Industrial Internet of Things

The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is often presented as a revolution that is changing the face of industry in a profound manner. In reality, it is an evolution that has its origins in technologies and functionalities developed by visionary automation suppliers more than 15 years ago. As the necessary global standards mature, it may well take another 15 years to realize the full potential of IIoT. Over this period of time the changes to the industry will be far reaching. The good news is that end users and machine builders can now leverage their existing investments in technology and people while taking advantage of available new IIoT technologies. Introducing IIoT solutions using a “wrap & re-use” approach, rather than a “rip & replace” approach will enable greater business control. In addition, this measured approach will drive the evolution towards a smart manufacturing enterprise that is more efficient, safer, and sustainable. The emergence of the IIoT megatrend has created both hope and confusion among stakeholders responsible for operating industrial plants. Much of the early hype is focused on the impact of technological advancements on existing automation platforms.

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Source: Schneider Electric

IoT Connectivity – The winner takes it all

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IoT will be one of the most important catalyst in realizing the fourth industrial revolution, which is a collective term embracing a number of contemporary automation, data exchange and manufacturing technologies. IoT will have the power to displace the concepts of where work is done, by whom and at what cost. In the earlier days internet was believed to be a physical system of computers interconnected by a medium, which has been displaced in the present world and is synonymous with Facebook, Twitter or e-commerce and the likes. We can only assume that this trend will continue during Industry 4.0 (fourth industrial revolution), and data along with the associated analytics will be pivotal in the new world of connected things. IoT traditionally enables three major use cases

• Command-response traffic (triggered reporting), having latency of 10 seconds.
• Exception reported by IoT module having latency of 3-5 seconds.
• Periodic reports or Keep alive, insensitive to latency

In the near future, it is expected to enable a new use case as well

• Ultra-low latency, command-response 'conversational' traffic having latency as low as a millisecond for tactile applications.

  On comparing the internet of things world with the present day internet, one thing that comes our clearly is that there will be a plethora of devices which will be asymmetric in their capabilities, thus there is a need to look at this diverse geometry and discuss a diverse connectivity portfolio. We are also talking about devices/things with specific use cases; thus a generic approach at IoT platform design at the device side could fail miserably. We can say that no one size fits all in this case – being addressed as ‘device profiles’ by some of the platform vendors.

  IoT necessitates the need for a low power solution, so that there is no need to worry about power backup and battery replacement hurdles during the lifecycle of the device. IoT though is a buzzword these days, the early deployment dates back to 80’s with proprietary connectivity solutions or through either industry alliances or standard developing organizations (SDO’s). Connectivity technologies were developed within the leading SDOs, i.e. the IEEE, ETSI, 3GPP, and IETF. In the current era, prominent low power short-range solutions are available including Bluetooth and IEEE 802.15.4 (promoted by Zigbee alliance). However the biggest misconception has been the understanding of low power and associated costs. While Zigbee or other short-range communication can keep the power consumption relatively low, the biggest drawback is the range, which necessitates the need for gateway components or aggregators in the system. This also requires additional cost in terms of management and maintenance of such components and services, thus while the chip/SoC cost could be as low ~ 5 USD, the total cost could be around ten times ~ 50 USD. Another way to look at the low power requirement is to view it as a holistic problem around energy, which means that we can intermittently transmit at high power (thereby achieving range), but keep the transmission time very less, thus the equation energy =  Power * Time, gives us a low energy requirement. This can help us remove the need of intermediate gateway components, and yet achieve a low energy target. This was clearly understood by IEEE 802.11 group, and they came up with a low power version (enhanced duty cyles) - 802.11ah to introduce low-cost connectivity in unlicensed bands. It is currently being developed to enable low-cost long-range (up to 1km) connectivity with high spectral and energy efficiencies. However it won’t be able to deliver the required reliability, for some of the IoT use cases, as there is neither a guaranteed QoS support, nor enough tools to combat severe interference in unlicensed bands.

   Another class of IoT connectivity technology has emerged lately termed Low-Power Wide Area (LPWA), which operates in unlicensed spectrum and supports low data rates with relatively smaller daily traffic volumes. Some of the famous ones are technologies by SigFox, LoRA, Neul (to name a few), which are usually non-compatible and proprietary alternatives. There is a clear advantage in using LWPA from time to market perspective, as we keep hearing announcements from several operators and telcos deploying trial networks using one or the other form of LPWA. Limitations of asymmetric link budgets between the uplink and downlink directions arising due to regulation on unlicensed spectrum poses a challenge for long range communication (explained in [2]). It also suffers due to scalability issues to support a massive number of devices with LPWA technology on unlicensed bands.

   Cellular technologies particularly LTE gives lot of advantages from coverage, cost, availability and ease of deployment perspective. We have learnt that in addition to the existing LTE MTC work item which defines Category-0 devices; with the advent of NB-IoT (narrow band IoT) a new way to slice the technology and deployment will come up this year. The technology can be deployed “in-band”, utilizing resource blocks within a normal LTE carrier, or in the unused resource blocks within a LTE carrier’s guard-band, or “standalone” for deployments in dedicated spectrum. NB-IoT is also particularly suitable for the re-farming of GSM channels. Customer pilots using pre-NB-IoT technology are already underway. Pre-commercial deployment is expected during the second half of 2016, with commercial rollout from early in 2017.

   While there are several connectivity solutions available for catering to the IoT market, there will be no clear winner for the same due to varied deployments and asymmetric capabilities of the ‘things’. We believe that while LPWA technologies can be used to enter the market early, a clear established solution will be using cellular due to associated accessibility and ease of deployment/management of devices and use. In a way, entering late into this market will give cellular a clear advantage in understanding the varied requirements for IoT (low latency/high latency, static/mobile, low power/extended coverage etc.). We also note that cellular standards in the current form also support unlicensed accesses (LTE-LAA), and short range communication (LTE D2D or side link). Thus, a wide profile for connectivity could be made available for IoT solutions. Provided, there is some focused effort to also standardize and establish LTE for IoT in unlicensed band and to enable D2D for IoT profile – we see a clear winner here.

Note:Some of the thoughts presented here are well established in the available literature on IoT or M2M, and has been quoted and re-quoted by several speakers at keynotes of conferences and summits around the world. The authors would like to share their deep regards for the work by Prof. Mischa Dohler and team, and the associated IoT MOOC by Mischa Dohler, which helped them in building and ratifying their understanding. (Please check out the references at the end).

References:

[1] The Internet of Things:  Learn how IoT works, and how to create a successful product or company using it, with this free online course. Educator – Mischa Dohler <https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/internet-of-things/1/steps/54817>

[2] Understanding the IoT Connectivity Landscape – A Contemporary M2M Radio Technology Roadmap, Sergey Andreevy, Olga Galinina, Alexander Pyattaev, Mikhail Gerasimenko, Tuomas Tirronen, Johan Torsner, Joachim Sachs, Mischa Dohler, and Yevgeni Koucheryavyhttp://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?tp=&arnumber=7263370&tag=1

By : Diwakar Sharma & Tushar Vrind, Samsung Semiconductor India R&D, Bangalore

IoT operator Sigfox: No one can match our offering

IoT operator Sigfox is confident that competing LPWAN technologies are no match to its own offering at this point. An exclusive interview with Thomas Nicholls, executive vice president of communication at Sigfox.

We can count the days without an announcement on Low-Power Wide-Area Network (LPWAN), a market that is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 93.01 percent between 2016 and 2022, according to Infoholic Research. The race is on between the likes of Sigfox, LoRaWan and NB-IoT. Toulouse-based IoT operator Sigfox believes however that it has a unique position in the LPWAN market. Furthermore, comparing Sigfox with LoRa or NB-IoT is a bit like comparing apples and oranges: there are multiple solutions and there is ample room for various actors and solutions. ”The most important thing for people to understand is that the IoT base is huge and that there will be multiple types of connectivity. Also, it is crucial to understand the positioning of the different solutions and here nobody has a similar positioning as Sigfox,” Thomas Nicholls, executive vice president of communication at Sigfox, told Industrial IoT 5G Insights. ”There will not be one actor winning everything because the different accesses cater for different types of applications. And there are many use cases that can only be addressed by other solutions than Sigfox.”

”No one can match Sigfox offering”

So, competing solutions will co-exist but not one matches what Sigfox can offer, according to Nicholls. He views NB-IoT as a complementary solution to Sigfox, saying that the cost of integrating NB-IoT in an end-point is ten times as high as with Sigfox. It has in addition yet to be standardized and hit the market. ”It costs 40 dollars per end-point today since you have to use traditional LTE modules. Prices will drop over time, maybe over the next five to ten years. But it will still be significantly more expensive than Sigfox,” said Thomas Nicholls.

As for LoRaWan and Ingenu, he believes these solutions can only succeed in the private network space. ”We are yet to see one country covered with LoRaWan or Ingenu and we do not really believe this will happen. The models are flawed for public networks but fine for private networks,” said Nicholls. ”Saying that Samsung is rolling out a LoRa network with SK Telecom is an exaggeration. Samsung is a gigantic organization with one division that sells network equipment. They of course sell to anyone that wants to buy their equipment, including SK Telecom,” he added.

The Sigfox executive suggests that a fair comparison to Sigfox should look at four different elements: service type, coverage, energy consumption and subsection and end-point connection costs. ”Using that type of comparative approach, you will find there is no one that can match the Sigfox offering … Some vendors are confusing the market by saying they have competing offers, when in reality they either have a very different offer or are in such an early stage that they do not yet have a commercially available offer.”

Ongoing Expansion

Truth be told, Sigfox can boast a 1.3 million square kilometer coverage across 20 countries. But to stay ahead of competition, it must keep moving fast. The company announced recently a nationwide rollout in Finland, which should be completed by spring 2017. Sigfox is also expanding its IoT network to 100 U.S. cities. ”We do not see any actor in the market that can compete with us. And lots of big customers are waiting for us to have deployed nationwide or Europe-wide. It is still a blue ocean market for us,” said Nicholls.

Yet, the company has been reported to have faced a customer backlash. Light Reading reports that bicycle tracking gadget company Nigiloc has joined in the criticism earlier expressed by Sigfox rivals and was one of a number of Sigfox customers to have terminated their planned Sigfox rollout due to ”bad coverage and failing technology”. In an unrelated comment, Thomas Nicholls told Industrial IoT 5G Insights that ”there are additionally some actors in the market with an interest to slow down the market. It is a common strategy for large organizations to slow down disruption in order to figure out how to best react,” adding that Sigfox job was to stay focused on execution and not getting distracted.

Sigfox chooses new countries to cover based on a number of parameters, but also addresses incoming opportunities from potential Sigfox Network Operators as they arise. The end goal is to build out a complete worldwide network, Nicholls explained.

Acquisitions could also come into play as part of the company’s growth strategy . ”But we are not in the process of acquiring anyone right now,” added Nicholls.

Sigfox’s low ARPU business model

Traditional operators have massive overheads and competing in the low ARPU segment might prove more difficult for them. Sigfox believes it can take advantage of this. ”Sigfox focuses on the use cases that only support a very low ARPU. These use cases are not addressed by current or future versions of the cellular networks or by the ways in which those networks are deployed and managed. It is a very complementary offer. If you look at evolutions such as NB-IoT, then you’ll quickly notice that there is still a gap in pricing, especially on the end points, and in energy consumption. There will also be many use cases that combine Sigfox and cellular,” said Nicholls.

The operator’s business model is simple: provide a global connectivity solution and that is it. Data subscriptions are provided to the distributors, which the company calls Sigfox Network Operators, and they in turn sell connectivity to various channels, including consultants, vertical experts, MNOs. ”It is a pyramidal mode that relies on efficient partnerships,” said Nicholls.

Eying an IPO

Sigfox had revenues of $12 million in 2015, triple 2014 revenues. That number is expected to grow significantly this year as well. The company will be also doubling the number of employees in 2016. Being in an expansion phase, the IoT operator is not yet profitable. It is planning another important round of financing in the near future. ”The round will most likely drive us to the IPO we are planning in the coming years,” said Nicholls. Sigfox’s business model is all about volume and, according to Nicholls, the company can reach profitability despite the ”ridiculously small amounts of money by subscription” it makes. ”It takes only a couple of large deals per country for that country to be profitable. Other actors trying to enter the operated low power connectivity space have instead high expenses and more complicated organization; it is more difficult for them to live in a very low ARPU world,” he said.

Source:Industrial IoT 5G

Comparative Look at LPWA Performance.

There are over a dozen LPWA technologies contending to provide connectivity for some of the billions of connected devices as projected by market analysts. How they all compare with each other is a hot topic in the race to markets. We recently published detailed analysis benchmarking these technologies in terms of capacity, range, throughput, power consumption and other characteristics*. In the process we developed a graphic for two parameters – range and throughput. Both are important parameters, but in the context of IoT, they are not the only parameters that need to be considered. Nevertheless, it is worth outlining some important aspects of this graphic.

IoT Technologies Map. [Source: Xona Partners]

When it comes to range, technologies in the licensed spectrum bands will on average perform better than those in unlicensed spectrum for the simple fact that interference in unlicensed spectrum cannot be controlled. This leads to higher margins that need to be added for public networks to ensure a specific coverage grade is met.

Unlicensed spectrum has lower radiated power limits than licensed spectrum. This works in favor of licensed-spectrum technologies to achieve longer range. Moreover, because regulatory requirements vary from country to country leading to different performance. Thus, a LoRa or SigFox network in France would have different performance than one in the US. The same is not true for licensed band technologies which are constrained by other factors.

Implementation impacts performance. Licensed-band technologies, leveraging the cellular networks, are designed to take advantage of installed base stations. Thus, they support multiple antennas for diversity and other features that extend coverage. Unlicensed-band LPWA technologies implement their own features to make connectivity more robust, which would have to be accounted for. These features impact performance and cost.

Throughput performance is related to range and the number of devices served by the gateway/base station. Average throughput provide an indication on what is actually possible in practice as opposed to peak throughput which is unattainable most of the time. Throughput will decrease as more devices contend for access. This is a major differentiator among technologies.

There are multitude of IoT applications. Each application has unique requirements. No one technology can serve all the applications efficiently. A few technologies will be required to meet the broad spectrum of applications. Technologies have to be evaluated in the context of applications. This is a critical point. The success of LPWA technologies will be defined by the ability of each player to develop its markets. The challenge is not one of technology performance, but it is in providing a solution to a problem that customers are willing to pay for. Where there is strong overlap in technology, history has shown that it not always the best technology that wins the race.

Source: Frank Rayal - Strategic insights & advisory in telecom and technology

3DEXPERIENCE®City - City Dream

How the rise of driverless cars will transform the advertising industry

Ford forecasts that in just five years we’ll be seeing self-driving cars on roads across the UK and USA. Business Insider UK goes for a punchier prediction, saying that by 2020 there will be 10 million self-driving cars on roads. Global auto and tech giants such as Google, Uber, Ford and Volkswagen are gearing up for a battle for drivers, passenger attention and marketing revenue. The rise of autonomous vehicles will permanently change the global ad industry by heralding the demise of outdoor display ads and generating substantial new revenue streams for mobile app brands.

Google is arguably in pole position in the race to dominate the world of self-driving car technology. The company's tech experience gained from projects in robotics, drones and software helps drive its ambitious autonomous vehicle programme. But why are they even tackling this project? At heart, Google is still an advertising company - and it is on a focused mission to reach as many consumer eyeballs as technologically possible. With millions of eyes off the road, this creates a passenger world of opportunity where much more mobile app content like games, movies and news will be consumed on mobile devices.

Connected cars to kill the radio star

So you think that video killed the radio star in the 80s? Not quite! Fast forward a few decades and mighty streaming mobile apps like Apple Music and Spotify have decimated the bottom lines of many a commercial network. It’s been forecast that about 380 million connected cars will be on roads by 2021, which will likely knock the last nail in the coffin for traditional radio. If music streaming apps were successful at luring millions of radio listeners, self-driving cars and the accompanying new scores of passengers will not just listen to music, but they’ll also have the opportunity to binge watch video content and play video games whilst on route to their destinations. Brands and media agencies will have a huge opportunity to attract, retain and engage with consumers thanks to the increased free time self-driving cars will give them.

Outdoor display ads will evolve or die out

When self-driving vehicles are on the road drivers won’t be paying as much attention to billboards as they do now. Outdoor display ads will have to change radically to ensure they're not just communicating a single marketing message; they’ll need to be much smarter, interactive and targeted.

One company which is ahead of the curve in outdoor advertising isClear Channel America, which recently partnered with major US telcos such as AT&T to monitor consumer travel behaviour and habits via smart phones. It has been trialing a data and analytics-driven platform called Radar, which is a new way for billboards to see who’s driving and to deliver data to advertisers. Radar outdoor ads track smartphones as they pass and capture information about traffic patterns, which in turn inform profile demographics.

Although Radar can’t identify typical data like age or sex, it can determine certain patterns. For example, Radar can spot travel patterns such as routes taken by, say, soccer moms, and deliver bespoke outdoor advertisements to these audiences. Media agencies need to start increasing investment in smart outdoor advertising otherwise the current, traditional, one-directional billboards will go the way of the dodo.

Mobile apps to rule the roost for in-car entertainment

Mobile apps are an intrinsic part of our daily lives with millions of people consuming content 24/7. The increased time spent on mobile apps means more eyeballs for advertisers, publishers and developers. In addition to this, mobile revenues peak during rush hours as connected vehicles and on-demand apps like Hailo and Uber create a treasure trove of opportunity for brands. What’s more, connected self-driving cars will deliver captive audiences for marketers because you can’t get more captive than being in a self-piloting car.

Conclusion

Autonomous vehicles will lead to more convenience and increased safety for passengers, and their prevalence will send shock waves across countless industries. The global advertising industry will undoubtedly go through a transitional period where it will snap up consumer attention from older ad formats to further  increase investment in mobile marketing. In a few decades time we could all be reminiscing about how autonomous cars were the beginning of the end for display ads, how it killed radio, and how it was responsible for a massive explosion of investment in mobile app marketing.

Source:Connected car Tech

Defining a Smart City

From transport infrastructure and service efficiencies to using data as an enabler for business, smart cities and connected technologies offer compelling benefits, writes Niall Hunt. But with a gamut of options knowing where to focus your efforts can be confusing.

Tweeting bins in Finland might be considered by some the trashy gimmick of smart city technology – despite the efficiencies they drive in refuge collection – but with examples such as the US city of Chicago’s Array of Things making serious headway into creating genuine efficiencies in city management the benefits are obvious. The question though is where to start.

Raj Mack, head of digital of the UK’s second city Birmingham, told the audience at Smart to Future Cities last month: “We need a definition about what Smart looks like. We also need to know what the outcomes are. We need to identify key strategic objectives and bring together assets to support those objectives. We need to have an integrated approach beyond systems, its about different functions working together.”

“We have made sure we have constantly dialogue with the citizens on what smart should looks like” – Raj Mack, head of digital, Birmingham

Trevor Gibson, Smart City leadership manager, Peterborough DNA added: “We have made sure we have constantly dialogue with the citizens on what smart should looks like. We use a circular city perspective, using the idea of looking about holistically at everything.”

Turning to London, Andrew Collinge, GLA assistant director, intelligence and analytics, said: “One of the things that we cannot ignore is that we have a broken data economy in the capital. If we want 21st century service, we need to get over the fact that we are 33 London Boroughs. Across these boroughs we need a more collective idea of demand for smart technologies.”

Bristol Is Open managing director Paul Wilson added: “You have to attack the topic from multiple approaches. King of all is livability, we are trying to build resilience and are trying to focus on sustainability.”

“For the big promise of a smart city, you need need a fundamental technology approach looking at connectivity in cities, because the current approach isn’t enough,” he said. “Bristol is focused on digital evolution. However, someone else from Bristol might come at it from a different point of view might focus on the people.”

Mack suggested that the “definition of sustainability has changed [for smart cities], its more about efficiency and taking a holistic view.”

Collinge agreed, citing one of Smart London’s demonstrator projects. “Transport for London has developed a system that is changing heat from the tube into power. In future we are broadening out our approach to heat and power. The whole point is trying to build out from our range of demonstrator projects,” he said.

Gibson describer Peterborough’s Circular City approach, which aims to use technology “to efficiently manage the numerous flows of resources coming in and out of its geographical boundaries”.

“We have taken a step back to see if we can use tech and data to see where we can focus, from waste to health to transport management. We looked using tech to drive that through our Living Data Portal, which business can use to share data. And its not just business we are also hoping to connect this to third sector. This will lead us to a more efficient city that is more sustainable and resilient.”

Partnerships and collaboration are also vital for smart city initiatives to work. “Bristol collaborated with the University, as well as folks like NEC. The heartland of Bristol is the council and the university and why wouldn’t you tap into business too.”

He described the creation of the Bristol Energy company ad its “smart from the start” philosophy. “The company was set up because the large energy companies weren’t doing well enough on things like renewables,” Wilson said.  “80% of Bristol Energy’s energy comes from renewables generated in the surrounding area.”

“It’s about reducing demand, asking how we can be more efficient, and asking how we engage with our partners to do that” - Paul Wilson, MD, Bristol is Open

With UK government spending under tighter and tighter scrutiny smart solutions are forcing cities’ hands, as Wilson said: “It’s about reducing demand, asking how we can be more efficient, and asking how we engage with our partners to do that. Yes it is about efficiency, it is about money, but its about doing it in an intelligent way.”

Moving to a smarter approach though has its challenges. Collinge said it is “about anticipating the future and not missing disruptive forces like Uber and Air B&B. It is also about focusing on people, which is also overlooked”.

Mack added: “[it is about] being connected at every level, allowing us to make local decisions based on local data, especially in terms of transport, housing, energy and technology. The only way we can get meaningful progress on this is with meaningful data.”

Wilson said it is on the verge of a £1 billion devolution deal for Bristol and its regions. “It’s an important thing that we devolve more,” he said. “We need to put proper powers in the hands of cities and we need to have the responsibility, tools and levers to do this.”

The definition then, while yet to be finalised, seems to be one that puts the decision-making power in the hands of the city governments. One that it driven by the needs of its citizens, services and business, rather than technology. And at the heart of it all is open data.

Source:Iot world News