. In factories, smartwatches are being used to record working hours.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
CASE STUDY
Recently, commercial facilities and theme parks in Japan have been opening attractions and games using AR/VR which is gathering attention
A scene from the previous show in 2016. The aisles were packed with visitors throughout the threeday exhibition
Device Zone is where companies promote their latest wearable devices. Companies such as Toshiba and Sharp have been presenting their smart glasses, and Jawbone their smart bands. IoT Zone is where IT companies exhibit with technology such as IoT or M2M solutions, and Cloud Services that can be applied to the wearable industry. In the AR/VR Zone (augmented reality / virtual reality) you can find systems and services related to AR/VR. Recently, commercial facilities and theme parks in Japan have been opening attractions and games using AR/VR which is gathering attention. Development Technology Zone is where companies that provides technology for developing and supporting wearable device exhibit. Products/technologies such as electronic components, materials, high performance materials, battery, display, etc. are showcased. Since 2015 we have also seen an increase in textile companies, reflecting the needs of materials for smart clothes.
Japanese market and both exhibitors and visitors enjoy learning and exchanging information. We expect to expand this area further, gathering more exhibitors who want to expand their ideas in the Japanese and other Asian markets. Alongside the exhibition, there is a conference involving leading executives from organisations such as Intel and Huawei. It attracted 19,137 attendees in 2016. The show management team is now arranging conference programmes for the 2017 show covering the latest product and technology. WEARABLE EXPO is the ideal platform to promote your company and expand business in Japan/Asia. For more information contact Show Management at wearable-eng@reedexpo.co.jp . For those looking for solutions and technologies at WEARABLE EXPO go to: http://www.wearable-expo.jp/en/.
Concurrent shows From the 2nd edition of WEARABLE EXPO, we added a special exhibition area for wearable device start-up companies. This area is restricted to overseas (non-Japanese) exhibitors with wearable devices, including prototypes. Exhibiting companies must have been established after January 1st, 2013 and have fewer than 50 employees. Healthcare and medical devices, compass-like devices to guide your way, and devices to deliver smart homes were some of the exhibition products that gathered attention. The area was a big hit as exhibiting companies were new to the
IoT Now - June / July 2016
WEARABLE EXPO is co-located with four other specialised exhibitions gathering 2,270 exhibitors in total. These are the 46th NEPCON JAPAN, an exhibition specialising in electronics technologies; 9th AUTOMOTIVE WORLD, Asiaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s largest exhibition for automotive technologies; the 9th Light-Tech Expo, an exhibition for lighting technologies; and finally, the 1st RoboDEX, an exhibition dedicated to the development of robots and their applications.
69
RESEARCH
Worldwide wearables market grows 67.2% amid seasonal retrenchment, says IDC A combination of device releases, price reductions, and company rationalisations marked the first quarter of 2016 (1Q16) in the worldwide wearable technologies market. According to data from International Data Corporation, (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Wearable Device Tracker, total shipment volumes reached 19.7 million units in 1Q16, an increase of 67.2% from the 11.8 million units shipped in 1Q15.
"Smart watches attempt to offer holistic experiences by being everything to everyone, while basic wearables like fitness bands, connected clothing, or hearables have a focused approach and often offer specialised use cases."
The first quarter saw its its fair share of significant events to entice customers, with multiple fitness trackers and smartwatches introduced at the major technology shows; post-holiday price reductions on multiple wearables, including Apple's Sport Watch; and greater participation within emerging wearables categories, particularly clothing and footwear. Conversely, several start-ups announced headcount reduction or shut down entirely, underscoring how competitive the wearables market has become.
Ubrani continued, "It's shortsighted to think that basic wearables and smart watches are in competition with each other. Right now, we see both as essential to expand the overall market. The unique feature sets combined with substantial differences in price and performance sets each category apart, and leaves plenty of room for both to grow over the next few years."
"The good news is that the wearables market continues to mature and expand," noted Ramon Llamas, research manager for IDC's Wearables team. "The wearables that we see today are several steps ahead of what we saw when this market began, increasingly taking their cues from form, function, and fashion. That keeps them relevant. The downside is that it is becoming a crowded market, and not everyone is guaranteed success." Still, there are two areas where the market shows continued growth: smart watches and basic wearables (devices which do not run third party applications). "There's a clear bifurcation and growth within the wearables market," said Jitesh Ubrani, senior research analyst for IDC's Mobile Device Trackers.
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Top five wearables vendors Fitbit began 2016 the same way it finished 2015: as the undisputed leader in the wearables market. The launch of its new Alta and Blaze devices resulted in million unit shipment volumes for each, pointing to a new chapter of fashionoriented fitness trackers. It also points to significant declines for its previously successful Surge, Charge, Charge HR, and Flex product lines. Still, with a well-segmented portfolio, pricing strategy, and a strong brand, Fitbit's position is well-established. Xiaomi supplanted Apple in 1Q16 and captured the number 2 position. The company expanded its line of inexpensive fitness trackers to include heartrate monitoring and also recently launched a kids' watch to help parents track their children. It should be pointed out that its success is solely based on China, and expanding beyond its home turf will continue to be its largest hurdle. ▼
“several startups announced headcount reduction or shut down entirely.”
IoT Now - June / July 2016
Worldwide wearable devices market share by product type, 2016Q1 Basic Wearables
Smart Watches
Smart Other
100% 80% 60% 40% 20% 0% 2015Q1
2015Q2
2015Q3
2015Q4
2016Q1
According to Apple CEO Tim Cook, the Watch has met the company's expectations. Its total volumes and revenue trailed far behind its iPhone, iPad, and Mac product lines, and did little to stem their declines. Until the next version of the Watch comes out, it would appear that Apple will continuously update its watch bands to keep the product relevant. Garmin finished slightly ahead of Samsung on the strength of its wristbands and watches appealing to a wide range of athletes, most especially golfers, runners, and fitness tracker enthusiasts. While the company added two fitness trackers with the vivoactive HR and the vivofit 3, Garmin launched its first eyeworn device, the Varia Vision In-Sight Display, for cyclists.
Top five basic wearables vendors, shipments, market share and year-over-year growth, Q1 2016 (Units in Millions)
Vendor 1. Fitbit 2. Xiaomi 3. Garmin 4. XTC 5. Lifesense Others Total
1Q16 Unit
1Q16 Market
1Q15 Unit
1Q15 Market
YearOver-
Shipments
Share
Shipments
Share
Year Growth
4.8 3.7 0.8 0.7 0.7 5.7 16.4
29.4% 22.8% 5.0% 4.3% 4.1% 34.5% 100.0%
3.8 2.6 0.6 N/A N/A 2.9 9.9
38.7% 26.6% 6.0% 0.0% 0.0% 28.7% 100.0%
25.4% 41.8% 36.5% N/A N/A 98.2% 65.1%
Source: IDC Worldwide Quarterly Wearables Tracker, May 16, 2016
Samsung landed in the number 5 position on the success of its Gear S2 and Gear S2 Classic smartwatch. What sets the Gear S2 apart from most other smartwatches is that it is among the very few with a cellular connectivity version, forgoing the need to be constantly tethered to a smartphone. It is also compatible with Android smartphones beyond Samsung's own, broadening its reach. However, its application selection trails behind what is available for Android Wear and watchOS. BBK tied* with Samsung for fifth place worldwide. This is the second time that BBK finished among the top five vendors worldwide, having debuted in 3Q15 with its Y01 phone watch for children. The company returns with another phone watch for children, the Y02 with improved water resistance and durability.
Top five wearables vendors, shipments, market share and year-over-year growth, Q1 2016
Top five smartwatch vendors, shipments, market share and year-over-year growth, Q1 2016 (Units in Millions)
Vendor
1. Apple 2. Samsung 3. Motorola 4. Huawei 5. Garmin Others Total
1Q16 Unit
1Q16 Market
1Q15 Unit
1Q15 Market
YearOver-
Shipments
Share
Shipments
Share
Year Growth
1.5 0.7 0.4 0.2 0.1 0.5 3.2
46.0% 20.9% 10.9% 4.7% 3.0% 14.5% 100.0%
N/A 0.5 0.2 N/A 0.1 0.8 1.6
0.0% 29.8% 11.0% 0.0% 7.2% 52.0% 100.0%
N/A 40.5% 98.2% N/A -17.3% -44.2% 100.2%
Source: IDC Worldwide Quarterly Wearables Tracker, May 16, 2016
(Units in Millions)
Vendor 1. Fitbit 2. Xiaomi 3. Apple 4. Garmin 5. Samsung* 5. BBK* Others Total
1Q16 Unit
1Q16 Market
1Q15 Unit
1Q15 Market
YearOver-
Shipments
Share
Shipments
Share
Year Growth
4.8 3.7 1.5 0.9 0.7 0.7 7.3 19.7
24.5% 19.0% 7.5% 4.6% 3.6% 3.6% 37.2% 100.0%
3.8 2.6 N/A 0.7 0.7 N/A 3.9 11.8
32.6% 22.4% 0.0% 6.1% 5.8% 0.0% 33.1% 100.0%
25.4% 41.8% N/A 27.8% 4.5% N/A 87.9% 67.2%
Source: IDC Worldwide Quarterly Wearables Tracker, May 16, 2016
* IDC declares a statistical tie in the worldwide wearables market when there is less than one tenth of one percent (0.1%) difference in the unit shipment share of two or more vendors.
IoT Now - June / July 2016
Table Notes: • Data is preliminary and subject to change. • Vendor shipments are branded device shipments and exclude OEM sales for all vendors. • The "Vendor" represents the current parent company (or holding company) for all brands owned and operated as a subsidiary. • The table labeled “Top Five Wearables Vendors…” represents the sum of both basic and smart wearables equaling the total wearable market size. • The table labeled “Top Five Basic Wearables Vendors…” represents the total basic wearable market size. • The table labeled “Top Five Smartwatch Vendors…” does not equal total smart wearable market size as certain form factors (i.e. eyewear, wristbands) are excluded.
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EVENTS
Security of Things World 2016 Berlin, Germany 27-28 June 2016 http://securityofthingsworld.com
M2M Zone Pavilion @ CTIA Super Mobility 2016 Las Vegas, USA 7-9 Sept 2016 http://www.m2mzone.com/ctia2016
Internet of Insurance USA New York, USA 27-28 Sept 2016 http://www.internetofbusiness.net/ins urancenyc
IoT in Oil & Gas 2016 Houston, TX 14-15 Sept 2016 http://energyconferencenetwork.com /iot-in-oil-and-gas-2016/
Connected Cars World IoT Tech Expo North America
London, UK 28-30 June 2016 https://connectedcarsworld.com
Santa Clara, CA, USA 20-21 Oct 2016 http://www.iottechexpo.com/ northamerica/
Insurance Telematics 2016 London, UK 29-30 June 2016 https://insurancetelematicsevent.com
Industry of Things World Berlin, Germany 19-20 Sept 2016 http://industryofthingsworld.com/en/
IoT in Oil and Gas Europe Aberdeen 29-30 June 2016 http://energyconferencenetwork.com /iot-oil-gas-europe-2016/
Internet of Healthcare London, UK 21-22 Sept 2016 http://www.theinternetofbusiness.co. uk/healthcare
Smart Summit London
Tec Expo 2016 London, UK 24-25 Oct 2016 www.the-tech-expo.com
Olympia, London 21-22 Sept 2016 http://smartsummit.net/london
IoT Evolution Expo Las Vegas, USA 11-14 July 2016 http://www.iotevolutionexpo.com /west/
IoT Planet International Trade Show 2016
CTIA Super Mobility 2016 Las Vegas, USA 7-9 Sept 2016 www.ctiasupermobility2016.com
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Smart Cities Week 2016 Washington, USA 27-29 Sept 2016 http://www.smartcitiesweek.com
Grenoble, France 25-27 Oct 2016 http://www.iot-planet.org
IoT Now - June / July 2016
THEREâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S NOTHING LIKE A BIT OF ACCURACY Our IoT forecasts made in 2011 for 2014 were within 3% of actuals achieved that year
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IoT Now: ISSN 2397-2793
J U N E /J U LY 2 0 1 6 • VO LU M E 6 • I S S U E 3
USA IoT SUPPLEMENT AERIS INTERVIEW Partner with the best in IoT, don’t go it alone
INSIDE: US News • Aeris Interview • PTC LiveWorx Review • East Coast & West Coast Reports • CTIA Preview
GLOBAL ADVISORS V ON IoT, M2M AND BIG B DAT TA
Ente erprise Io oT Worksshops.
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CONTENTS
USA IoT Supplement S4
S6
US IoT NEWS
TALKING HEADS
S10
S12
AUGMENTED REALITY
EAST COAST REVIEW
IN THIS ISSUE S4
S6
US IoT NEWS Murano platform to help create connected products; Vizzia lab connects business, education & IoT tech; IoT a top concern for US enterprises; Resin.io winsUS$8m funding INTERVIEW: PARTNER WITH THE BEST You need the courage to work with others in order to move faster, says Drew Johnson of Aeris
S10 AUGMENTED REALITY Caterpillar and PTC show how AR and virtual reality plus IoT can benefit industry. Jeremy Cowan reports from Boston
S12
EAST COAST REVIEW Software and analytics take centre stage in our report on IoT on the US East Coast
S14
CTIA PREVIEW Are you and your business ready for an everythingconnected world?
S17
WEST COAST REVIEW Guy Daniels reports on the growing role of software services in West Coast IoT
Aeris is an IoT solutions provider with a complete stack of technology from an online management portal to an application enablement platform. With a full complement of cellular technologies, Aeris offers GSM and CDMA for 2G, 3G, and 4G/LTE. www.aeris.com
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US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be copied, stored, published or in any way reproduced without the prior written consent of the Publisher.
S3
US NEWS
Exosite unveils Murano IoT platform to help customers create connected products Exosite, LLC, an Internet of Things (IoT) platform provider, has launched Murano, a cloud-based IoT software platform to Christian Renaud: enable endBarriers to IoT to-end adoption ecosystem that helps customers develop and deliver connected products. Exosite reportedly works closely with industrial, commercial and consumer brands to develop and bring both legacy and new connected devices to market and, as a result, claims a deep understanding of the business and technical challenges these organisations face when making this transition. According to Christian Renaud, research director, 451 Research, “One of the biggest barriers to IoT adoption is the perceived risks tied to making business process changes. Exosite combines extensive customer deployment experience with its innovative and unique customer engagement model to partner with customers through their digital transformation journey.”
Developed with an open platform philosophy, Murano offers open APIs, connects with other public cloud platforms, such as Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure, and offers advanced device connectivity that includes provisioning, security and management functionality. Additionally, Murano provides pre-integration with OEMs through its partner program, Exosite IoT Alliance. And, with Murano, customers always retain complete control and ownership of their users, data, IP and code. This open ecosystem is purposebuilt to dramatically accelerate time-to-market for connected solutions, reduce implementation costs, leverage reusable system components to support standardisation and organisational alignment and enhance quality from design to production. Murano’s key features reportedly include: • Device Connectivity & Security Custom APIs • Application Hosting & Framework • Roles & Permissions Management • Third-party Integration
“Murano provides a fully integrated, enterprise software platform that companies can rely on to transform their legacy products into 21st-century connected devices to revitalise customer engagement, deliver new revenue streams for their business and improve their competitive position in the emerging digital ecosystem,” said Paul Anderson, vice president of software products, Exosite.
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Vizzia lab connects business, education and IoT technology in New Mexico VIZZIA Technologies, a provider of technology solutions for healthcare organisations, has partnered with the University of New Mexico’s (UNM) School of Engineering to launch the Internet of Things Laboratory (The Lab) and the beginning of an Internet of Things (IoT) curriculum. The Lab prepares students for high-tech job opportunities through real-world and hands-on education by testing various types of sensor systems and their performance in various applications. VIZZIA sources best-in-class systems for the healthcare industry where sensor systems are used to track movements and interactions between doctors, nurses, patients and their equipment. For the Lab, VIZZIA provides testing protocols which allow students to compare sensor systems. This not only provides the students with exposure to world-class systems, but is also serving as a research and development resource for VIZZIA, and soon other companies that need to evaluate the latest sensors. “New sensor systems are being developed at a fast pace all around the world,” explained Andrew L. Halasz, president and CEO of VIZZIA Technologies. “Having an active testing programme ensures we will know the best systems to deploy for our clients while also providing a tremendous learning environment for students.” The core of the new connected world are sensors that measure temperatures, pressures, locations, movements and a variety of other important performance data needed to automate processes and/or make better decisions. The IoT project began in 2015 when VIZZIA received funding from the Venture Acceleration VIZZIA saw a natural partnership with UNM’s School of Engineering. Chaouki T. Abdallah, UNM provost and executive vice president for Academic Affairs, said: “The early success of the programme has enabled UNM and VIZZIA to set its sights on incorporating existing software development, network architecture and Internet security coursework while also investigating new ideas and curriculum in big data management to create an overall IoT program at UNM,” said Joseph L. Cecchi, dean of the UNM School of Engineering. “It has given our students valuable, real-world training and experience.”
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
US NEWS
IoT solutions a top concern for US enterprises, says Machina Enterprise Internet of Things (IoT) solutions are one of the hot button topics of the technology space for 2016. To better understand the dynamics involved with the adoption and deployment of IoT solutions among US enterprises, Machina Research was commissioned by the Telecommunications Industry Association (TIA), InterDigital and Telit to develop a survey of enterprise decision makers focused on core IoT elements. Based on the survey findings, Machina Research has compiled a White Paper providing an analytical assessment of top trends in IoT as detailed by US company executives and addresses their top project objectives, the key role of technology standards, deployment strategies, as well as future deployment and spending expectations. The survey indicates that IoT solutions have reached critical mass, fast becoming a top concern for U.S. enterprise decision makers. Executives who participated in this study strongly indicated that IoT adoption has already gained significant traction among US enterprises in the context of both strategic planning and execution, with 48% of respondents stating that their companies are actively using IoT technologies in their business, and an additional 43% looking to deploy IoT solutions in the next 24 months. At this pace, IoT will become a mainstream enterprise element by the beginning of 2019. While many current IoT deployments are still limited in scope, US companies are already gearing up for the integration of IoT solutions within their broader array of enterprise systems. Successful IoT adoption however, at both industry and enterprise level, requires standards. Facing a dizzying array of technology, integration and design choices for IoT projects, enterprises emphasised the key role of standards in the evolution of successful IoT implementations. The full White Paper, Internet of Things Enterprise Survey, is available to download at http://machinaresearch.com
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
Resin.io wins US$8m funding to speed growth of IoT DevOps platform Resin.io, has secured US$8 million in funding from DFJ, GE Ventures, and Ericsson. Resin.io was founded in 2013 with a mission to use Linux containers and other open technologies to simplify the way developers build, deploy, and manage software for IoT devices. Since then, businesses across a range of vertical industries have adopted the resin.io platform to deliver software over-the-air for security patches, new feature deployments and device configuration changes. The new round of funding will be used to expand the company’s product footprint, grow its open source community, and broaden its global reach through new strategic partnerships and channels. “As billions of complex devices come online, IoT project leaders are faced with the dual challenges of safety and speed. They must securely maintain mission-critical remote devices, while also delivering new software features and functionality to their customers.” said Alexandros Marinos, founder & CEO of resin.io. “Resin.io is a modern software deployment and management platform that builds on Docker, Git, Yocto and other open technologies to solve these challenges. With the support of GE Ventures and Ericsson we are exceptionally well positioned to help IoT project leaders use software as a strategic advantage.” Whether it’s a major retailer employing industrial lighting systems across hundreds of stores, a manufacturing firm struggling to keep track of expensive inventory in realtime, or the next generation of connected home devices that require frequent firmware updates, the massive scale and complexity of these connected devices is causing new problems for companies with wide-scale IoT deployments. “Advancing the Industrial Internet requires the ability to deploy and manage software in remote environments,” said Sam Cates, director at GE Ventures, a unit of General Electric Co. “resin.io is uniquely positioned to bring the speed and safety of DevOps to the Industrial Internet and we are excited to help them do so.”
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INTERVIEW
Drew Johnson, VP Engineering Aeris
Partner with the best in IoT, don’t go it alone The IoT offers such a wealth of opportunity that you need the courage to work with others in order to move faster, argues one of the industry’s leading lights, Drew Johnson, vice president of engineering at California-based service provider Aeris. Report by Nick Booth, freelance IT & communications writer. IoT Now: What trends have you seen in your time in the industry? Drew Johnson: There have been so many in the five years I’ve been at Aeris. Just in that time, of course, we’ve stopped calling it the Machine-to-Machine industry and now everyone says it’s the Internet of Things and all the big companies have gotten into this space.
The newest emerging trend, which we started talking about
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According to our recent study of enterprises which we released in May 2016, the three main motivations cited for IoT are to boost revenue (noted by 14% surveyed), create competitive differentiation (17%) and monitor products (23%). The number of companies that have a specialised IoT department is still a minority (40%), but that proportion is growing.
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US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
This is exemplified by the cases of Nest and Honeywell. Whereas Nest’s ‘IoT-First’ approach re-imagined the user experience and interaction with an ecosystem, Honeywell just bolted on its IoT capability as an afterthought. Nest created a system that can make pro-active, intelligent interventions on your behalf if you are not at home. It’s simple but powerful. Nest also connects with an ecosystem. It can interact with the power companies and even with other devices in the home. IoT-First means making IoT a design priority, so you start out with a fresh set of plans. We see this also in the connected car space. Granted, cars have been connected for 15 years, but the original concepts were limited. These days, designers are re-imagining events at every stage of a car’s life, from manufacturing, through shipping, the time at the car dealership, then ownership and warranty issues, all the way through to scrapping. Each one of these processes can be made more efficient – and precious resources can be saved – by designing them with IoT in mind. Just as Nest has done this well on the consumer side, Tesla has set the example in IoT design for the connected car. Now, other companies are starting to see this approach as the standard to which they should aspire. IoT Now: Can you clarify the confusion created by the wealth of IoT platforms? DJ: You are right. There are so many IoT platforms out there that it can be very confusing.
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
We tend to look at the anatomy of any IoT system as having seven core elements that need to be harmonised. These seven elements consist of: 1. The “thing”, the device itself 2. The connectivity 3. The data being exchanged 4. The analytics of that data 5. The visualisation of this information 6. The creation of value, meaning the monetisation 7. The security Though we like to highlight security as an independent element, it should be endemic in all the other elements of the IoT too. Yes, overzealous application of security disciplines can slow projects down, but we should bear in mind that a system is only ever as secure as its weakest link. So anyone could take one component of a system and pick the rest apart. For example, in fleet management it has been proved that in some cases a simple SMS message has the potential to do a lot of damage. Through a text message you can pinpoint a machine’s location, and it offers the potential to redirect information. So that’s a big risk, created by a small element within the grand scheme of things. That’s why security (across platforms) is hard for many companies, as they can build a system but not a holistically safe one. There are platforms available for every element in IoT. Meanwhile, the public clouds are also becoming increasingly influential in the IoT. There is still a lot of complexity in leveraging the public clouds today, but they will definitely be the right answer for some companies and will play an important role over time. To lessen this confusion, I would offer this advice. Try to select a platform that costeffectively delivers most of what you want and is in harmony with the public clouds. Concentrate your resources on the elements that will provide true value and differentiation
These days, designers are re-imagining events at every stage of a car’s life, from manufacturing, through shipping, the time at the car dealership, then ownership and warranty issues, all the way through to scrapping
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at the end of last year, is for companies to take an ‘IoT-First’ strategy, where their product is now designed, from the outset, with IoT as a primary consideration. Just as ‘Mobile-First’ changed the mindset of web designers, so they no longer imagined the systems they were creating being used in a fixed internet setting, so has IoT forced a redesign of all aspects of the product.
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INTERVIEW
to your customers. Those elements are typically the customer experience. You will save a lot of time and money by allowing others to deliver what is in the middle. IoT Now: What type of analytics are most important to start with? DJ: The best way to tackle the challenge of analytics is to start by thinking about the answers you need and how quickly you will need them. There are three types of analytics challenges, based on whether you need to look at real-time intelligence, batches of information or longer term trends from deeper analytics. For example, the safety and security analysis we conduct on airplanes falls into all three of these categories at different levels. It’s not just about, say, potential crash data, but longterm analysis of trend-related intelligence, which can give historical information on components and contextualise that with recent reports on the current state of play. This data allows us to identify a component that is worn and needs replacing, so we can prevent a problem from becoming bigger, replace the component and get the new equipment tested and in place for the next flight. For an effective IoT analytics platform, there are three important interfaces to consider. There needs to be an interface for the data scientists to create their long-term prognosis. There also needs to be an interface for the data engineers to get high-performance access for the online use cases. Finally, there needs to be a way to let the business managers use the intelligence and visualise ways to use it to run the enterprise more efficiently.
In May 2016, we completed a survey of enterprise IoT in global corporations. We found that the biggest priority among the survey group was analytics, with 21% of those questioned saying IoT data analytics capabilities are important to their IoT service. More people nominated this category than any other category followed by device management. IoT Now: What advice would you offer from a technologist’s perspective? DJ: Many predict that IoT will soon impact every single enterprise. My advice depends a bit on whether the enterprise is acting as a consumer of IoT or creates products and will be a producer of IoT. When the enterprise is a consumer of IoT services, the key to success is choosing services that are open and can be integrated into other services. For example, an enterprise selling apples may have farming equipment and trucks and cameras at different points of the production process, but unless they can tie them all together, they won’t be able to get consistent (and most cost-effective) management as those apples proceed from the orchard to the warehouse to the shops. Our survey of all the professionals who are involved in deploying IoT programs, across a range of industries, identified that integrating software and platforms is most popularly nominated as the most complex task. One fifth of those surveyed mentioned this first. Only security (which was nominated in 18% of cases) came close, but security and integration are co-dependent. When acting as a producer of IoT, enterprises
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US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
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The best way to tackle the challenge of analytics is to start by thinking about the answers you need and how quickly you will need them
Our survey of all the professionals who are involved in deploying IoT programs, across a range of industries, identified that integrating software and platforms is most popularly nominated as the most complex task
must be able to tie their services into those created by others. So they must they must choose technologies and platforms that readily tie into the ecosystem. We are actually focused primarily on the IoT producers. We want to help them take the journey from unconnected product to connected product with an IoT-First approach. IoT Now: Which innovation excites you most about the future of the IoT? DJ: As a technologist, I’m super-excited about where we are right now. Overall, it’s still early in the IoT evolution. I think there are several drivers that need to continue to emerge in order to take IoT to the next level. We have to have low-cost devices and sensors. That area has benefited already quite a bit from the sensors, modules, and processors being produced in mass quantity at low cost for mobile phones. We have to have low-cost connectivity. That’s being delivered by cellular in many cases but also by WiFi and new LowPower IoT networks. We also have to have low-cost ways to analyse all the data. It’s been amazing to see all the open source Big Data technologies emerge over the last 6 or 7 years. Finally, we also need new ways to interact with products. Now, nearly everyone is walking around with a smart phone and there is a new emergence of voice interactive agents like Amazon’s Alexa. I have to say that I really believe this IoT-First concept will create a lot of value for consumers, for product-makers, and even help the world save resources. We already talked about the Nest thermostat. It saves the consumer time and money and also helps the power companies be more efficient. Another simple example is a watering system that does not water lawns or crops when it rains
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
or is about to rain. Imagine how much water could be saved. There are hundreds of thousands of such products that can be empowered to talk to each other and use a machine form of common sense. IoT Now: What advice would you give to a company just getting started with planning their IoT programme? DJ: There is endless scope for disruption in this industry. If I were starting out I would be very focused on how to re-imagine the product interactions around IoT and connectivity. Try starting from a clean slate without preconceptions on how users will interact. Focus also on how not just to use the connectivity to pull information out but also how to tie into other information as part of a bigger ecosystem. Once you have done that then it’s important to get something working quickly in order to get feedback and improve rapidly. IoT Now: From your perspective, why are some IoT programs more successful than others? DJ: We see those that struggle are the ones that try to execute in areas where they don’t have the expertise. If you don’t leverage the talents of key partners, you will likely struggle too. If you are not strong in all of the seven elements of the IoT, then it won’t work. Make sure you do your own part very successfully and get the best you can from partners in the other areas. Nobody can be best at everything. We see a lot of enterprises fail at data management and analytics with respect to scale. We have seen companies struggle when they attempt to go it alone, and we like to help them to focus on areas where they have the maximum value.
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AUGMENTED REALITY
PTC's CEO, Jim Heppelmann
Caterpillar shows how augmented and virtual reality technology plus IoT can benefit industry OK. Rewind five years, says Jeremy Cowan. Imagine you’re the CEO of PTC, Inc. a US-based computer software company that since 1985 has specialised in 2-dimensional & 3D design software, product, application and service lifecycle management (PLM, ALM & SLM), and service management solutions. Long story short, you already help enterprise customers from mining to oil & gas, and manufacturing to retail and healthcare to maximise the lifetime and efficiency of their hardware, software and services. But how should you support and prepare for the changes that big data and wider, cheaper connectivity are enabling for your clients? This is in a nutshell was the challenge facing Needham, Massachussetts-based PTC, Inc., delivering technology that enables industrial customers to aggregate, analyse, and deploy product information to support their decisionmaking. In 2011 PTC acquired MKS, producer of a Software System Lifecycle Management (SSLM) solution. In 2014 the company acquired both ThingWorx, a major player in the growing Internet of Things (IoT), and Axeda to enable customers to establish secure connections and remotely manage a wide range of machines, sensors, and devices.
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Which is good because the industries you serve are evolving at ever greater speed. They see IoT and data analytics providing the connectivity, customer and business intelligence to move away from a pure manufacturing role of hardware and devices into becoming service providers. Your customers are shape-shifting to Industry 4.0 (to use a European term).
How else could you meet their needs? Well, PTC's CEO Jim Heppelmann used 2015 to acquire the Vuforia™ augmented reality (AR) technology platform. This was designed to accelerate PTC’s strategy to provide technologies and solutions that blend the digital and physical worlds. In the same year ColdLight’s Neuron was bought for its automated predictive analytics platform. Scroll forward to 2016, and at LiveWorx, PTC’s annual gathering in Boston of more than ▼
Long story short, you already help enterprise customers from mining to oil & gas, and manufacturing to retail and healthcare to maximise the lifetime and efficiency of their hardware, software and services
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
Caterpillar demonstrated mixed AR & VR-support for its XQ35 genset
4,000 clients, partners analysts and media, Jim Heppelmann tells his audience how the company is working with its customers to blend Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality (VR) with the Internet of Things to deliver business intelligence and control that would have seemed fanciful only a few years before. Take Caterpillar, for example. The American-based company is well-known for its broad range of industrial machinery in construction, materials handling and power generation, to name just a few sectors. CAT, however, sees new revenues in providing more than generator sets, it’s offering Power as a Service. In order to optimise the service to its customers, CAT now wants to simplify the start-up, use, testing and fault management of its complex gensets. If it can use Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality it can deploy equipment operated by less expensively-skilled staff, it can show new users how to manage and maintain the hardware on site, and it can support them from a remote location with more experienced staff if a fault needs fixing. Expensive truck rolls can be minimised, saving customers millions of dollars a year in Operational Expenditure (OpEx). At this year’s LiveWorx in Boston, Terri Lewis, account executive at Caterpillar Inc., and Jim Heppelmann demonstrated the use of PTC’s Vuforia technology which has already enabled CAT to create a prototype Mixed Reality (AR & VR combined) to give users an iPad view of the internal workings and components of a CAT XQ35 genset. As Heppelmann said, “People think of the Internet of Things (IoT) as a way to connect and monetise products and services. But that leaves out people. PTC is investing time and money in AR/VR, it’s a convergence of the physical, digital and human experience. The genset is used to power pumps,
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
compressors and other equipment on construction sites, or at concerts for lighting and sound.” “CAT is changing,” said Lewis. “We’re in the rental business, where the whole experience needs to be easy.” Another benefit of AR and VR support is that dealers can provide customers with connected use to understand how the equipment is being used in the field. AR explains and simplifies the start-up procedure, for example guiding the user to turn a handle to select the correct voltage for the application, and confirming that the operating voltage is 12.4v, that the unit is 98% charged and functioning on 120v supply. At a glance on the iPad screen it can give a readout showing the genset was last serviced 1,750 hours ago and is ready for another service. It even shows the user how to replace an oil filter, fuel filter, air filter and how to change the oil. The AR functionality provides a full service manual when needed. The VR functionality enables the service engineer to look inside the machine to identify a faulty part, and the engineer can be instructed on how to replace the item. Everything appears on the iPad screen.
At a glance on the iPad screen it can give a readout showing the genset was last serviced 1,750 hours ago and is ready for another service
Jay Wright, president and general manager of Vuforia Technology, PTC, talked about how AR and VR are changing working practices and getting dramatic reactions from new users. "It's like you're showing them (customers) fire for the first time. When you put this tablet in front of them or glasses on their heads it's like Wow!" Development work is continuing at CAT, supported by PTC’s Vuforia technology, and the new technology is not available yet. When it is, Lewis said, “it will transform the whole sales and marketing experience. IoT has existed for years, but the technology only recently democratised. Now any smart person with a problem to solve can transform industry.”
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AREA REVIEW
IoT on the US East Coast Last year, IoT Now looked at how the East Coast telecoms sector and its historic IT connections was influencing the development of IoT, mainly through the focus on the industrial internet. As Guy Daniels reports, an East Coast technology business is now more likely to be software and analytics focused than pure ICT engineering, although these historic ties mean there is a strong industry focus with IoT companies in the region, which is regarded as the home of the “industrial internet”.
The author is freelance ICT writer, Guy Daniels
The group was formed in 2014 by AT&T, Cisco, GE, IBM and Intel with the aim to “break down the barriers of technology silos to support better access to big data with improved integration of the physical and digital worlds to unlock business value”. In March this year, the IIC aligned itself with the Plattform Industrie 4.0 organisation, based in Germany – the other centre of excellence for the digital transformation of industry. The companies set out to explore the alignment of their two architecture models and succeeded in creating a clear roadmap to ensure future interoperability. They are also going to be collaborating in the areas of IIC Testbeds and I4.0 Test Facility Infrastructures. “Industrie 4.0's strong foundation in industrial manufacturing and process combines well with the IIC's emphasis on emerging IIoT applications in healthcare, transportation, power, and smart cities,” said Stan Schneider, member of the IIC Steering Committee. “We look forward to driving the rapid growth of the IIoT across all industries.” One of the IIC’s founder members, the GE industrial conglomerate, is headquartered in Connecticut. Its IoT activities fall under the GE Digital division, and its latest innovation is the creation of a Smart Airline Baggage
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Management system. Working with Oracle and Machine to Machine Intelligence, and in collaboration with the IIC, they have created a connected baggage solution to improve management, reduce check-in times, increase communication with passengers, and contribute to airline risk management. The testbed is part of a broader aviation ecosystem vision aimed at reducing the instances of delayed, damaged and lost bags leading to lower economic risk exposure to the airlines, and brings together various fragmented systems across the aviation ecosystem. The testbed will be hosted on Predix, GE’s cloud-based platform for the Industrial Internet. Oracle is providing airline applications built on its Airline Data Model and M2Mi is providing device management, connectivity, data handling and instream analytics. “The success of the Industrial Internet requires team work across the ecosystem, and this testbed is a great example of collaboration,” said Shyam Nath, Industrial Internet Architect, GE Digital. “By hosting the testbed on Predix and working with M2Mi and Oracle, we hope to help airlines increase efficiency and improve passenger experience.” Massachussetts-based PTC, a computer software company specialising in design software, product, application and service lifecycle management solutions, has embraced the IoT and big data movement by acquiring specialist companies to meet the changing needs of its customers (it bought ThingWorx in 2014 for $112 million and Axeda for a further $170 million later in the same ▼
The North Eastern states of the USA are home to some of the major vertical markets companies – from manufacturing to healthcare – and most of them are already looking to integrate IoT solutions into their workflows and services. What’s more, these deployments are generally large scale, and it’s no surprise that Boston is the headquarters of the Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC).
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
year, then followed with the purchase of augmented reality company Vuforia and predictive analytics firm ColdLight in 2015). (Also see pages S9-10.) "Our business strategy has been centered on helping companies transform how they create, connect, operate and service products," said Jim Heppelmann, president and CEO, PTC. "Sensor data by itself creates value, but that value is magnified dramatically when companies use predictive analytics to process that data into many forms of actionable knowledge that can transform the way they do business.” Heppelmann also wants to blend augmented reality with IoT to deliver a new level of business intelligence and control. “People think of the IoT as a way to connect and monetise products and services, but that leaves out people,” he explained. “PTC is investing time and money in AR/VR – it’s a convergence of the physical, digital and human experience. The genset is used to power pumps, compressors and other equipment on construction sites, or at concerts for lighting and sound.” Boston-based TetraScience was created to modernise research by bringing cloud software to the laboratory. Founded by scientists and engineers from local universities Harvard and MIT, TetraScience has developed an open IoT platform to connect and manage research equipment and instruments. Its solution is purpose-built for science and used across industries including pharma, biotech, food production, oil and gas, and plastics, allowing research teams to increase productivity. It recently received investment from Digital Science (jointly located in Boston and London) to expand Digital Science’s research management portfolio. The IoT scene centred around Boston is thriving, harnessing the academic excellence
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
of the region as well as the historic manufacturing culture. But it’s not the only IoT hub on the East Coast. Not far from Washington DC, northern Virginia houses a number of technology firms, many of them in the Dulles Technology Corridor. This is less a “Silicon Valley of the East” and more of a community that values the proximity to major air routes and the centre of government. In Chantilly, Virginia, Encore Networks manufactures wireline, cellular and satellite VPN routers. It recently announced a deal with Corner Media Partners to supply fully managed LTE data connectivity for digital Kiosks and interactive advertising displays (pictured top right). Encore’s wireless VPN router is designed for high-availability IoT applications in fixed or portable locations supporting not only digital signage but also business continuity, video surveillance, pointof-sale retail units and ATMs. Its management system enables customers to manage, monitor and configure their routers from a centralised location through the cloud.
The IoT scene centred around Boston is thriving, harnessing the academic excellence of the region as well as the historic manufacturing culture
Corner Media, which is also located in Virginia, works with US property owners to integrate digital media displays and mobile data points to help advertisers reach and engage consumers in the out-of-home environment. “Digital out-of-home advertising and real time communication is an integral part of the retail environment,” said Joe Kunigonis, president of Corner Media. “We work closely with partners like Encore to tailor specific solutions for each of our client’s unique media real estate applications.” The East Coast is still firmly routed in industrial and business-focused IoT development. It’s the practical applications and implementations of connected technology that will power the next industrial revolution.
www.plattform-i40.de www.iiconsortium.org www.iiconsortium.org/ baggage-management.htm www.ptc.com www.tetrascience.com www.digital-science.com www.encorenetworks.com
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CTIA PREVIEW
Are you and your business ready for an everything-connected world? Are you ready for the mobile-first revolution? Wireless innovation through the Internet of Things (IoT) is making other industries more efficient and effective, which means businesses and consumers are quickly adopting a mobile-first mentality. Imagine this was your daily routine: • In the morning, automated, real-time notifications on your phone provide you the fastest commute based on traffic or train/bus schedule, and your alarm uses this information to wake you up earlier or later to get you work in time. • Just before noon, your favourite treadmill is reserved because you remotely schedule time on it, and then your lunch arrives at the same moment you return to the office. • After work, your phone gives you recommendations for dinner options that are close to your kids’ soccer game–in an unfamiliar part of town–so you can pre-order and pick up the food on your way home, all without getting caught in traffic. This will soon be the future as Americans demand and adopt a mobile-first life using the Internet of Things (IoT). While smart kitchens (refrigerators that can help you write your grocery list) and smart homes (temperature, lights and music adjusted when you leave and return) are already being introduced today, we’ll see more innovations and benefits on an even wider scale. In our communities, cities will install sensors on roads so that snow and salt trucks are deployed when needed. Instead of waiting until a water main break, sensors will be affixed to a municipality’s water supply pipes so that leaks are detected early. Garbage cans will have a sensor so that they are emptied when needed and not merely because it’s on the schedule. IoT is being used by companies to streamline their businesses for everything from fleet management to re-ordering materials “just-in-time” so there’s no need to worry about space to house excess products. Retailers are adopting beacon technology to recognise customers as they enter a store and push personalised coupons and discounts based on past purchases.
These kinds of opportunities that improve efficiency and effectiveness are why the IoT global market is projected to grow from $591.7 billion in 2014 to $1.3 trillion in 2019. If you haven’t deployed IoT into your business, what are you waiting for? If your customers haven’t already started to demand IoT efficiencies, will you be ready? That’s why you need to attend CTIA Super Mobility 2016. With 1,000 companies exhibiting products and services for connected businesses and consumers alike, you’ll be able to experience the latest mobile technologies and map out your company’s most effective mobile and IoT strategy. With hundreds of hours of educational programming and networking opportunities, CTIA Mobile Intelligence Conference connects you with experts to discuss crucial technology and implementation tactics so you can avoid others’ mistakes and stay ahead of your competition. 2016 tracks for the Mobile Intelligence Conference include: • Everything Connected: Smart City + Smart Consumer Explore smart city strategies and requirements as well as downstream consumer innovations created by IoT and 5G. • Everything Intelligent: Taking Networks To 5G - Gain the knowledge necessary to lead the evolution from 4G to 5G and what it means for network infrastructure. • Everything Enterprise: 5G Use Cases - Look at creating business plans that maximise 4G capabilities and leverage emerging 5G use cases. I’ll see you September 7-9 in Las Vegas for CTIA Super Mobility 2016
Report by Heather Lee Landers, Show Director & Conventions AVP
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US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
CTIA PREVIEW
CTIA Super Mobility 2016 is smarter than ever Report by Heather Lee Landers, show director & conventions AVP This year, the CTIA Super Mobility 2016 show floor will transform into a Smart City so you can experience the latest wireless technologies. CTIA’s Smart City will be organised into different zones, including:
best business practices and key issues that are driving the next generation of wireless. Mobile Intelligence 2016 will feature four tracks:
• Enterprise + Industrial IoT Zone – Focuses on technology solutions for IoT, M2M, sensors, data security and business efficiency, whether for cloud, virtualisation or privacy applications, and includes: - M2M Zone where show goers can gain in-depth knowledge on machine-to-machine technologies that will transform nearly every industry vertical - Connected Car Lot, where visitors can see how wireless is impacting the auto industry, and discover the newest vehicle entertainment platforms and safety features
• Everything Connected: Smart City + Smart Consumer – Explore smart city strategies and requirements and the downstream consumer innovations created by IoT and 5G. • Everything Enterprise: 5G Use Cases – Learn about creating business plans that maximise 4G capabilities and leverage emerging 5G use cases. • Everything Intelligent: Taking Networks To 5G – Gain the knowledge necessary to lead the evolution from 4G to 5G and what it means for network infrastructure. • Everything Policy: How Washington Shapes Mobile – From cybersecurity and privacy to spectrum, discover how policymakers are influencing the wireless industry.
• Connected Life + Technology Zone – Featuring the latest wireless products and services that connect individuals and communities, such as: - Drone Airfield with air shows demonstrating the latest drones - Startup Lab, where investors, inventors and entrepreneurs can connect
With 300,000 square feet of exhibits, new interactive destinations and more than 200 educational hours, CTIA Super Mobility 2016 is the can’t-miss event of the wireless industry. We look forward to seeing you in Las Vegas on September 7-9.
• Innovation Zone – Here you’ll be able to find the most upto-date advances in all things mobile. This zone includes: - 5G Launchpad Smart Experience where attendees can explore emerging concepts and use cases for nextgeneration network technologies - AR/VR Arcade Smart Experience, filled with the latest augmented and virtual reality gear, devices, content and games - Smart Home Experience, featuring consumer electronics, appliances, entertainment and energy controls to transform your home Attendees can also participate in the CTIA Mobile Intelligence Conference, an educational, open-dialogue program where participants gain insight into crucial technical intelligence,
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
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IoT on the US West Coast When IoT Now looked at the West Coast Internet of Things scene last year, we identified the abundance of software talent and access to start-up support and funding as principle reasons behind the creation of such a strong IoT community. We focused on a number of prominent companies of all sizes, but the vast majority were targeting IoT devices, mainly – though not exclusively – aimed at the smart home market.
Starting our West Coast journey inland in Nevada, Dronesmith Technologies is creating services and tools to build, run, and scale drone applications. Earlier this year, Dronesmith partnered with Resin, who are based further up the West Coast in Seattle, on a project that would allow an in-flight drone to update software on-demand. They gave themselves three weeks to integrate a thermal camera onto a drone to illustrate how it could be of value in a search-and-rescue scenario, using on-board sensors and remote-sensing techniques to aid human operations with machine intelligence. Dronesmith’s “Luci” dual processor architecture enabled the Resin developers to deploy code wirelessly, remotely and in realtime. Luci is a standalone programmable device, so users can develop on it and use it on any drone platform that they want. Three weeks later, and ready for its debut at Mobile World Congress, the company had created the first standalone, wirelessly programmable autopilot. Seattle-based Resin.io aims to bridge the gap between the cloud and IoT devices, making it simple to deploy, update, and maintain code running on remote devices, bringing web development and deployment workflow to hardware. Resin.io was recently selected to participate
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
in the European Commission-funded “Adaptive Gateways for Diverse Multiple Environments” (AGILE) project. Its platform will enable fast and robust cloud compilation of new gateway and maker app features, including same-day updates, as well as device monitoring and maintenance in difficult environments such as behind NATs or firewalls. “As more devices become connected devices, the ability to seamlessly push live updates over-the-air becomes a critical business requirement,” said Alexandros Marinos, founder and CEO of Resin.io. The company has since partnered with Samsung to enable developers to build, deploy and manage software on Samsung Artik devices. “Resin.io has built a highly robust and elegant management platform that solves a real problem for companies struggling to deploy and manage IoT software with both speed and security,” said Curtis Sasaki, VP of Ecosystems, Samsung Electronics. “Through this collaboration, software developers will have an easier experience building, deploying and managing a wide range of IoT applications, whether it’s an early hackathon project or a complex deployment to a fleet of thousands of IoT devices.”
Stephan Grinzinger of Lorentz
John Horn: Leave behind obsolete technologies
A number of global technology companies also see the potential of the coder community on the West Coast. For example, Samsung has based its Artik business unit in San Jose, in the heart of Silicon Valley. The goal of Samsung Artik is to provide tools to reduce IoT product development ▼
This year, as Guy Daniels reports, there’s another trend coming into play, and that is the role of software services. What’s more, the community is incredibly connected and inter-dependent.
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Dronesmith Technologies enables users to build, run and scale drone applications
IoT starts living up to its promise when the interaction between data, devices and services becomes transparent, and the user can focus on what the devices are trying to say - Abhi Rele, Samsung Artek
timelines, getting products to market faster. It has an end-to-end ecosystem strategy, with access to modules, the network stack and cloud on-boarding, removing technology bottlenecks and enabling businesses to focus on their product or service. Samsung Artek is creating APIs for IoT, in an attempt to break down the silos that are forming around clusters of devices and apps that don’t interoperate, and hence drive the large-scale adoption of IoT among consumers and businesses. Let the device manufacturers use their expertise to make these IoT “things”, whilst giving developers the resources to make devices interoperable and grow a developer ecosystem. Using the Samsung Artek Cloud, which launched in April, developers have access to built-in open APIs to collect and store sensor data from connected physical devices and device clouds, and gain access to normalised data and pre-analytics. “IoT starts living up to its promise when the interaction between data, devices and services becomes transparent, and the user can focus on what the devices are trying to say,” said Abhi Rele, Director of Product Marketing at Samsung Artek. “We’re enabling developers to help IoT live up to its ideal – allowing the end user to benefit from all this connectivity without having to think about the underlying technology.”
www.dronesmith.io www.resin.io
That’s not to say there aren’t great examples of IoT devices and connectivity services on the West Coast. Santa Clara-based Aeris offers a complete stack of technology from an online management portal to an application enablement platform, with cellular technologies ranging from GSM and CDMA to LTE. In May it announced that its Aeris IoT Solutions platform had been deployed by Lorentz, a manufacturer of solar powered water pumping solutions to enable enterprises to provide clean drinking water for people, livestock and for irrigating agricultural crops in over 130 countries.
www.artik.io/overview/ www.artik.cloud www.aeris.com www.ingenu.com
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Lorentz has installed Aeris global SIMs in its products and by utilising Aeris’ single global access point name, its systems can be deployed on a plug-and-play basis without
the need to configure local network settings. It also gives Lorentz near real-time access to data usage, alerts and management over the SIM life cycle. “Mass global deployment is only possible by working with a reliable cellular network partner who can give us end-to-end monitoring of our solution,” explained Stephan Grinzinger, global head of sales with Lorentz. “As water pumping is a life-critical application, we need real-time data with robust alerting and reporting capabilities, which Aeris can deliver through its carrieragnostic network.” And finally for this year’s West Coast roundup, San Diego-based Ingenu is a provider of dedicated IoT networks to other companies looking to connect machines. With its licensed partners, Ingenu now provides connectivity in 25 countries over 38 private networks via its branded “Machine Network”, using what it calls Random Phase Multiple Access (RPMA) technology for the low power wide area (LPWA) networks. “The rapid global deployment of a network for machines changes that dynamic and allows companies everywhere to leave behind obsolete technologies, and build and deploy IoT solutions with stability for decades to come,” claims John Horn, CEO of Ingenu, who is aiming perilously high with his wish that RPMA becomes the global standard for IoT connectivity. One of its latest customers is the City of Dallas, which will be deploying its Machine Network to serve a population of more than 4.4 million people. It believes it can provide coverage with only 17 access points, as opposed to the “10 to 30 times” the cellular infrastructure it believes would be needed to provide similar coverage. “The Dallas/Fort Worth metro area is leading the country in technology innovation,” said William Finch, chief information officer, City of Dallas. “IoT is an important technology strategy for the region, and the Machine Network will accelerate the deployment and adoption of limitless IoT solutions.”
US Report IoT Now - June / July 2016
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