Iot Now Magazine - Apr/May 2016

IoT Now: ISSN 2397-2793

APRIL/MAY 2016 • VOLUME 6 • ISSUE 2

TALKING HEADS Numerex’s Shu Gan: Becoming a true IoT services company

FLEET MANAGEMENT A pioneering IoT vertical

SMART CITIES

SMART UTILITIES

SMART HEALTH

INDUSTRIAL IoT

IoT GLOBAL NETWORK

New spaces for living, working and playing.

See our Analyst Report at www.iot-now.com

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 November/December issue.

The new interconnected manufacturing environment.

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Log on at www.iotglobalnetwork.com to discover our new portal for products, services and insight

PLUS: FLEET MANAGEMENT: Analyst Report Inside! • Updated standards from oneM2M • KORE acquires Wyless • Inmarsat and Actility partner for satellite and LoRa • Aeris appoints executive team for Aeris India • New LPWA definitions from Beecham Research • Special IoT Transformation supplement • www.iot-now.com

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CONTENTS

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27

TALKING HEADS

52

VIRTUAL AND AUGMENTED REALITY AND THE IoT

IN THIS ISSUE 4

EDITOR’S COMMENT The current IoT transformation is going to be long and complex, but help and advice are at hand

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MARKET NEWS OneM2M publishes updated standards; Cooperation starts between IIoC and Platform Industrie 4.0; LPWA connections treble – Machina Research; prpl Foundation shares Embedded Computing security principles

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COMPANY NEWS Altice, SFR and SIGFOX partnership; Wipro and Schneider target Indian Smart Cities; Inmarsat goes LoRa with Actility; KORE acquires Wyless; Comarch works with Nokia on IoT; Eurotech and Red Hat to simplify IoT WHAT’S HOT ONLINE New insights from a Verizon report: ‘State of the Market: Internet of Things 2016’; Device management survey from DevicePilot reveals a risk to IoT business growth; General Motors (GM) and Vodafone partner for GM connected car services in Europe CONTRACT NEWS & HOT LIST Latest wins for Gemalto, Sierra Wireless and many more

10 PEOPLE NEWS New names at Cryptosoft, Gemalto, Aeris, Ruckus and others 11

PRODUCT NEWS MultiTech wins LoRaWan certification; u-blox launches Dead Reckoning positioning module; Pycom uses Kickstarter for LoRa, WiFi, Bluetooth module; Infineon intros NFC security module

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WHAT’S HOT ON THE GLOBAL IoT NETWORK Beecham’s Robin Duke-Woolley on KORE’s acquisition of Wyless; ‘Welcome to the Internet of Experiences’, says Stephen Chadwick, MD for EuroNorth at Dassault Systèmes - and more

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TALKING HEADS Shu Gan, new CMO at Numerex, talks about how his company has been going through a major restructuring to adapt itself to the challenges and opportunities ahead INTERVIEW Ingrid Wistrand and Rami Avidan, managing directors at Tele2, on partnering as a critical strategy

20 INTERVIEW Tre Zimmerman, co-founder and CTO at Ubicquia, on smart city connectivity and platforms 24 CASE STUDY Numerex shows how the right connectivity can safeguard US children on their way to school 27 IoT NOW ANALYST REPORT - FLEET MANAGEMENT: A PIONEERING IoT VERTICAL In this edition’s independent Analyst Report, Rickard Andersson, senior analyst at Berg Insight looks at the state of the fleet management market and its solutions around the world 39 CASE STUDY Aeris shows how it provided a connectivity and monitoring solution to Isotrak, the leader in grocery retail and food distribution, for Europe and beyond 41

INTERVIEW Esmeralda Swartz, VP at Ericsson, explains the company’s IoT vision and current projects

45 INTERVIEW Telit’s Valerio Carta, explains how to complement GPS positioning by exploiting recent advances in MEMS technologies to deliver highly accurate positioning information without continuous GPS coverage 50 MWC REVIEW IoT-centric perspectives on the industry’s recent Show of Shows – 101,000 people can’t be wrong 52 PERSPECTIVES Virtual Reality – Augmented Reality and the IoT sector with views from Epson and Vuforia/PTC 54 INTERVIEW Thomas Nicholls, EVP Communications at SIGFOX, talks to Beecham Research’s Robin Duke-Woolley about the LPWA market 56 PERSPECTIVES Blockchain meets the IoT – hype or next big thing ?

60 IoT MASTERCLASS Saverio Romeo of Beecham Research on the EU’s various IoT initiatives

Numerex Corp. (NASDAQ:NMRX) is a leading provider of managed enterprise solutions enabling the Internet of Things (IoT), producing new revenue streams and creating operating efficiencies for customers. Numerex's technology and services are delivered through integrated platforms, and sold on a subscription basis. The Company offers a portfolio of managed end-to-end IoT solutions including smart devices, network connectivity and cloud-based applications which address a wide spectrum of vertical markets and industrial customers. Our mission is to empower enterprise operations with world-class, managed IoT solutions that are simple, innovative, scalable, and secure. Numerex is ISO 27001 information securitycertified. For additional information, please visit www.numerex.com IoT Now - April / May 2016

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COMMENT

Making the IoT journey…

EDITORIAL ADVISORS

As someone who’s lived and worked through probably five or six technology transformation cycles, going back to even before the term ‘paperless office’ arrived in the late 1970s, it can be easy to get firstly jaded – and then disappointed by the eternal rush to the ‘new’. A lot of the change that’s happened through the introduction of various technologies over the last few decades has been relatively slow and incremental. It’s already becoming clear that the impact of the IoT is almost certainly going to be faster and deeper than anything we’ve seen before.

Olivier Beaujard, vice-president Market Development, Sierra Wireless

Erik Brenneis, head of Vodafone M2M

Many people I spoke to at Mobile World Congress this year commented that this year seemed to be different – see page 50 for our review of the event. What was clear was that a number of different Alun Lewis, technologies had reached a editor, IoT Now point of both maturity and Magazine critical mass and were coming together with exponential effects.

Numerex explains how that company is reconfiguring itself for the future after a long and successful history. Other articles on the application of technologies like augmented and virtual realities and blockchain and the IoT highlight some of the other opportunities now emerging.

Finally, we thought that the whole issue of change and transformation was worth committing an entire supplement to. In this, you’ll find a perspective from SAP on the role that they’re playing - as well as the IoT Now Guide to Business Transformation. For this we approached a number of leading players, both large and small and all involved in some aspect of IoT-enabled change, for their take on the many different issues that have to be addressed during a strategic project. These include rapid prototyping, the emergence of servitisation as a new business model and, as ever, security.

Some industry sectors, like fleet management and telematics, explored in this issue’s analyst report by Rickard Andersson of Berg Insight, are already relatively mature, at least within the limits of the technologies that they’re currently using. Look a bit deeper – such as in the interview with Telit about their use of 3D dead reckoning-enhanced GPS, enabled by recent advances in MEMS technologies – and it’s easy to see how a development in area one can change the game in another.

Robin DukeWoolley, CEO, Beecham Research

Andrew Parker, project marketing director, Connected Living, GSMA

Gert Pauwels, M2M marketing director, Orange Business

Alun Lewis Editor, IoT Now Magazine

Deep change crops up in this issue in a number of other contexts as well. Shu Gan of

Alexander Bufalino, CMO, Telit

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: Rickard Andersson Senior Analyst at Berg Insight since 2010, Rickard’s current focus is the telematics market including fleet management solutions and intelligent transportation systems.

EDITOR Alun Lewis Tel: +44 (0) 1296 660423 a.lewis@wkm-global.com 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

Saverio Romeo Principal analyst at Beecham Research, Saverio shares his insights on IoT initiatives from the EC and future plans and investments

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR Cherisse Jameson Tel: +44 (0) 1732 807410 c.jameson@wkm-global.com

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IoT Now - April / May 2016

MARKET NEWS Updated IoT standards from oneM2M enable safer interconnection

Dr Omar Elloumi, ETSI/Nokia

ETSI has announced today that it has published the complete set of updated oneM2M Release 1 specifications, covering requirements, architecture, API specifications, security solutions and mapping to common industry protocols such as CoAP, MQTT and HTTP. Release 1 has already been used

in service provider deployments in South Korea, Asia and Europe for smart city and transport system deployments. “oneM2M enables interoperability across IoT applications regardless of the underlying technology used,” said Dr. Omar Elloumi of Nokia, oneM2M technical plenary chair. “Tenders are now explicitly requiring that oneM2M be incorporated in deployments; the first release and the impending Release 2 will respond to a critical need.”

New LPWA definitions from Beecham A report just published

by Beecham Research, ‘An Introduction to LPWA Public Service Categories: Matching Services to IoT Applications’, proposes service categories for Robin Dukeproviders of LPWA Woolley public services. The aim Beecham Research is to make it possible for users to match the IoT applications they want to the most appropriate connectivity services required to enable them and the report explores this matching process for a range of service types. In addition, the

report proposes a new name to refer to this new class of providers. Through discussions with the key market players who offer LPWA-based public services, it’s proposed that the term Public LPWA Services Provider (LSP) is used for a provider offering LPWA-based connectivity services directly to users.

In addition, where services offered by these LSPs are themselves enabled through a cloud-based service, it’s proposed that the term LPWA Services Enabler (LSE) for the cloud-based services provider is used. Details of this report and a free summary are available at www.beechamresearch.com

Plattform Industrie 4.0 and Industrial Internet Consortium agree to cooperate Plattform Industrie 4.0 and the Industrial Internet Consortium have met to explore the potential alignment of their two architectures the Reference Architecture Model for Industrie 4.0 (RAMI4.0) and the Industrial Dr. Richard Mark Soley, IIoT Internet Reference Architecture (IIRA). The meeting was a success, with a common recognition of the complementary nature of the two models, an initial draft mapping showing the direct relationships

between elements of the models, and a clear roadmap to ensure future interoperability. Additional possible topics included collaboration in the areas of IIC Testbeds and I4.0 Test Facility Infrastructures, as well as standardisation, architectures and business outcomes.

Dr. Richard Mark Soley, executive director of the Industrial Internet Consortium, commented, "This shows that smart technical people can bridge any gap and find a way to solve problems that might otherwise have created barriers to entry for IoT technology in industrial applications."

Machina Research study finds that LPWA connections trebled during 2015 to reach 23.2 million Machina Research has launched a new market tracker to follow developments in Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) networks. Its first iteration concludes that LPWA growth is certainly significant, Aapo Markkanen, more than trebling Machina Research during 2015. The study’s author, Aapo Markkanen comments: “In dedicated LPWA, much IoT Now - April / May 2016

of the attention has so far revolved around Sigfox and LoRaWAN, and in the coming months especially, Ingenu’s RPMA should increase its mindshare. In the meantime, Telensa – which is arguably the most tried and tested LPWA option out there – has just got fresh financing. Further technological advancement is driven by innovators such as Accellus, M2Communication, Nwave, and WAVIoT, although these have a lot to do on the commercial side of their strategies.”

NEWS IN BRIEF prpl Foundation reveals vision for a secure Internet of Things The prpl Foundation, an opensource, community-driven, collaborative, non-profit foundation supporting the next-gen connected devices industry, has announced availability of a new document entitled Security Guidance for Critical Areas of Embedded Computing, downloadable from its website. It describes a fresh hardware-led approach that is claimed to be easy to implement, scalable and interoperable.

“The Internet of Things is connecting our world in ways not anticipated even a decade ago. This connectivity finds its way into everything from light bulbs and home appliances to critical systems including cars, airlines and even hospitals,” said Art Swift, president of the prpl Foundation. “Security, despite its huge and increasing importance, has so far been addressed in piecemeal and often proprietary ways.”

Automotive industry adopts GSMA Embedded SIM specification Backed by international brands including General Motors, Jaguar Land Rover, Renault Nissan, Scania and Volvo Cars, this will enable automakers to remotely provision connectivity over the air to vehicles with an operator of their choice, delivering a range of in-vehicle services such as infotainment, realtime navigation, insurance and breakdown services, as well as telematics and remote diagnostics.

22 live operator solutions are now commercially available.

GSMA announces security guidelines for IoT The GSMA has announced availability of new guidelines to promote the secure development and deployment of IoT services, supported by mobile operators AT&T, China Telecom, Etisalat, KDDI, NTT DOCOMO, Orange, Telefónica, Telenor and Verizon and vendor and infrastructure partners 7Layers, Ericsson, Gemalto, Morpho, Telit and u-blox. “As billions of devices become connected in the IoT, offering innovative and interconnected new services, the possibility of potential vulnerabilities increases,” said Alex Sinclair, CTO, GSMA.

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COMPANY NEWS

NEWS IN BRIEF Altice, SFR and SIGFOX announce strategic IoT partnership Altice N.V., the international telecoms and media group, its subsidiary SFR, the second-largest French global telecommunications operator, and SIGFOX, have announced they will integrate SIGFOX connectivity with the group’s service offerings. Altice is currently building an international group with media, content and platform services in Western Europe, the USA, Israel, and French Overseas Territories.

“We are convinced that the IoT market is an opportunity to seize now, with a global vision,” said Michel Combes, COO of Altice, chairman and CEO of SFR. “We share the same entrepreneurial vision with SIGFOX and its network allows us to bring new IoT solutions to our B2B clients.”

myDevices’ Cayenne drag and drop IoT tool exceeds 200 million events in first 30 days myDevices, has announced that Cayenne, its drag-and-drop IoT projects builder, has already exceeded 200 million IoT events - such as threshold alerts, sensor history and rules engine triggers - just one month after launch.

“In order for IoT to evolve, the industry needs easy solutions to quickly prototype projects, but the platforms must be powerful enough to allow for different device types to be mixed and matched, regardless of their manufacturer or how they connect to the platform,” says Kevin Bromber, CEO of myDevices.

KORE to acquire Wyless KORE Wireless Group, Inc. has announced the acquisition of Wyless Group Holdings. The combined company will have more than 350 employees, maintain a customer base in excess of 3,000 B2B companies globally, serving over six million subscribers, so making it one of the six largest providers of M2M/IoT services globally. The combined business will have an extensive physical presence and data centre operations in Asia, Latin America, Europe and North America.

Alex Brisbourne will continue in his role as CEO and Mike Coffey, CEO of Wyless, will assume the new position of COO. The executive team will comprise of key executives from both companies.

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Eurotech and Red Hat collaborate for more secure and scalable IoT Red Hat, Inc., provider of open source solutions, and M2M/IoT company Eurotech, will work together to simplify and accelerate IoT integration. By pushing computing power to the Robert Andres, network edge, the Eurotech solution will help to remove the need to ship data to the cloud for real-time processing by enabling essential data aggregation, data transformation, integration, and routing to occur closer to the operational devices, triggering

business rules that automate machine processes.

Robert Andres, CMO, Eurotech, commented, “Both companies understand the value and necessity of a strong ecosystem to deliver IoT solutions. The companies’ respective competencies and products complement each other - Red Hat on the enterprise IT side, and Eurotech on the operational technology (OT) side with hardware and software. What’s more, Open Source and Java are important pillars in both companies’ strategies.”

Wipro and Schneider Electric partner to develop Smart City Solutions Wipro Limited has announced a strategic partnership with Schneider Electric to develop convergent solutions for India’s Smart Cities. The collaboration is intended to enable the delivery of cost-effective and efficient citizen services to urban and rural communities, focusing on areas like energy optimisation, analytics and citizen service improvement.

Kiran Desai, VP and Head – Global

Infrastructure Services, Wipro Limited said, “Wipro’s strength in system integration combined with Kiran Desai, Schneider’s world class Wipro products and solutions will help create a unique proposition for customers. Wipro is uniquely positioned to create convergent solutions with optimal total cost of ownership thereby enabling enhanced citizen experience.”

Inmarsat and Actility partner to deliver single, global platform for the IoT Inmarsat is partnering with Actility, a founding member of the LoRa Alliance, to enable an end-to-end IoT solution Olivier Hersent, anywhere in the world.

Actility The partnership combines Inmarsat’s global connectivity with Actility’s ThingPark™ IoT management platform to link connectivity, services and IoT devices from a single application and service

management point. Inmarsat also recently announced its membership in the LoRa Alliance.

“Actility is thrilled to be collaborating with Inmarsat to provide global customers with an end-to-end solution and a single service management point to fulfil their IoT business needs anywhere in the world with our ThingPark LoRaWAN platform,” said Olivier Hersent, CEO and CTO at Actility.

Comarch announces IoT technology partnership with Nokia The two companies will work together on connectivity management platforms as well as vertical applications services for key industries.

The platforms will complement Nokia’s existing IoT ecosystem to help form complete, end-to-end IoT solutions that will be offered to telecom and other industries worldwide. The Comarch M2M Platform has been implemented by major European mobile operators, including the Telekom Austria Group.

“We’re keen to bring the cooperation between Comarch and Nokia to the next level. The broad scope of the agreement Mariusz Lasek, reflects our vast Comarch investment in software Technologies and hardware around IoT for various industries such as e-health, low energy devices and automotive over the last year,” said Mariusz Lasek, Comarch Technologies CEO.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

WHAT’S HOT ONLINE

www. iot-now.com IoT goes mainstream, according to new Verizon report With an addressable market that includes more than 150 million cars that are not currently connected, over 300 million utility meters, nearly one million vineyard acres and 45 million people sharing goods and services in the US alone, the IoT is now mainstream according to a new report released today by Verizon.

Titled ‘State of the Market: Internet of Things 2016’, the report includes insights from an Oxford Economics study commissioned by Verizon, among other new findings.

Throughout 2016 and beyond, Verizon’s experts say that the IoT will continue to be a revenue driver for businesses both large and small due to the confluence of five macrotrends: • In an IoT-enabled world, consumers are starting to understand and expect that their smartphones can do more. In three to five years, average consumers will experience a much higher level of automation in their daily lives thanks largely to the ability to engage with IoT applications through simplified interfaces.

• Data monetisation will become a required competency.

Nearly 50% of businesses expect to be using more than 25% of their data over the next two to three years. Data analytics will evolve from descriptive data collection to a more sophisticated predictive and prescriptive model and there will be a shift from ‘big data’ to domain experts.

• Changes in the regulatory landscape will continue to bring the right ecosystem partners together to help establish industry standards more quickly.

• Network connectivity, low power devices and IoT platforms will democratise innovation by creating more tools for developers, enabling businesses to scale their IoT deployments from millions to billions of connections more cost-efficiently.

• Meanwhile, consumers are more willing to try new technologies and apps that introduce a better way of life.

The end result will not only give rise to thousands of new use cases over the next two years, but will also create an accelerated pipeline for innovation and a new economy.

www.iot-now.com (Search for: Verizon)

Device management survey reveals a risk to IoT business growth What do 50+ companies deploying connected devices believe is key to delivering ambitious IoT growth expectations?

DevicePilot recently surveyed 50 IoT companies taking connected products to market, across many different industry sectors, including environmental monitoring, elderly care/wellness, smart home, energy management, industrial monitoring, refrigeration, retail, public services and the smart city. Respondents were mainly CXOs in companies which ranged from established players with millions of devices already deployed to new start-ups with ambitious growth plans.

The survey uncovered some interesting views, including: • 61% of companies anticipate 10x growth over the coming year.

• 70% estimate their addressable market to be in the millions of devices – and 9% in the billions.

• The most common business model is a combination of up-front fee plus ongoing service fee.

• Only 18% of companies describe their device management as “highly automated and slick”.

• The biggest perceived risk of not managing devices well is risk to the growth of the company.

• 86% of companies say that as far as managing devices is concerned, they’re either already in trouble, or expect to be within 12 months.

As the IoT matures, users’ expectations of service quality are rapidly increasing, making it increasingly important to have an accurate picture of how those devices are performing.

www.iot-now.com (Search for: DevicePilot)

Vodafone’s M2M deal with GM brings out the importance of multinational coverage General Motors (GM) has announced that it is using Vodafone’s network for its GM OnStar connected car services in Europe.

position as a provider of multinational M2M contracts, and highlights further implications that this deal has for other operators.

This news further bolsters Vodafone’s credentials for major connected car contracts, and represents a significant setback for other major European operators – most notably, Telefónica, which had previously announced an agreement with GM for providing connectivity, says Tom Rebbeck, research director at Analysys Mason.

“GM’s OnStar system provides services such as emergency response, security, diagnostics and in-car connectivity. This new service will be operated in Europe by Vodafone, in partnership with AT&T. The agreement between AT&T, GM and Vodafone took effect when production of the new Opel and Vauxhall Astra began, before being expanded to all other models,” adds Rebbeck.

“We estimate that the GM contract could, in time, be worth over €20 million per year in revenue to Vodafone. This article discusses how this agreement may strengthen Vodafone’s • +44 hello@arkessa.com 1279 799270

IoT Now - April / May 2016

www.iot-now.com (Search for: Vodafone)

arkessa.com

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CONTRACT NEWS Good news for US beer drinkers! Ovinto and Globalstar underpin brewing industry’s first IoT deployment for beer shipment monitoring Globalstar has announced that its STX3 chipset is underpinning the first IoT system for monitoring craft beer while it is shipped around the world. US beer distributor, B. United International, is deploying Ovinto’s satellite-enabled sensor technology to monitor the location, temperature and pressure of hundreds of beer, cider and mead brands as they are shipped in tank containers from breweries around the world. Using Globalstar’s satellite communications, B. United can access

and share with its customers real-time details about the status of beer in each container, even when it is in transit across the ocean.

“After a journey of ten days from Europe or four weeks from Japan, the taste of craft beers can change. On arrival in the US, we review the data from Ovinto and analyse samples in our lab to determine the best way for putting it in kegs,” said Matthias Neidhart, Founder, B. United.

Kris Herteleer, owner of Belgium-based De Dolle Brouwers, supplies beer to the US market through B. United. “By bringing technology innovation into the craft beer sector, B. United is introducing unprecedented levels of transparency to the condition of our beer as it travels to the US.”

THE CONTRACT HOT LIST IoT Now April/May 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 Actility Aeris Aidon Arqiva ARM Asavie Blue Telecom Consulting Cisco CLX Communications Comarch Concirrus Ltd Ctrack Cyan Deutsche Telekom Device Solutions Ericsson Gemalto Geotab Geotab Giesecke & Devrient Globalstar/Ovinto Gooee Gooee HARMAN Hitachi Data Systems Huawei Huawei IBM Watson IBM Watson Jasper Jasper Kii KORE KORE LogiSense Corporation LogiSense Corporation Lynx Software Technologies, Inc. MultiTech NEC Nokia Paradox Engineering Persistent Systems Red Hat Inc. Schneider Electric Sierra Wireless Sierra Wireless Sierra Wireless SIGFOX SIGFOX SIGFOX Silver Spring Networks Silver Spring Networks Sony Spirent Communications Stadium Group Stream Technologies Stream Technologies Tech Mahindra Viva Labs

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Client, Country Inmarsat Digi-Key Smart Strøm Østafjells, Norway Wireless Logic, UK Hewlett Packard Enterprise EMC, Vodafone Ireland Tele2 Jasper Wirefast Nokia London Smart City programme Anglian Water, UK Micromodje, Iran KPN, Netherlands BinMaster, USA Volvo Jasper Cummins Connected Diagnostics MapsBI Vodafone Group B. United EnOcean, Germany Nordic Semiconductor, Norway NXP New York Waterway, USA Vodafone KUKA Fingrid, Finland KONE POST Luxembourg Tellular, USA HOUZE, USA Intelligent Telematics, USA Wyless Numerex, USA xMatters Dell, USA WaterBit, USA University of Adelaide, Australia Nakina Systems EnergiMidt, Denmark IBM Watson Eurotech, Italy Wipro, India Sagemcom Valeo, Russia Parkeon Altice/SFR - global Verisure Securitas, France OTIO, France Philips Lighting Consolidated Edison, Inc, USA Altair Semiconductor, Israel Oasis Smart SIM Trak Global Data2Go Wireless, USA Gaia Smart Cities, India Microsoft Lounea, Finland

Product / Service (Duration & Value) IoT connectivity IoT connectivity management Smart Grid Reseller arrangement for SIGFOX Device interoperability project IoT test bed M2M service monitoring system Acquisition IoT partnership IoT platform partnership Sensor data platform Fleet telematics Smart meter monitoring QIVICON Smart Home platform IoT project Self-driving car project Subscription management solution Vehicle telematics Acquisition eSIM management solution Beer shipment monitoring Energy harvesting for Smart Lighting Bluetooth and Smart Lighting V2X automotive partnering Intelligent transport data analytics NB-IoT Lab partnership Smart manufacturing Smart Grid solution Smart building partnership IoT platform services Telematics partnership Energy efficient Smart Homes In car camera telematics solution Acquisition Usage rating and billing platform Usage and rating platform Security technology LoRa-based agricultural monitoring Smart City partnership Acquisition Smart City project Engineering process project IoT collaboration Smart City partnership LTE-Cat 1 Smart Meter connectivity Telematics Smart parking connectivity modules SIGFOX deployments Alarm connectivity Smart Home device connectivity Networked LED solution Smart Grid and IoT platform Acquisition Strategic partnership Telematics device supply IoT-X platform integration IoT-X connectivity management Use of Azure IoT suite Smart Home platform

Awarded 2.2016 2.2016 1.2016 2.2016 3.2016 2.2016 2.2016 3.2016 2.2016 3.2016 2.2016 2.2016 2.2016 3.2016 3.2016 2.2016 2.2016 2.2016 2.2016 3.2016 2.2016 3.2016 3.2016 3.2106 1.2016 2.2016 3.2016 2.2016 2.2016 2.2016 2.2016 3.2016 3.2016 3.2016 1.2016 3.2016 2.2016 2.2016 3.2016 2.2016 2.2016 3.2016 3.2016 3.2016 2.2016 2.2016 2.2016 3.2016 2.2016 2.2016 2.2016 2.2016 1.2016 2.2016 3.2016 3.2016 2.2016 2.2016 3.2016

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PEOPLE NEWS Cryptosoft announces IoT visionary, Dan McDuffie, to join as board advisor

Dan McDuffie, Cryptosoft

Cryptosoft, specialist in policy driven authentication and encryption services for connected IoT and M2M devices, has announced that renowned IoT technologist Dan McDuffie has joined as a board advisor. This coincides with the company’s 2016 plans to aggressively expand its IoT data security platform into new customer markets. McDuffie was previously Group CEO of Wyless Inc.

“Cryptosoft is one of the most exciting companies I have seen in a long time,” said McDuffie. “Their ability to offer IoT platform providers the opportunity to drive further value to their clients, as well as deliver a compelling, competitive security advantage via a completely secure data and authentication platform for IoT, has huge potential.”

Jesper Bennike appointed CEO of GateHouse Logistics

Jesper Bennike, GateHouse Logistics

Tracking, monitoring and satellite communications software provider GateHouse Holding A/S has appointed Jesper Bennike as CEO of its whollyowned subsidiary GateHouse Logistics A/S. GateHouse Holdings logistics systems track over 200,000 units each day in ships, trucks and planes.

comments: “Clearly, we are delighted to welcome Jesper Bennike to the GateHouse Group’s senior management team. He brings a rich pedigree in developing disruptive technology businesses to the group and as CEO of the GateHouse Logistics subsidiary will be the driving force for our ghTrack data unifying platform.”

Michael Bondo Andersen, CEO GateHouse Holding,

Gemalto announces future CEO succession

Philippe Vallée, Gemalto

Gemalto has announced that its current CEO Olivier Piou is retiring at the end of August, 2016.

Mr. Philippe Vallée, currently COO of Gemalto, will be proposed at the annual general meeting to become an executive director of the Board and new CEO, effective September 1, 2016. Mr. Vallée has 27 years of experience in the digital security space and joined Gemalto in 1992.

Mr Vallée said, "I am really honoured to be proposed. Together we have created a tremendous foundation for future growth. Authentication and data protection are truly essential to modern digital services and the products, platforms, software and services that Gemalto provides are fundamental elements of the 21st century way of life."

Aeris appoints Dr. Rishi Bhatnagar as president of India Operations

Dr. Rishi Bhatnagar, Tech Mahindra

IoT and M2M technologies specialist, Aeris has announced its expansion into India and the appointment of Dr. Rishi Bhatnagar as the president of Operations for Aeris India to oversee operations in Africa, the Middle East and Asia Pacific. Before Aeris, Dr. Bhatnagar was the global head of Digital Enterprise Services at Tech Mahindra, spearheading IoT initiatives for the company.

Dr. Bhatnagar said, “With Prime Minister Modi having a strong focus on building a digitally empowered nation, the timing could not be more

perfect for Aeris to venture into this market.”

Dr. Bhatnagar is also the chairperson for The Institution of Engineering and Technology-Internet of Things (IET-IoT) India Panel.

Aeris has also formed a senior leadership team to work with Dr. Bhatnagar, including Tushir Malik as VP of sales and business development, Arvind Gopalakrishnan as VP of sales engineering and customer success, and Asit Goel as VP of engineering and operations.

Ruckus Wireless appoints industry veteran Nick Watson as VP EMEA

Nick Watson, Ruckus Wireless

Ruckus Wireless, Inc. has announced that Nick Watson has joined the company as VP to lead marketing, sales and operations in EMEA. “Nick joins us at an exciting time in the growth of Ruckus,” said Ruckus CCO Ian Whiting. “He is a pragmatic, tenacious, strategic field sales leader who has built numerous vertical and geographic multi-country teams while delivering exceptional

customer experiences. His experience and leadership will be an invaluable addition to our team.”

Watson joins Ruckus from HP Networking, where he was VP, EMEA. Previously, he spent 15 years at Cisco, where he held various sales and sales leadership roles, including responsibility for EMEA’s top global accounts.

Navmii appoints Steve Coast, OSM founder, as board advisor

Steve Coast, Navmii

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Navmii, the free, smart navigation and traffic app, has appointed Steve Coast, the founder of the OpenStreetMap Foundation (OSM), as a board advisor. Navmii has created enhanced, automotive grade OSM maps using its map enhancement platform and billions of points of mapping data collected from its users. Navmii will offer this enhanced data for license to B2B customers both as pure map data and mapping tile services to

power web and mobile solutions.

Steve Coast started the OpenStreetMap project in 2004, which quickly grew into a huge crowd sourced community project of volunteers to build an open source map of the world. During the past ten years the project has mapped the entire planet and is now used by companies, governments and humanitarian organisations.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

PRODUCT NEWS Infineon announces plugand-play NFC security module for smart wearables

MultiTech’s MultiConnect mDot awarded LoRaWAN certification by LoRa Alliance Global manufacturer of M2M and IoT devices, MultiTech Systems, Inc., has announced that its MultiConnect® mDot™ a LoRaWAN ready, LPWAN RF module, is now fully certified by the LoRa Alliance. Via a LoRaWAN certification process conducted at Espotel’s laboratory in Jyväskylä, Finland, the certification ensures that the module formally complies with LoRaWAN

specifications and is compatible with LoRaWAN networks.

MultiConnect mDot radios use the new Semtech LoRa, low power, wide area RF modulation. They are said to bring intelligence, reduced complexity and cost to the edge of the network by running ARM's mbed OS on a low power ARM Cortex-M4 series processor.

Customers integrating the mDot into their final design can now also leverage the module’s CE, FCC and LoRaWAN certifications.

MultiConnect mDot

u-blox in automotive GNSS innovation with untethered 3D dead reckoning ublox, global provider of wireless and positioning modules and chips, has released NEO-M8U, an Untethered 3D Dead Reckoning (UDR) module.

Combining multi-GNSS (GPS, GLONASS, BeiDou, Galileo) with an onboard 3D gyro/accelerometer, the NEOM8U provides accurate positioning even where GNSS signals are weak or not available. It achieves this without any connection to the vehicle other than power.

Intended to provide superior multipath suppression to improve position

accuracy even in tough environments, ublox NEO-M8U such as urban canyons, tunnels, or parking garages, it’s claimed that the NEO-M8U is typically three times more accurate than a traditional GNSS receiver. In addition, NEO-M8U offers instantaneous position immediately after power-up, without the need to wait for a first fix as with regular GNSS receivers.

Infineon Technologies AG, in collaboration with Beijing-based Mobile Payment Solutions Co. Ltd., have announced a new NFC security module series. This new plug-and-play solution is claimed to significantly reduce design efforts for device manufacturers by bundling a high-end Infineon security chip with NFC antenna components and software on the smallest PCB footprint. The smallest module of the series measures only 4mm x 4mm, making it suitable for applications like fitness trackers, smart keys, chains, watches or wristbands.

The Boosted NFC security module series manufactured by MPS has now been awarded the Mobile Finance Secure Element Certificate by the China Financial Authentication body of the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) - a key enabler in the move to address the fast-growing mobile payment market in China.

Infineon NFC Security Module

OPINION

SPONSORED COLUMN

Specialised IoT connectivity services save you time and money Alexander Bufalino, CMO of Telit, explains why IoT connectivity services can benefit organisations of all sizes The relative newness of the IoT market means it is hard for organisations to predict the take-up and the lifecycle of a service. They want to avoid committing to high volume connectivity at the outset but they need the assurance that they can scale up as demand materialises. IoT connectivity services therefore need to be flexible and highly scalable to enable organisations of all sizes to achieve their aims.

IoT services can cover different markets and territories so direct relationships with national telecoms carriers will not address all the markets an organisation might serve. Even within a single market, relationships with more than one carrier may be required to guarantee coverage and quality.

Alexander Bufalino, CMO, Telit

Significant challenges are involved in managing multiple carriers, their different pricing and, in some cases, different network technologies. IoT connectivity services abstract this complexity away so businesses gain the benefits of consistent services across multiple markets and tap into the cost savings the purchasing power of a specialist creates.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

Companies can access the experience of a specialist connectivity provider to ensure they have the most appropriate connectivity for the service they are offering – backed by 24/7 support and at great cost efficiency. IoT connectivity service providers also offer managed security across multiple networks and bundle SIM provisioning, SMS, data and voice services into a single deal. Why waste time and money managing relationships with a complex web of suppliers when you can ease the management burden and save costs by selecting a specialised IoT connectivity services provider? www.telit.com/pan-european-offering/

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WHAT’S HOT ON IoT GLOBAL NETWORK

KORE acquires Wyless

Robin Duke-Woolley Beecham Research

KORE’s announcement of its acquisition of Wyless has been a while in the making, but hugely significant now it is here, writes Robin Duke-Woolley, the chief executive of Beecham Research. The combined business will have considerably more direct M2M connections than most mobile network operator (MNO) M2M business units worldwide and will be the largest independent M2M network provider globally,

certainly in terms of revenue. Among other statistics, the combined company has more than 350 staff, a customer base of more than 3,000 B2B companies and more than six million direct M2M connections that are significantly revenue generating. There are also further revenuesharing connections that drive the total overall connection numbers somewhat higher.

Read the rest of this two-part article at http://bit.ly/225UxKH

How to avoid an Internet of Exploited Things Adoption of the IoT is proceeding quickly and although most people don’t yet have a smart refrigerator or toaster in their home, smart has taken off in certain market segments, writes Christian Fredrikson, the chief executive of F-Secure. TVs, fitness tracking devices, home monitoring systems and personal wearable devices are all hot products for connectivity, and it’s only a matter of time before other segments

follow. Gartner tells us that by 2020, 25 billion devices will be connected. But as F-Secure’s chief research officer Mikko Hypponen has pointed out, “a smart device just means an exploitable device”.

He is, of course, correct. In the past year alone we’ve seen exploitable flaws in smart cars, smart security systems, smart thermostats and smart toys, to name a few.

Read the rest of this two-part article at http://bit.ly/1SfgfFV

Welcome to the Internet of Experiences A technology revolution is underway in which sensors, networks, and analytics software connects physical objects and infrastructure to computing systems, writes Stephen Chadwick, managing director for EuroNorth at Dassault Systèmes. This provides an unprecedented view of the status, location, and activities of products, assets, and people. This is the IoT that the BBC

describes as a ‘layer of digital information which covers the physical world’. According to Forrester Research, ‘While smart homes and cool gadgets get the headlines, its the non-glamour applications that get the traction’. It is estimated that the IoT will connect 50bn things over the next five years in a market worth up to £1.5tn.

Read the rest of this two-part article at http://bit.ly/1WGw5bF

Lost in the IoT Standards space?

Let IoT Global Network guide you through - www.iotglobalnetwork.com

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IoT Standards Galaxy

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TALKING HEADS

“We have a solid base to build from with around 8,000 enterprise customers, including some wellknown names such as John Deere, Comcast, and United Technologies”

Shu Gan, CMO, Numerex

Numerex – the journey to becoming a true IoT services company While the role of the IoT in business transformation is a popular topic – see this issue’s special supplement – most of the focus is on transforming the customer, not on the changes that IoT vendors and service providers must themselves go through. In the face of unrelenting technology change and a growing demand across an almost infinite range of market sectors, how should IoT product and service suppliers react?

IoT Now’s editor, Alun Lewis, recently spoke with Shu Gan, CMO at Numerex, a long-established pioneer in the M2M/IoT space, about how his company has been making major structural changes and improvements to its business model in order to adapt to the challenges and opportunities ahead.

that we’re on as having the goal of becoming a true IoT services company – but with a series of specific and well communicated specialities. To support that, we’re also redefining our focus on some specific vertical markets to provide complete end-to-end solutions for our customers.

IoT Now: Shu, the last six months or so has seen considerable change in the senior executive ranks at Numerex – a new CEO, a new CTO and, in March this year, a new CFO. You yourself joined last October as CMO after a successful career spanning many IoT-related fields. What’s going on?

Numerex already has all of the IoT key building blocks in place – devices, connectivity through our carrier partners, featurerich applications, and a scalable platform that allows rapid deployment of virtually any IoT solution. We combine that with technical expertise developed over many years and a keen insight into specific markets. With our new corporate goals, we are looking to reconfigure the assets that make up these building blocks to increase in feature/functionality and services, simultaneously broadening the scope of our offerings while also refining the targeting of particular vertical and horizontal markets.

We have a solid base to build from with around 8,000 enterprise customers, including some well-known names such as John Deere, Comcast, and United Technologies. Altogether, our customer install base adds up to more than 2 million enterprise users, connected across the planet in ways that encompass the full range of cellular and satellite technologies.

Any corporate vision like the one that we’re undertaking obviously has many different facets, but if I was to sum up our strategy in the simplest way possible, I’d define the journey

IoT Now: There’s a huge amount of discussion across the industry about platforms, with many different definitions and types of offerings under that catch-all term. What’s the Numerex strategy here?

SG: Many platforms today focus on only a few IoT-enabling elements, but our nxFAST™ platform was built to deliver an end-to-end solution that can encompass connection and subscription management, application enablement, full vertical solutions, IoT billing and rating services, and device management. The platform incorporates a complete suite of IoT components including solution services, enablement services, and core services – all on a highly scalable, secure, and geographically redundant platform. ▼

SG: Numerex has been a key player in the development of first telemetry, which then became M2M, and which is now known as the IoT, over many years – next year we’ll be celebrating our 25th anniversary as a company. Our board recognised that Numerex - and the wider IoT sector - are now at a critical juncture in their evolution and that strategies, services and products that have served us and our customers well for years must now adapt to the new and growing demands of the marketplace.

IN ASSOCIATION WITH NUMEREX IoT Now - April / May 2016

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TALKING HEADS

“Numerex is incredibly lucky in already having a highly skilled, talented and well-motivated workforce – we wouldn’t have nearly 200 issued or pending patents to our name otherwise”

IoT Now: It’s become a corporate cliché to say that employees are a company’s most important asset. We’ve covered the recent changes at the top of the organisation – what’s Numerex been doing in terms of staffing for this sea change in operations and marketing?

SG: Numerex is incredibly lucky in already having a highly skilled, talented and well-motivated workforce – we wouldn’t have nearly 200 issued or pending patents to our name otherwise. The changes that we have underway under the new CEO, Marc Zionts, won’t significantly affect our total headcount, but we are changing our organisational structure and recruiting fresh faces from the services sector to create true enterprise-grade service to improve the account support, quality assurance and high end service delivery that we want to guarantee to our customers.

We’ve also been refreshing our sales and account management teams to help them focus better on meeting our customers’ diverse needs. One key executive you missed at the beginning of our discussion is our new Chief Revenue Officer, Vin Costello, who joined us one week after me, and he has been recruiting market experts who speak the language of the different sectors we’re targeting and is building a new customer account team who have an intimate understanding of how a world-class service is run.

IoT Now: You touched earlier on the different markets that you’re aiming at. Can you go into more depth on these?

SG: I’ll start by clarifying the market sectors that are not on our list today: smart cities, connected cars and consumer wearables. While these obviously all have huge potential, we believe that companies like ours perform best when they specialise in what they do better than most of their competitors – and those specialties can be a mix of vertical and horizontal market definitions and the sweet spots where they cross over and meet.

The three biggest segments from our perspective are safety and security, asset monitoring and optimisation and asset tracking – and each of these translates in practice into a number of specific package offerings.

For example, in the area of safety, lone worker protection is fast becoming a must-have for many different types of industries, from real estate agencies to home nursing providers, and pretty much all kinds of industrial service forces, especially as organisations seek to cut costs and

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reduce staffing. We can provide a simple, yet effective solution – branded as mySHIELD™ - that includes the wearable device, tracking and geo-fencing tools to monitor lone workers, and provide instant access to a live operator via a one-push panic button. This type of solution is also becoming popular in helping senior citizens remain independent and active, knowing that help can be instantly summoned.

Asset management and optimisation also has a number of different use cases within the IoT. One specifically involves tank monitoring through our iTank™ offering - a comprehensive, turnkey solution created specifically for the distributors of bulk-lubes and fuels - providing wireless tank level readings and route optimisation. Traditionally, bulk fuel deliveries are made on a tight schedule such as once a week.

Consumption rates will however almost always vary, and it’s much more efficient for both the distributor and their customers to be able to track real time fill levels of the tanks with different product types with the most efficient route schedules and the right mix of product loads, only sending a tanker out when pre-set criteria are met. This can create big savings for the distribution companies by eliminating truck rolls, avoiding unnecessary ‘top-offs’ of already full tanks, and reducing vehicle wear and tear and fuel costs, all the while simultaneously improving the customer experience.

Similarly, our iManage™ industrial IoT solution allows manufacturers to wirelessly track, manage, and analyse the flow of production parts, assemblies and racks between factories, suppliers and warehouses. It can alert supply chain professionals in the event of a stoppage, slowdown, or other issues. This ensures that production facilities continue to operate without experiencing material shortages, incurring rush shipping charges, or suffering unplanned downtime. In addition, iManage provides data for tracking compliance with third party logistics service-level agreements, mitigating loss or theft of shipping racks, containers, or high-value inventory.

That’s another angle on our focus on security through loss mitigation of both inventory and the containers they are shipped in.

That said, as we sharpen our market focus and bring our solutions to industry leadership, we at the same time are actively seeking new growth opportunities suitable for Numerex. I would not be surprised if you hear us talking in a few months down the road about a new sector that we’ve just entered.

Personally, I feel that I’m in an interesting – and even rather unique - position in this context. While I am the CMO, my original background is in engineering, and my career has led me through both product management and sales, so at Numerex I also have responsibility for the product roadmap, which is very exciting, given the technical complexity and the rapid change in IoT marketplace. This is another important aspect of the company’s development in bringing marketing and systems and device engineering closer to the needs of our many different customers.

IoT Now: After a period of relative stability, new wireless technologies specifically designed for the IoT space such as

▼

To support the focus on specific markets that I mentioned earlier, nxFAST also supports pre-packaged, hosted IoT vertical solutions that can be quickly deployed. These include end-to-end IoT solutions for home and personal security, asset tracking, asset monitoring and optimisation, and public safety vertical markets. The accompanying services include branded service provider portals, pre-integrated devices, and distributor account management. The platform and its individual elements can operate as a completely hosted solution, as a hybrid solution that leverages customer components and its built-in capabilities or, finally, as a hosted Platform as a Service (PaaS) model.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

LTE-M and Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) are now emerging.

What’s the Numerex position on the potential of these?

SG: There are a number of different issues with the whole wireless connectivity area that must also be taken into account, such as providing continuity of service and support as 2G spectrum is refarmed. For example, we announced at the end of last year that we’ll continue to support IoT customers with 2G network connectivity through 2020 via the T-Mobile network in the USA. Since so many IoT devices are still operating on 2G networks, this allows current 2G customers to keep their deployed assets, but still gives them time to plan for future LTE migration - some may bypass 3G altogether - and this will possibly save millions of IoT devices from 'going dark' as a result of 2G turndowns on other networks.

In terms of the technologies that you mentioned, we think that it’ll still be six to twelve months before the LPWA market matures enough for us to make a firm decision. We’re also looking at LTE-M and NB-IoT with a strong interest but that time frame is probably a bit longer down the road, given the initial stage of standards today. One thing I might add though, is that as service provider of end-to-end managed solutions, we are technology agnostic. We will not hesitate to embrace a new network or technology and include it in our portfolio when it’s proven, mature, and meets the requirements of our customers.

IoT Now: Security is another perennial topic in the IoT. With your focus on enterprise and industrial markets, how do you get potential customers to place their trust in your systems and processes?

SG: Throughout our history we’ve always concentrated a significant proportion of our work on ensuring that our customers’ data remains safe and this involves deploying appropriate tools such as encryption, network monitoring to detect attacks in real time, plus ensuring that the wider operational environment can be protected from human vulnerabilities as well.

I believe that we were the first M2M service provider in North America to be awarded the prestigious ISO 27001 information securityrelated certification. Numerex follows an ISO-sanctioned systematic approach in the implementation of security controls, which encompass people, processes and IT systems. That certification means the M2M and IoT data that we process and transport on behalf of our customers maintain the strictest levels of confidentiality, integrity and availability.

One tangible proof of that is that one of our customers is FEMA – the Federal Emergency Management Agency – itself a part of the United States Department of Homeland Security. Another is the FAA, the Federal Aviation Administration. These government entities require a high level of security and they trust Numerex to deliver it.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

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INTERVIEW

Growing the IoT market through partnerships Since its formation in 2012, Tele2’s IoT division has taken a different approach to other telecoms operators with global ambitions in IoT. Tele2’s focus is on providing capabilities to customers and partners, rather than owning the entire value chain for solutions. Tom Rebbeck, Research Director at Analysys Mason talks to Ingrid Wistrand and Rami Avidan, managing directors at Tele2, who jointly run the company’s IoT division about their IoT strategy, partnerships and how they view IoT today.

IW: We provide a generic horizontal layer on top of which other partners build solutions for specific vertical requirements.

RA: I think it’s very simple. We have a horizontal approach. We don’t build end-toend solutions in given verticals. We offer connectivity solutions and then on top of that we wrap value-added services in many different areas, with a big focus on working with partners.

TR: How do you manage the potential for conflict with partners?

TR: When you talk about a horizontal approach what do you provide and how do your partners fit in?

RA: If you look at our offering it consists of two buckets. One is the Tele2 solutions these include, for example, connectivity, connectivity management, data storage and security solutions.

The other bucket is partner solutions. We have partnerships with a lot of different players: Microsoft, IBM, Salesforce, SAP, Telit to name a few. With partners and with our own solutions, the idea is we should be able to cater for our customers’ needs, whatever their requirements.

IW: From a channel perspective we focus on what we call open-book management. We have a clear view across our entire direct/indirect pipeline so we can see early on where there could be a potential clash or conflict, so we can manage it properly. We don’t partner with everyone under the sun; we pick our partners carefully. We are stringent on the requirements for our partners; they have to fit this open model or we will not work with them.

The other aspect is that, even if we have our own solution, it is critical that we meet the customer’s requirements. We are not going to choke customers with our solutions if it makes more sense for them to go with a partner solution.

TR: How does it work in practice? You have partners like ThingWorx and Telit that potentially compete against each other, and

▼

Tom Rebbeck, Analysys Mason

TR: Tele2 has taken a different strategy to IoT from some other operators. Can you start by talking about your approach?

IN ASSOCIATION WITH TELE2

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IoT Now - April / May 2016

Rami Avidan and Ingrid Wistrand, managing directors at Tele2

you may have some of these capabilities in-house.

IW: Basically we put the various components in front of the customer and let them make the decision. Sometimes it will be our solution; sometimes it will be our partner’s.

There is not going to be one technology that wins. There is not going to be one platform.

As a telco provider, the position we take is that we have to stay agnostic. That doesn’t mean that we can’t have our own solution, but we have to be agnostic.

“We don’t want to cannibalise our partner revenue streams”

ESAB wanted the four providers to work together, but to procure directly from each, rather than to wrap it all up with the system integrator.

TR: Is that structure typical or do some customers want a single point of contact?

RA: I would say right now it’s around 50-50.

As we move further along the track of IoT I think more and more companies will want a single point of contact.

TR: And who do you think it will be?

RA: Why don’t we start with ESAB. ESAB is the world’s second largest welding manufacturer. They wanted to move away from selling products, welding machines, to selling a service. ESAB approached us and we brought some partners into the deal: Wipro, as a system integrator, a local system integrator called Enfo to build certain components on the application layer and Larsen & Toubro from India to build the hardware. Together the four of us delivered an end-to-end solution to ESAB.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

RA: It will probably be a systems integrator though we see an influx of application service providers (ASPs) – companies like CSL DualCom – adding value to the market. The ASPs are not only focusing on SME market but also on large enterprises. ASP is going to be a big segment.

IW: And Tele2 is being clear that we will not do the system integration part, we will not do the hardware part, we will not build the vertical solution.

TR: The fact that you can say: ‘we will not do

▼

TR: It would be useful to flesh this out with an example.

17

INTERVIEW

this, we will not do that’ seems to be core to your approach and is different from some other operators

experience you need control over your infrastructure and it has to be proactively managed by IoT experts.

IW: Yes, most of our competitors are confusing not only their customer, but also their partners.

We want to make it easy for partners to come and work with us.

TR: I am interested in the balance between bespoke solutions and more ‘off-the-shelf’ solutions. How is this mix developing?

RA: And I think Tom the message here for us internally and to the market is that we do not want to cannibalise our partner revenue streams.

IW: We can build a larger cake rather than eating more of the existing one, which is what you do when you enter into specific end-to-end solutions, alienating partners.

TR: There is an incorrect perception that connectivity is a commodity and the other aspects of IoT are more complex. What is your view on this? How you are providing customers with quality connections?

IW: The demands on connectivity for the IoT are vastly different when compared with the traditional telecommunications business.

As use cases are becoming increasingly business critical, if the connectivity isn’t working correctly the consequences can be much more severe than if you can’t make a voice call. To provide our IoT customers with an excellent connectivity

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RA: If you look at the ‘off-the-shelf’ solutions, the mature players already have a system in place and just need connectivity. But IoT is predominantly being looked at by ‘greenfield’ customers that don’t have an existing IoT solution. There is not going to be an ‘off-theshelf’ product available, as they will want it to be their product. They will want their logo somewhere, their look and feel based on their specific requirements.

Our vision is to make the products 80% off–theshelf to enable fast go-to-market for customers and partners.

TR: If the intention is 80% off-the-shelf, where do you say you are today?

RA: I would say that we are probably in the region of 40% to 50%.

TR: And how long it will take to get to that 80%?

RA: Probably two to three years. We are on a real, heavy trajectory of growth. We are hiring a

▼

“Our vision is to make the products 80% off-the-shelf to enable fast go-tomarket for customers and partners”

IoT Now - April / May 2016

“The demands on connectivity for IoT are vastly different compared with traditional telecommunications”

lot of R&D people and product people. We are putting a lot of our focus on the value-added services side of things. We are now around 70+ people and growing rapidly so will be, organically, 100 by the end of the year, but we are also growing inorganically.

TR: When you say inorganically where are you looking to grow?

RA: On the product side. We are engaged in four different acquisitions right now. We are hoping to announce one, maybe even two, before the summer and then an additional one or two after the summer.

TR: Are those all to add capabilities or is it for their existing customer base or their people?

IW: It is all about capabilities and capabilities come from great people. As Rami said, acquisitions are primarily on the product side but also on the technology side.

TR: There is a danger that by making these acquisitions, and offering more products, you will damage your partner relationships. How are you managing this?

IW: Acquisitions are 100% in line with our horizontal strategy, so there is no risk of jeopardising our partner relations - we will not start selling hardware or vertical applications.

TR: IoT is clearly extremely important to Tele2 as a group.

IW: We are the tenth ‘country’ in the group, but a ‘country’ without borders. The majority of our business is outside our network footprint. We are already, today, in 155 countries; it is a global business. Our top management and owners are investing heavily in us and in what we are doing as they see great potential in the IoT area.

TR: IoT at Tele2 is led by the two of you. It is an unusual structure. Can you talk about how the two of you manage decision making?

RA: I think it is something that stands out and also shows that Tele2 is ready to try new models.

In our case it works well and we see it as part of the success we’ve had. Our model is to take all important decisions jointly, around strategy,

IoT Now - April / May 2016

major investments, key people and it works well.

If you have two people who complement each other, you do get so much more than just one plus one.

TR: The final thing I want to get your take on is what is happening in IoT today. The forecast of 20 billion plus connected devices is turning into an IoT cliché, along with the connected fridge.

Revenue forecasts are in the trillions. But the deals we see today are mostly small. Now clearly Tele2 is growing at a fast rate and the industry is too, but we are still at a very early stage. How do you manage expectations for IoT? IW: It is a good question, and you are right; there is a lot of hype around the industry. When you read analyst reports, and listen to the consultants and advisers that speak to top management they talk about these billions and trillions. It is far from the reality we operate in. It sounds like you just can go out with your knife and cut gold. Of course is not as easy as that.

But, that said, it is an area that is experiencing strong growth and the potential is enormous, but as an industry we need to manoeuvre in the right way to capture the full potential. There are hurdles that we need to overcome like security, which we hear customers talk about more and more. Quality is also important as IoT becomes business critical for more companies.

There are a lot of companies involved in IoT everyone wants to do IoT in one way or another.

This all comes back to why we think it is so important to be clear on our role in the value chain. When Rami and I were setting the strategy in 2012, we decided that we needed to be focused because it is a complex value chain, and many players want to take a piece of the pie. To manage expectations, it helps to be clear on what you are doing.

Tom Rebbeck leads Analysys Mason’s Digital Economy research practice, drawing on more than 15 years of experience in the telecoms sector. He is based in their London office, works for clients worldwide, and is a specialist on the IoT and other new digital services.

Before joining Analysys Mason, Tom worked for Telefonica, where he was involved in the launch of a number of services across Telefónica’s worldwide footprint.

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INTERVIEW

Leveraging streetlights to power innovative distributed IoT platforms for Smart Cities

AM: For readers who are not familiar with Ubicquia, can you introduce us to your company?

TZ: Ubicquia was established to pursue and develop solutions for the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) in 2013. We are a

ten employee strong and privately funded company headquartered in Wellington, Florida. Ubicquia offers an innovative integrated platform that enables any customer to easily design, deploy and manage IIoT solutions that are cost effective, scalable and secure. The solution

▼

Ensuring a sustainable quality of life in cities is both a great challenge and a great opportunity.

Worldwide, every day, about one million people move to live in cities and, by 2050, an estimated 70% of the global population will live in an urban environment. Smart city and IoT technologies aim to improve productivity and transportation, ensure a clean environment, provide sustainable energy and water, give access to healthcare, and provide security.

However, if we’re to make smart cites successful, multiple stakeholders including city councils, citizens and enterprises, as well as universities and educational institutions must work together. Moreover, smart city solutions often involve cooperation across an ecosystem of network operators, service providers, system integrators and technology providers. André Malm of analyst firm Berg Insight speaks to Tre Zimmerman, co-founder and Chief Technology Officer at Ubicquia, about how cities can rapidly deploy wireless networks to enable open smart city applications and services.

IN ASSOCIATION WITH UBICQUIA 20

IoT Now - April / May 2016

AM: A few years ago when Ubicquia was founded, the company focused on microcontrollers and sensors for the IIoT. In February this year, Ubicquia launched its new Kairo solution that can turn streetlights into a low cost sensory network for entire cities. Can you describe the developments that led to the creation of the Kairo device?

TZ: We understood early on as we began to look at the IIoT market that it was really a ‘Big Data’ issue and for data to be truly big it needed to be collected all the time and everywhere: pervasive and persistent data. We developed our own microcontrollers and systems because cost is a limiting factor in being persistent and pervasive, and nothing on the market met our needs. As we built our boards we began to realise that there were more fundamental issues to fully leveraging the true potential of IIoT and 20 billion connected devices: How do you connect heterogeneous networks and multiple

IoT Now - April / May 2016

We understood early on as we began to look at the IIoT market that it was really a ‘Big Data’ issue and for data to be truly big it needed to be collected all the time and everywhere: pervasive and persistent data

devices in order to deliver seamless IIoT services and applications? Kairo is essentially an amalgam of our basic technology with the realisation that while connectivity may be pervasive, power is not, which is a limiting factor for again leveraging the full economic value of IIoT. The Kairo device is a miniaturised integrated service router that contains all the computing components required to provide networking, storage and communications for IIoT applications. The device is designed for placement on light poles and derives power from the ‘cobra head’ lighting fixture.

The Kairo architecture is meant to encompass all the relevant components – software and hardware – to address large scale IIoT deployments. Our embedded software – the Envira operating system – allows for ingesting any data from a sensing device and visualising that data with our ORCA Stack-enabled cloud so that it can be acted upon by those collecting the data. Our hardware components are easily integrated into our Kairo form factor and expandable by simply inserting a new board. We can also

▼

uses an IEEE 802.11s mesh network architecture that is ideal for a broad range of smart city applications.

21

INTERVIEW

Tre Zimmerman, co-founder and CTO, Ubicquia Tre Zimmerman is an entrepreneur and technology executive with a depth of experience within the wireless communication devices and mobile applications markets. He has over 20 years in the digital technology industry, specialising in mobile media delivery and emerging technologies, centrally focused on content delivery and connected platforms.

AM: Kairo is only one part of Ubicquiaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s comprehensive IIoT platform. What additional key components do you offer and how are they different from other solutions on the market that already address IIoT and smart city deployments?

TZ: We offer a fully integrated approach, not a pieces and parts approach to delivering a solution. Other solution providers deliver a science project to end-users requiring them to develop the means to collect, compile and transmit data that is required for smart cities.

We also assist in resolving the almost intractable issue that is inherent in IIoT, which is networking thousands of devices without needing expensive network facilities such as cellular.

AM: There is already an abundance of connectivity options for IoT deployments available and more to come in the future.

Which connectivity and networking technologies do you support today and how

22

can future requirements be met?

TZ: We are completely agnostic as to connectivity and physical networking interfaces. Hardware boards are available to support wireless standards such as Wi-Fi, cellular, satellite, LoRa, SIGFOX, ZigBee and Bluetooth, as well as wireline interfaces such as Ethernet, SONET Ring, fibre and cable. We are also beginning to deploy solutions utilising eSIM technology which will revolutionise and flatten the cellular network bottleneck worldwide. The existing SIM is a hardware interface that restricts the ability of those accessing cellular networks to easily migrate to other networks that may be less expensive, faster or in a different geographic location. By simply turning the hardware interface into a software interface allows for greater flexibility for those utilising these networks at scale.

AM: Creating and deploying smart city applications requires an ecosystem of actors.

Can you give a few examples of different companies, organisations and customers that Ubicquia is working with today?

TZ: We already work with LedSource and Ericsson. LedSource is one of the largest LED

â&#x2013;ź

remotely activate the functionally of each board by independently accessing the General-Purpose Input/Output (GPIO) pins of each board.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

André Malm, Berg Insight André Malm is a senior analyst focusing on the IoT and M2M markets. He joined Berg Insight in 2006 and his research areas for instance cover connected cars, smart cities and IoT platforms.

André holds a Master’s degree in Industrial Engineering and Management from Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden.

distributors in the USA with the ability to manufacture, sell, deliver and support our solutions nationwide. Ericsson in one the largest systems integrators in the world. They have a worldwide reach with clients that are asking for the comprehensive IIoT solutions which we develop and provide. Ubicquia would like to develop and license solutions and provide Original Design Manufacturer (ODM) hardware or white labelled offerings for those solutions to run on - for clients such as LedSource and Ericsson. We do not want to become a typical hardware company with all the attendant extraneous costs that do not enhance the bottom line.

AM: There are numerous applications being deployed that make cities smart. Which are the most common applications enabled by Ubicquia’s platform?

TZ: There are several applications such as public safety – including video surveillance and gunshot detection – street light power management, environmental monitoring, Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) and public Wi-Fi access.

have launched pilot/commercial systems, and in which cities and how large these deployments are today?

TZ: Currently we have one large proof of concept and three smaller deployments. We have for instance deployed with Ericsson in Sao Paulo, Brazil. The deployments are not very large given the recent commercialisation of the technology. We are still at the proof of concept stage and have twelve deployments scheduled worldwide through 2016. Demand is highest in Asia and India, with Latin America close behind.

There are numerous applications being deployed that make cities smart. Which are the most common applications enabled

by Ubicquia’s platform?

AM: Can you describe Ubicquia’s business model and pricing strategy?

TZ: We aim to heavily subsidise the hardware.

Given the cost of our solution – especially hardware – we prefer an ‘as a service’ model or subscription based model where the Kairo device is heavily subsidised and we charge on a per device per month basis or, depending on the solution or service, by bandwidth. We have also discussed giving the device for free for a 5-7 year commitment and instead charging for services.

AM: Can you add examples of customers that

IoT Now - April / May 2016

23

CASE STUDY

Remote Monitoring and Control

RTC Software

Numerex Network Solutions

School Flasher

Numerex - Getting America’s children to and from school safely The Challenge RTC has been in the business of helping students get to school safely since 1987. School districts across America use flashing warning-signals, known as ‘flashers’ to school personnel, in school zones to alert drivers at times of the day when children will likely be present.

Typically, school flasher time schedules are individually updated manually for every school by a school district employee. School flasher times vary throughout the year based on the school calendar. If an unexpected early dismissal or weather event alters the schedule, then the flashers need to be updated with a hand-programmed schedule update, or switched on manually. This requires a significant effort due to the large number of flashers typically present in a school district.

Solution RTC developed software that communicates between the central traffic offices via cellular network to an embedded electronic device, the RTC AP22 Time Switch. In order to ensure constant connectivity, RTC partnered with Numerex to utilise their secure, multicarrier network. To streamline operations for RTC, Numerex also provided the device that allowed the Time Switch panel to communicate. “We find that with cellular connectivity, communication is always improved,” said Mark Sampson, electrical

engineer for RTC. “In addition, Numerex provides 24/7/365 support so the school systems never have to worry about their school zone warning flashers being disconnected, despite the harsh environments in which they operate.”

Results The Numerex cellular solution, implemented over a 12-month time period in districts across the country, now offers the ability to send data back to the central traffic office, making school flashers worry free and labour efficient. “The school systems we serve are now able to receive text or email alerts telling them when a bulb burns out or when the battery is failing,” said Ron Featherston, VP of RTC. “The connectivity provided by Numerex enables this real time communication for technicians to be dispatched for repair before any school children are put at risk.”

With over 2,000 devices currently in the field from Boston to San Francisco, RTC plans to expand by 1,000 to 3,000 devices per year. “Working with a partner like Numerex who is able to provide both the device and reliable network connectivity enables us to deliver superior products and services to our clients. It makes all the difference,” said David Walker, president of RTC. ▼

In order to ensure the safety of the students and to increase the efficiency for school administrators, RTC developed a solution that simultaneously and remotely updates the school flashers from a central traffic office in each district. There were other solutions proposed that either relied on pager technology, or a spectrum-radio, both those options would require a total rebuild of the signal infrastructure. Those alternate solutions either provided only a limited solution or were cost prohibitive and difficult to implement. In contrast, the cellular M2M solution, provided by RTC and powered by Numerex, offered both an economical and a simple to implement alternative that met the needs of the school districts.

IN ASSOCIATION WITH NUMEREX 24

IoT Now - April / May 2016

With over 2,000 devices currently in the field from Boston to San Francisco, RTC plans to expand by 1,000 to 3,000 devices per year

Features • Numerex device with embedded switch • Constant cellular connectivity with two-way data transfer • Real-time schedule adjustments via cellular communication • Alerts via text, phone, or email

Benefits • Real-time communication with 24/7/365 support • Early alert system mitigates repair delays • M2M solution increases efficiency and decreases manual labour • “On the fly” adjustments of flashers and schedule in real time

How Numerex Enables Smart Safety Technology Connected Smart Safety: how does RTC connect work?

The school calendar is downloaded from RTC Connect software running in the central office via the Numerex wireless network to a cellular modem and then to the RTC AP22 Time Switch. The school flashers are switched on and off automatically, based on the calendar information. This signal activation data is updated to all devices within the district at the same time via wireless connectivity.

In the event of harsh weather conditions, or an early dismissal, the schedule change can be communicated on the fly in one simple update.

This frees up human resources to help children enter and exit the school safely while eliminating wasted time for administrators since they no longer need to manually switch the lights on and off for each sign.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

25

Global Inssights Made in Sweden

Contact us for more information abou ut our M2M/IoT market research or to arrange a mee eting.

We cover in-depth all the areas illustrated below:

Berg Insight - 11 years of leading M2M/IoT market research esearch Based in Sweden, we have been specialising in all major M2M/Io oT verticals such ch as fleet management, car telematics, smart metering, smart homes, mHealth and industrial M2M since 2004. Our vision is to be the most valuable source of intelligence fo or our customers. Berg Insight ory services. can off ffe er numerous market reports, detailed market for o ecast databases and advisor arch papers, We provide custom research tailored to your requirements including fo ocused resear business case analysis, go-to-market strategies and bespoke market for o ecasting. anagement Our clients include many of the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s largest mobile operators, vehicle OEMs, fleet managemen nd venture solution providers, wireless device vendors, content providers, investment firms and capitalists, IT companies, technology start-ups and specialist consultants. To date we have provided analytical services to 750 clients in 69 countries on six continents.

info@berginsight.com | Phone +46 31 711 30 91 | www.berginsight.com ight.com

ANALYST REPORT

FLEET MANAGEMENT A pioneering IoT vertical…

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• Global Connectivity and Single APN • Broad Technology e (2G, 3G, LT TE, GSM & CDMA) • SIM Management Portal • Real-Time Analytics • Comprehensive API Library

L Learn more from our whitepapers at Aeris.com m! w aeris.com/telematicsm2m a For more information call: +44 118 925 3202 www.aeris.com | EU_Info@aeris.net

CONTENTS

30

38 COMPANY PROFILE

39

GLOBAL CONNECTIVITY FOR FOOD DISTRIBUTION FLEET MANAGEMENT

ANALYST REPORT 30

IoT NOW INSIGHT REPORT Rickard Andersson, senior analyst at Berg Insight, examines the current status of fleet management solutions and their vendors across Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Russia and the CIS, North America, Latin America, China and South Africa.

Berg Insight estimates that over 30 million commercial vehicles worldwide are now equipped with active fleet management systems based on satellite positioning and mobile communications, corresponding to a penetration rate of 10%. In addition, the company predicts that with a compound annual growth rate of 19%, the global fleet management market will exceed 70 million active vehicle systems by 2020. Additionally, a high rate of M&A activity in the sector will drive global consolidation across the whole fleet management market.

38

COMPANY PROFILES Aeris’ offerings in this market are explained

39

CASE STUDY This example from Aeris shows how Isotrak, the leader in grocery retail and food distribution with 25% of the world’s top food retailers using its fleet management and software and solutions, selected the company to provide connectivity across the UK, Europe and beyond. Via its realtime ATMSi fleet management system, Isotrak provides integrated supply-chain solutions that combine access to real-time data with robust alerting and reporting capabilities. Isotrak found that Aeris could provide a reliable mobile network, optimised to meet the demands of fleet management systems around the world, while also providing actionable visibility of the IoT/M2M solution’s performance.

GOLD SPONSOR

ANALYST REPORT

Fleet management – a pioneering IoT vertical Fleet management (FM) represents an early application area of M2M/IoT technology, writes Rickard Andersson, senior analyst at Berg Insight. The fleet management market for commercial vehicles has developed significantly over the past decades, impacted by general trends such as the transition to SaaS-based business models and the increasing integration of mobile devices as part of the infrastructure which goes hand in hand with a general commoditisation of hardware. Recent developments have even seen a diversification among providers of fleet management solutions for commercial vehicles to also support other types of assets. In line with a development sometimes dubbed as the Internet of Transportation Things, several solution providers now offer systems that can be deployed across off-highway vehicles, non-powered assets and other non-vehicle fleets, in addition to the conventional commercial vehicle types traditionally targeted by FM providers.

Fleet management infrastructure and applications Fleet management (FM) is an ambiguous term used in reference to a wide range of solutions for different vehicle-related applications. Berg Insight’s definition of an FM solution is a vehiclebased system that incorporates data logging, satellite positioning and data communications to a back office application. At a high level, the infrastructure for fleet management can be divided into four segments: • Vehicle segment – All vehicles connected to the FM solution need to have a combined satellite positioning and wireless communications unit. The unit can be of a wide range of form factors and may be connected to various devices, peripherals and data interfaces inside the vehicle.

• Network segment – Wireless wide area networks are employed by the FM solution for data transmission. Cellular mobile networks are currently the most widely used, while systems using satellite communications are also available.

• Back office segment – Behind a data communications gateway, a wide range of standard and third-party applications may have access to data from the vehicles.

Fleet management includes numerous feature sets for various commercial vehicles. Typical highlevel categories include vehicle management, driver management, operations management and regulatory compliance and reporting. Each category includes different subsets of functionality, some of which are generally applicable for all types of segments, while others are specific for certain operations.

• GNSS segment – The FM solution relies on public global navigation satellite systems such as GPS and GLONASS for accurate positioning of the vehicles.

30

IoT Now - April / May 2016

Figure 1: Major applications for fleet management

Figure 2: Active fleet management units by region (2014-2020)

Vehicle management

Driver management

• Driving data registration and analysis • Eco-driving schemes • Insurance risk management

Active FM units (millions)

100

• Remote diagnostics • Maintenance planning • Security tracking

80

60

40

20

0 2014 Europe

Regulatory compliance and reporting

• Routing and navigation • Transport management • Mobile workforce management

• Drivers’ working hours • Digital tachograph • Electronic toll collection

The global fleet management market for commercial vehicles There are approximately 1.2 billion motor vehicles in the world today. The Americas represents the largest vehicle market with close to 400 million vehicles, followed by Europe and Asia-Pacific which both account for around 350 million vehicles respectively. More than 300 million vehicles of the total global fleet are commercial vehicles, out of which the majority are light commercial vehicles such as vans and pickups. Berg Insight estimates that over 30 million commercial vehicles worldwide are equipped with active fleet management systems based on satellite positioning and mobile communications. This corresponds to a penetration rate of 10%. Growing at a compound annual growth rate of 19%, the global fleet management market is forecasted to exceed 70 million active vehicle systems by 2020. The largest fleet management markets are currently Europe and AsiaPacific followed by North America. Middle East & Africa and Asia-Pacific are expected to experience the strongest growth rates in the upcoming years.

The leading fleet management solution providers The fleet management market is populated by hundreds of telematics players worldwide. The majority of the aftermarket involves small local players with installed bases in the range of a few thousand units up to 50,000 units. Most FM companies are only active in their respective domestic markets and

IoT Now - April / May 2016

2016

North America

2017 Latin America

2018

2019

Asia Pacific

2020

Middle East & Africa

The global fleet management market is anticipated to show healthy growth in the next 5 years

neighbouring countries. A number of major fleet telematics players have emerged which are active regionally or internationally with significant customer bases. The top ten FM providers worldwide together have a total active installed base of more than 5 million units. The fast-growing provider Fleetmatics has recently surpassed the milestone of 700,000 subscribers and is today the largest solution provider with presence in North America, Latin America, Europe and Australia. The runners-up include the Belarusian software player Gurtam, the major navigation provider Trimble, the USbased pioneer Omnitracs (formerly Qualcomm Enterprise Services) and TomTom Telematics which is a business unit of TomTom dedicated to fleet management, vehicle telematics and connected car services. These players all have more than 600,000 vehicles under management. Other vendors with over 400,000 active fleet management units include Arvento Mobile Systems, Telogis, Teletrac Navman, Geotab and Zonar Systems.

Figure 3: Top 10 fleet management providers worldwide (Q4-2015) 800

Active FM units (thousands)

Operations management

2015

600

400

200

0 Fleetmatics

Gurtam

Trimble

Omnitracs

TomTom Telematics

Arvento Mobile Systems

Telogis

Teletrac Navman

Geotab

Zonar Ststems

All of the top-10 fleet management providers have now surpassed 400,000 active units globally and many of them continue to experience strong growth

31

ANALYST REPORT

North America – front-running market with considerable momentum North America represents a pioneering fleet telematics market from a global perspective. Early initiatives include Qualcomm’s first commercial product OmniTRACS, a satellitebased communications system for the transportation industry used to manage truck fleets since the late 1980s. The market has in the following decades developed at a high pace, for example driven by various regulatory developments related to IFTA fuel tax reporting, distracted driving, CSA compliance, Driver Vehicle Inspection Report (DVIR) rules, anti-idling, Hours-of-Service (HOS) regulations and associated electronic logging devices (ELDs). The final ELD mandate rule was published in December 2015 and will affect around 3 million trucks in the US, with similar requirements expected also in Canada in the near-term. Compliant solutions are already available from a variety of different players, ranging from comparably simple solutions focused on fulfilling the regulatory demands based on mobile device integration to high-end fleet management systems offering ELD functionality as part of a broad portfolio of telematics services.

Leading providers on the North American fleet management market include Fleetmatics, Trimble, Zonar Systems, Omnitracs, Telogis, Verizon Networkfleet, Geotab and Teletrac Navman, all having more than 200,000 active fleet management units in the US and Canada. These two countries are generally seen as one and the same market as they exhibit similar market characteristics in terms of customer demands, corporate culture and regulatory implications on fleets. Some of the solution providers mentioned above are focused exclusively on the North American market while others have expanded geographically to other regions. The vendors also differ in terms of the fleet segments that they target. The North American heavy truck segment is dominated by Trimble’s PeopleNet and Omnitracs (including XRS). Other companies active in this segment include Zonar Systems as well as Rand McNally and Cadec (now part of PeopleNet).

Actors with substantial business within service fleets – often installing the solutions in LCVs such as “white vans” – include Fleetmatics, Verizon Networkfleet and NexTraq. Other vendors often have a broader market scope covering both light and heavy vehicles.

Various types of telematics solutions are also marketed by vehicle manufacturers such as Daimler, Ford, GM, Hino,

32

Peterbilt, Kenworth, Navistar, Volvo and Mack. In many cases, the OEM solutions offered on the North American market are powered by telematics partners such as Telogis, Zonar Systems and PeopleNet. The OEM channel thus constitutes a major opportunity for the aftermarket solution providers which can secure sales of large quantities of factory-fitted systems and associated subscriptions.

Mobile operators have become an important sales channel for fleet management solutions, as operators increasingly have diversified beyond providing the mere wireless communications services to promote end-to-end solutions through partnerships where the operator acts as a reseller and point of contact towards the end client. In North America, partner-powered FM offerings are available from carriers such as AT&T, Sprint, Bell, Telus and Rogers. Verizon even has its own fleet management subsidiary – Verizon Networkfleet – following the acquisition of Hughes Telematics.

Latin America – fragmented market with strong security focus While mature fleet telematics markets generally have been driven by resource optimisation and cost savings, Latin American fleets have focused on counteracting epidemic criminal activities such as vehicle theft, cargo robbery and even fuel siphoning. Basic track and trace solutions complemented with special features such as panic buttons and remote immobilisers are common in the region. Such solutions are available from a myriad of suppliers and often provide little functionality beyond the possibility of ensuring that vehicles and cargo are not lost. Providers of advanced fleet management solutions have historically claimed to have a hard time convincing businesses of the efficiency gains made possible by high-end FM applications, and an educational process has often been required in order to extend the perception of fleet management beyond securityrelated aspects. The Latin American fleet market has however in the past years started to evolve from the traditional emphasis on security to also focus on optimisation of fleet operations through management of logistics processes and improvement of driver behaviour.

The Latin American market is still highly fragmented and poised for consolidation as a very large number of players are active in many of the countries. Leading fleet telematics companies on the Brazilian market include the domestic

IoT Now - April / May 2016

providers Sascar, Autotrac, Zatix and OnixSat, while Encontrack, Copiloto Satelital, Grupo UDA and Global Track are examples of significant players based in Mexico. Other notable actors in Latin America include WideTech and Satrack based in Colombia, Tastets System, Wisetrack and GPS Chile in Chile, Hawk GPS in Argentina and Location World based in Ecuador, each holding important positions in their respective domestic markets and in some cases having expanded to neighbouring countries. A number of international players are also active in the region. Omnitracs for example has as a solid presence in Latin America where Brazil and Mexico are the main countries. Also, US-based Position Logic which is today owned by KORE Wireless has a strong position in Latin America where the majority of its client base can be found.

Additional international players with large subscriber bases in the region include Telogis and Teletrac Navman from the US, Pointer Telocation and Ituran based in Israel, and Gurtam which is headquartered in Belarus.

Western Europe – large multinationals and local providers coexist with strong OEM players

arm of the French operator group which acquired the domestic vendor Ocean in 2015, thus boosting its FM subscriber base considerably. Additional large Western European aftermarket players for example include the strong heavy truck telematics provider Transics (now part of WABCO) which is based in Belgium, Traqueur in France, and Trakm8, Quartix and Blue Tree Systems which are all headquartered in the UK and have expanded to various international markets. Fleetmatics has furthermore strengthened its position in Western Europe through multiple acquisitions in recent time.

The leading truck manufacturers in Europe such as Scania, Volvo and Daimler have all introduced in-house developed fleet telematics solutions that have captured large market shares, especially in the European truck telematics market.

Scania Fleet Management has surpassed 170,000 connected vehicles globally and Volvo’s Dynafleet has reached 90,000 vehicles while Daimler’s FleetBoard has an installed base of around 80,000 connected vehicles worldwide. Around 80– 90% of their subscriber bases can be found in Europe.

Western Europe is one of the most mature fleet telematics markets in terms of adoption rates. There are however considerable variations across the Western European countries. The UK and Ireland together with the Benelux countries represent the most advanced regional markets for fleet management solutions in Europe followed by the Nordics, France and the German-speaking markets. Southern European countries including the Mediterranean on the other hand represent comparably lagging markets with penetration rates far below the northern parts of the European continent.

Continuous developments on the EU level such as regulatory mandates affecting transportation-intense sectors and a general convergence between member countries in line with increased mobility across borders are however expected to result in a more homogenous market in the future.

The largest players in the region are TomTom Telematics and Masternaut which hold the leading market shares, both having more than 300,000 active fleet management units primarily in the western parts of Europe. Additional players with 100,000 subscribers or more include Microlise in the UK, DigiCore (Ctrack) based in South Africa, Teletrac Navman, Trimble and Orange Business Services. The latter is the business services

IoT Now - April / May 2016

The 1-Fleet Alliance has attracted a growing number of members in Europe, together having a total of more than 400,000 FM units in operation

33

ANALYST REPORT

There are so far few truly pan-European fleet management solution providers. Even the largest players in the region have most of their installed bases concentrated in a relatively small number of countries. Many of the small- and mid-sized fleet telematics providers are largely focused on the domestic markets while international presence is typically limited to a few neighbouring countries. A noteworthy development in recent years is the emergence of alliances between fleet management providers on the European market. The most notable example is the 1-Fleet Alliance which today brings together 17 companies in Western as well as Eastern Europe, together totalling more than 400,000 active fleet management units. Being part of this type of constellation may enable smaller players to conduct joint R&D projects and enjoy benefits related to scale in terms of, for example, purchasing activities.

Eastern Europe – trailing the neighbouring markets in the west The gap between the eastern and western parts of Europe has gradually narrowed and the western-most countries in Eastern Europe including EU members in the area today have fleet management markets which to a large extent resemble Western Europe. Many countries in the region are already tracking the most developed European markets relatively closely in terms of system functionality and service models.

The Eastern European FM market is influenced by the same drivers and barriers, but there are also local market conditions which can have a positive effect on the adoption patterns for fleet management. Eastern companies for example tend to keep close control on fuel costs as they represent a significant share of the total fleet costs. This drives the uptake of fleet management solutions integrating advanced fuel level sensor technology. An example of a local phenomenon influencing the fleet telematics market is the Hungarian electronic toll collection system HU-GO which is compatible with a range of conventional FM systems, unlike most other initiatives of this kind that generally demand dedicated hardware infrastructure. Instead of opting for on-board units that only support the toll system, fleets in Hungary can thus choose to leverage telematics platforms from domestic or foreign FM providers, so enabling various efficiency improvements

34

alongside mere regulatory compliance.

Notable fleet management players based in Eastern Europe for example include Finder (owned by TomTom Telematics) in Poland, Secar Bohemia in the Czech Public, WebEye International based in Hungary, Ruptela which is headquartered in Lithuania, Slovenia-based CVS Mobile, ICOM (EuroGPS) in Bulgaria and ETA Automatizari Industriale (SafeFleet) based in Romania. These players all have total subscriber bases of more than 35,000 units. Another company, Ecofleet, was established through the merger of two companies based in Denmark and Estonia respectively, having a strong presence especially in the Baltics in addition to Scandinavia. The large Turkish market is moreover the home of several major telematics players such as Arvento Mobile Systems and Mobiliz that have installed bases in the hundreds of thousands.

Russia/CIS – financially troubled market challenging for fleet telematics players Similarly to Eastern Europe, the expectations for the future fleet management market in Russia and the CIS also include a continued gradual convergence with the developments in Western Europe. The major Russian solution providers have historically mainly served large corporations with standalone software systems which are paid upfront and hosted in-house, whereas subscription services traditionally have been adopted primarily by SMBs. Cloud services based on monthly service fees have however now also become a greater focus for major enterprise fleets on the Russian market and the domestic FM solution providers are increasingly pushing for a transition towards SaaS-based models. In terms of functionality, there is similarly a gradual shift in customer requirements – initially among high-end customers – to increasingly align with fleet management features demanded in mature markets such as time- and money-saving automation tools and integration of eco-driving components.

The leading provider of fleet management software in the CIS region is Belarus-based Gurtam. The company has an installed base of around 500,000 active units on the Russian market alone. Major players based in Russia moreover include

IoT Now - April / May 2016

TechnoKom, Navigator Group, NIS, SCOUT and Omnicomm, all having 100,000 active units or more today. A number of incumbent players on the Russian fleet management market have experienced challenges in the past years, leading to significant staff reductions and even bankruptcy. This has opened up opportunities for new dynamic solution providers to reap market shares. International players from Western markets are however yet to reach significant market positions in the region. The recent economic developments in Russia and other markets in the CIS region such as Ukraine have indeed been troublesome for all industry players. Still, the telematics market in the region is now expected to benefit from developments such as ERA-GLONASS and the Platon electronic toll collection system which can have a positive effect on the adoption of commercial FM solutions as the general awareness of telematics increases.

South Africa â&#x20AC;&#x201C; mature market dominated by strong domestic telematics companies South Africa represents a mature telematics market and the country is clearly established as the front-running market on the African continent, being the home of renowned international fleet management solution vendors. The South African market however differs from other mature telematics markets in a number of ways. Many of the local providers have their roots in the security side of vehicle applications given the widespread adoption of stolen vehicle tracking and recovery in the country. Many telematics companies have extended their SVR offerings with additional functionalities, aiming to position themselves as providers of fleet management services. This development has blurred the lines between pure stolen vehicle recovery and fleet management solutions on the South African market and there are many offerings such as SVR services that include dot-on-a-map vehicle tracking and other basic FM features adopted by fleet customers. A notable share of the installed fleet telematics systems on the South African market is represented by comparably low-end tracking systems of this kind. Some industry players use the categorisation of light FM to distinguish low-end products from premium fleet management solutions.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

Five domestic players that have more than 100,000 FM units each in South Africa together control the majority of the market

The South African fleet management market is dominated by a distinct group of aftermarket telematics players including MiX Telematics, Cartrack, Altech Netstar, DigiCore (Ctrack) and Tracker which are all headquartered in the country and have installed bases of more than 100,000 fleet management units each on the domestic market. These top-5 players together represent as much as two-thirds of the total number of active fleet management systems in use in South Africa today. Renowned international vendors active on the market for example include TomTom Telematics, Pointer Telocation and Geotab. The latter is today based in Canada but has South African origins. Foreign telematics players have however generally not managed to achieve any significant market shares on the South African fleet management market so far. The remote location and the relatively high telematics penetration on the market in general combined with the presence of an abundance of local providers may potentially act as barriers to entry for international FM players eyeing the South African market.

China â&#x20AC;&#x201C; challenging and highly price-sensitive market with major untapped potential The fleet management sector in China is dominated by track and trace systems and the installed base so far includes a significant share of low-end systems with comparatively limited functionality by Western standards. The steep growth of the Chinese FM market anticipated in the upcoming years is expected to be driven by a combination of political decisions to track selected commercial vehicles and the

35

ANALYST REPORT

booming e-commerce market which creates demand for efficient transport operations. The top providers in terms of installed base are local Chinese players including E6GPS, Etrans, Beijing Zhongdou Technology (Ccompass), Shenzhen Huabao Electronics Technology, Shenzhen Weitongda Electronics and 666GPS. In the OEM segment, truck manufacturers such as Foton and Shaanxi Automobile Group stand out as prominent in terms of fleet telematics activities.

Also a number of international aftermarket solution providers have entered the Chinese fleet management market. USbased CarrierWeb has been active in China for more than a decade, serving a range of state-owned and private transportation companies with its traditional offerings as well as China-specific tracking products. Other international players with various levels of activities on the Chinese market include Trimble, MiX Telematics, Microlise, Teletrac Navman, Astrata Group and DigiCore. The installed bases of these solution providers however generally remain limited and international players report numerous issues when expanding their presence in China. In general, the telematics systems provided by local suppliers and adopted by Chinese fleets are most often heavily feature-stripped and priced at a level far below that of even the most basic entry-level systems available in Europe or North America. The Chinese market moreover has its own barriers to entry due to issues related to, for example, mapping, data privacy protection and the operation of web-based back office portals using SaaS models. Political influences on provincial and regional level are also working to the advantage of local Chinese telematics providers which will most likely continue to capture a major share of the market. Berg Insight nevertheless expects that there are substantial future business opportunities for Western FM providers in China if they adapt to the local market conditions.

High M&A pace drives global consolidation in the fleet management market Fleet management solution providers come in all shapes and sizes. The market is served by diverse players ranging from micro businesses laser-focused on specific FM features to

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multinational conglomerates for which fleet management is only one of many business areas. The abundance of vendors offering seemingly similar solutions in terms of functionality has resulted in intense competition, sometimes pushing pricing to a point where there is limited room for profitability.

In line with increasing market maturity, this fragmented industry has entered a phase of consolidation and M&A activities have been common over the past years. More than 30 company transactions have been done in Europe and North America alone during 2014–2015.

One category of transactions consists of businesses – commonly large enterprises – expanding in the fleet management space through acquisitions of specialised FM providers. Notable examples in 2014–2015 include Michelin’s acquisition of Sascar in Brazil, WABCO’s acquisition of Transics, FleetCor which together with Summit Partners acquired Masternaut, and the Russian operator group MTS which acquired NIS. These deals all include elements of diversification to more or less adjacent and – at least to some extent – related business areas. Novatel Wireless has furthermore in 2015 acquired DigiCore (Ctrack) and subsequently in 2016 sold its telematics hardware business to Micronet Enertec Technologies, aiming to accelerate its transformation from a hardware-centric manufacturer to a provider of IoT SaaS and Solutions.

Other deals involve the combination of existing fleet management players providing similar solutions. TomTom has in 2013–2015 acquired multiple local European FM providers including Coordina in Spain, DAMS Tracking in France, Fleetlogic in the Netherlands and, most recently, the leading Polish fleet management service provider Finder. These deals together contribute considerably to extending both the subscriber base and the geographic footprint of TomTom Telematics, and the company remains on the lookout for similar additional acquisitions. Fleetmatics has similarly in 2013–2015 acquired Australia-based Connect2Field, Italybased KKT, Ornicar in France and most recently Visirun in Italy in a bid to expand globally, while at the same time diversifying the product portfolio. Every year, there are numerous transactions of this kind taking place across the globe, where fleet management providers absorb smaller players. There are

IoT Now - April / May 2016

ANALYST REPORT

also examples of large fleet management providers joining forces and consequently rising significantly in the subscriber base rankings. In 2015, the two Danaher-owned companies Teletrac and Navman Wireless for instance merged to create a global top-10 provider tracking more than 500,000 vehicles on five continents.

The fleet management market has over the years become increasingly international as an effect of geographic expansion efforts in general and cross-border M&As among

the solution providers. The consolidation is expected to continue in the coming years, with additional blockbuster transactions as well as smaller strategic deals foreseen in the near-term. Leading solution providers on a global basis are now competing to be the first to reach a million subscribers, in many cases using a strategy that combines organic growth and selective M&As. Berg Insight anticipates a future scenario where the global fleet management market is dominated by a handful of providers with installed bases measured in the millions.

Rickard Andersson, Senior Analyst, Berg Insight Rickard Andersson is a senior analyst at Berg Insight, which he joined in 2010. Rickard’s current focus at Berg Insight is the telematics market and he has authored a wide range of reports on various telematics topics including fleet management solutions and intelligent transportation systems, covering geographies such as Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Russia and the CIS, North America, Latin America and China. He is also currently researching the market for insurance telematics in Europe and North America. Rickard holds an MSc degree in Industrial Engineering and Management from Chalmers University of Technology.

Berg Insight is a dedicated M2M/IoT market research firm based in Sweden, specialising in all major M2M/IoT verticals such as fleet management, car telematics, smart metering, smart homes, mHealth and industrial M2M since 2004. Berg Insight can offer numerous market reports, detailed market forecast databases and advisory services and provide custom research tailored to a client’s requirements including focused research papers, business case analysis, go-to-market strategies and bespoke market forecasting.

Berg’s clients include many of the world’s largest mobile operators, vehicle OEMs, fleet management solution providers, wireless device vendors, content providers, investment firms and venture capitalists, IT companies, technology start-ups and specialist consultants. The company has provided analytical services to 850 clients in 70 countries to date.

For any questions about market report subscriptions and advisory services or simply to understand how Berg Insight can help, contact the company at info@berginsight.com

IoT Now - April / May 2016

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COMPANY PROFILE

Company Summary Aeris is a privately held global technology company headquartered in Silicon Valley, having a total of 175 employees across locations in the US, the UK, India and soon in Japan. Founded in 1992, Aeris began offering M2M data services in 1997. The company today positions itself as an IoT platform company having a three-pronged strategy, offering Enterprise Connectivity-as-a-Service, End-to-end IoT Platform-as-a-Service and Cloud-based IoT applications and analytics.

Company Credentials Aeris is a pioneer on the IoT market. The company currently has operational reach in 180 countries, managing a total of over one billion IoT events per day. Aeris has in 2016 surpassed seven million active subscriptions, out of which more than 60% are associated with things that move such as vehicles, trains and parcels. Over one million subscriptions are related to fleet and logistics operations including trucks and vans.

Key Differentiators Aeris is 100% focused on IoT and is the only player providing support for GSM, CDMA and LTE under the same umbrella. Key differentiators include its agility, flexibility and innovativeness. The companyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s intellectual property portfolio includes more than 50 industry patents.

The business strategy is to build infrastructure from the

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ground up optimised for IoT, focus relentlessly on scale, quality and cost, and use the platform position to move up the stack from data delivery to data intelligence and applications with an application enablement and development platform.

Competitive Pressures The company has the industryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s only purpose-built core network dedicated to M2M. Owning and operating the core network provides a level of visibility and control to Aeris which is not available to MVNOs and not leveraged by MNOs. Real-time visibility of device transactions on the network has allowed Aeris to develop features which can detect events in near real-time and trigger immediate action.

The company has a strategy of seeking first-mover advantages to stay ahead of competitors, thus continuously innovating to create new solutions that serve customers cheaper, faster and better.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

CASE STUDY

Isotrak – with Aeris: empowering vehicle fleets to deliver safely and efficiently, anywhere on the planet The goal: To use real-time intelligence to solve transportation issues before they impact on business costs or customer experience

The problem: Isotrak needed global cellular connectivity covering 2G to 4G services to support customers across the UK, Europe and beyond As Isotrak’s integrated supply-chain solutions continued to expand around the world, they also needed a flexible and reliable data network solution to support their customers, irrespective of where they might be or what systems they might be using.

Isotrak also wanted analytics to support costeffective IoT/M2M deployments – and all of this had to be delivered in a time-critical fashion and at a low total cost of ownership.

The solution: Truly global cellular connectivity from Aeris complete with fully integrated data analytics Isotrak found that Aeris could provide a reliable mobile network, optimised to meet the demands of fleet management systems around the world, while also providing actionable visibility of the IoT/M2M solution’s performance.

“Our fleet management system provides data for a total vision of a fleet manager’s transportation ecosystem. We wanted to ensure reliable connectivity services and data insights no matter where our customers are located,” said Jason Price, sales and marketing director for Isotrak.

“By leveraging Aeris’ expertise in IoT network solutions, we were able to quickly provide a robust, global solution that goes well beyond improved connectivity and competitive rate plans to also offer our customers real-time, useful ▼

With 25% of the world’s top food retailers using Isotrak products, Isotrak is the definitive leader in grocery retail and food distribution. As one of the world’s major providers of fleet management software and solutions, Isotrak knows that the demands on delivery fleets are constantly evolving and that the market’s becoming more competitive than ever. Isotrak therefore uses business intelligence data to provide retailers and manufacturers with ‘total vision’ across their entire transportation ecosystem. Via its real-time ATMSi fleet management system, Isotrak provides integrated supply-chain solutions that combine access to real-time data with robust alerting and reporting capabilities.

IN ASSOCIATION WITH AERIS IoT Now - April / May 2016

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CASE STUDY

information at their fingertips to help improve their cost structures.”

Aeris’ global support of all the major cellular technology standards enables Isotrak to offer its customers flexibility and the potential for growth across the globe. In addition, Aeris’ flexible pricing models and minimal upfront commitment meant that Isotrak could move to Aeris without having the burden of an initial large financial outlay.

The results: A roaming solution that combined with IoT/M2M analytics to reduce time to market Powered by Aeris’ network, Isotrak can now provide an unparalleled solution for telematics and fleet management customers who want to lower their data costs and improve operational efficiencies through data analytics. Additionally, the security built into the Aeris system, with communications carried out over a dedicated virtual private network (VPN), gives Isotrak – and its customers – peace of mind that their data will remain safe and secure.

“By leveraging Aeris’s expertise in IoT network solutions, we were able to quickly provide a robust, global solution that goes well beyond improved connectivity and competitive rate plans to also offer our customers real-time, useful information at their fingertips to help improve their cost structures.”

Jason Price, sales and marketing director for Isotrak

ABOUT ISOTRAK LTD. Isotrak is the leading provider of fleet management software solutions and systems integration to some of the largest Fortune 500 companies and to six of the top 25 largest food retailers worldwide. Through its award-winning transport management system, ATMSi, businesses gain realtime visibility, control and measurement of their fleet’s performance through: Vehicle & Trailer Tracking, Job & Resource Management (including Plan vs. Actual), Electronic Proof-of-Delivery (ePOD), Driver Communications, Driving Style Management, and Business Intelligence Reporting.

For more information, visit www.isotrak.com or follow us on Twitter @Isotrak.

ABOUT AERIS Aeris specialises in the Internet of Things – as an operator of end-to-end IoT and M2M services and as a technology provider enabling other operators to build profitable IoT businesses. Among our customers are the most demanding users of IoT services today, including Hyundai, Acura, Rand McNally, Leica, and Sprint. Through our technology platform and dedicated IoT and M2M services, we strive to fundamentally improve their businesses – by dramatically reducing costs, improving operational efficiency, reducing time-to-market, and enabling new revenue streams.

Visit www.aeris.com or follow us on Twitter @AerisM2M to learn about new business models and participate in the revolution that the Internet of Things is now driving.

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IoT Now - April / May 2016

INTERVIEW

Ericsson - Enabling the transformational power of the IoT vision

SR: What’s your view of the current status of the IoT market?

ES: We are living a transformational period. We are moving from a connectivity and devicecentric view - a typical M2M view - towards a service-centric view across and between industries. The devices themselves do not hold

the market value. Instead, the value is in the applications and the services that we can deliver using various forms of connectivity and various types of devices to collect data, analyse it and transform it into new services with context.

Those applications and services are enabled by a software-based and data-centric view of the enterprise. The IoT vision is part of those factors

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Ericsson is intrinsically linked to the history of telecommunications. Since Lars Magnus Ericsson established the company in 1876, each step of both the evolution of the telecommunications market and the technological history of telecommunications have been defined by the presence of Ericsson. Over recent years, that legacy has defined Ericsson as a key telecommunications network infrastructure provider in the marketplace with a strong presence in the cellular world. However, Ericsson has always been much more than that. Specifically in the M2M space, the Swedish company has also had a strong say in the evolution of that sector, not only through infrastructure, but additionally through Ericsson’s platform. On top of that, Ericsson’s M2M customer base has not been only around mobile network operators, but has also involved enterprises from other sectors. This approach has evolved with the move from M2M towards IoT environments, further empowering Ericsson’s presence in the IoT space.

Saverio Romeo, principal analyst at Beecham Research recently met with Esmeralda Swartz, VP strategy and marketing BUSS (Business Unit Support Solutions), Ericsson, in order to understand more about the role of her company in the IoT market.

IN ASSOCIATION WITH ERICSSON IoT Now - April / May 2016

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INTERVIEW

that are transforming the enterprise from being hardware-centric to being entirely digital-centric.

And, in fact, the debate on the digitalisation of organisations not only includes the IoT, but also underlying SDN/NFV infrastructure and software, cloud, innovation and transaction platforms, business transformation services, value added services and sometimes co-opetition through partnerships – of many different services.

SR: What’s Ericsson position in the current IoT marketplace? What do you offer to MNOs and enterprises?

ES: Ericsson is at the centre of this transformation.

If we look at the Mobile Network Operators (MNOs), Ericsson is helping them move their raison d’etre from an infrastructure and deviceoriented nature towards a data-centric nature, bringing at the centre the concept of the digital services marketplace. Basically, we are helping MNOs move from connectivity towards services and digital marketplaces. We do that by enabling them to support the transition from products to services including creating new on-demand brokerage and trading models such as data as a service, bandwidth on demand, and even network function as a service. But Ericsson isn’t only about solutions for mobile network operators. We also help industry customers in several other different sectors who are also going through the digital transformation that we’re talking about.

We help those organisations to create new value, pursuing business and operational efficiency, accelerating time to market, and enhancing the customer experience. We do that in sectors including utilities, transport systems, public safety, smart cities, connected vehicles, smart agriculture.

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SR: Can we explore the work of Ericsson in those sectors in more detail? Let’s start from connected vehicles that has been an important topic in the industry for some time now.

ES: Connected cars are very good examples that illustrate the transformation that we’re living through and of the move from M2M to IoT marketplaces. Telematics has been the most important M2M application for some time. The availability of connectivity in the car then drove the idea of using that to support services in the car. We moved then to the concept of the connected car. We are now moving towards a connected car marketplace involving the ability to develop applications for cars using the data gathered and enabling software. Those applications are very diverse and they involve different organisations such as insurance companies, repair shops, fleet operators, content providers and others. This ecosystem of players is bringing innovation and creativity to connected cars. For example, Ericsson is working with Volvo to understand and develop service and application opportunities for autonomous cars.

This collaboration focusses on two areas: high bandwidth in-vehicle applications and contextualised information about routes, driver profiles and location. This work is based on an Open API approach in order to enable a connected car marketplace that delivers value for the whole ecosystem.

SR: Remaining in the area of mobility, what activities is Ericsson running in Intelligent Transport Systems?

ES: We are working around three key areas: ICT infrastructures for transport systems, transport

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Connected cars are very good examples that illustrate the transformation that we’re living through and of the move from M2M to IoT environments

IoT Now - April / May 2016

Ericsson has been the ICT expert in the consortium behind the Stockholm Royal Seaport smart city project

Esmeralda Swartz, VP strategy and marketing BUSS, Ericsson

SR: Smart cities seems to be an area with relevance for Ericsson too. Can you share some examples?

ES: Ericsson has been the ICT expert in the consortium behind the Stockholm Royal Seaport smart city project. The project has been strongly focused on energy consumption and sustainability, looking into developing smart grid communication, microgeneration, demand response to smart appliances, smart metering and electric vehicle; all there to serve the existing urban area, but also 10k new apartments and 30k new workspaces. The project has become a model for sustainable urban development.

Ericsson has also contributed to the Smart Santander project. This Telefonica-led project has been seen as setting out best practice for smart city projects. The scope of the project was very ambitious, looking at the city with a holistic view as a system of systems. Therefore, all aspects of city life were part of the project: smart parking solution, smart urban mobility, solutions for tourism, smart lighting, weather alerts, public

IoT Now - April / May 2016

park utilities control, and citizen inclusiveness in city governance through digital tools. Ericsson supported the project through their network infrastructure expertise and platform knowledge.

SR: Are there other IoT sectors in which you believe Ericsson is running interesting projects?

ES: We are doing a lot in renewable energies. We are also working in the public safety market providing preventive emergency response systems. The retail sector is also very important for us. We have also run several projects in smart farming, an example being a connected vineyards project in Germany. It might be a surprise to readers, but Ericsson is much more than just a telecommunications sector company. We operate around the entire business system because all industries are in transformation and Ericsson can facilitate that process.

SR: I imagine that several of these projects are the result of partnerships. Can you tell us how those partnerships come along and why they are so important in the IoT? ES: We are strongly convinced that there is no IoT without partnerships because it is about creating an ecosystem. This is because for the IoT vision to be realised, you need to provide context-aware apps and services across and between providers and even verticals. Imagine a smart city data portal. The IoT vision is multidisciplinary and partnership-based.

Therefore, we partner with several companies and organisations within a vertical ecosystem. MNOs are our traditional partners, but we also work with industry customers and embrace other technology partners and companies operating in

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transaction systems and traffic management solutions. We have worked on intelligent road system such as the Algerian Highway, Sao Jose Dos Campos in Brazil and Drive Sweden. We have provided solutions in metro systems in China, London, and DSB Denmark. We have also worked on public bus systems in The Netherlands – Translink, Volvo Buses in Brazil and the City of Varnia in Bulgaria. We helped international airports transform into smart city airports - in order to better service their customer base.

Chicago O’Hare International, São Paolo International, and Rio International are some examples.

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INTERVIEW

Connectivity and network infrastructure remain an essential element for the development of the IoT

the many different sectors in which we are involved. And, finally, we are actively involved, as is our tradition, in standardisation groups and research consortia such as 3GPP, GSMA, WFA, IEEE, IPSO and EU-based research projects.

SR: Let’s look at some issues of debate in the IoT community. The rise of LPWAN is animating the industry, what does Ericsson think about LPWAN and forms of connectivity in general?

ES: Connectivity and network infrastructure remain an essential element for the development of the IoT. Ericsson is naturally well suited to pursue all forms of connectivity and equip our customer base to offer reliable connectivity agnostic solutions. This is important because the end user does not care about the technology, but about the always-on experience. LPWAN in its different forms does open opportunities for applications not considered before and could also drive design rethinking for some applications today using other types of connectivity. On the other side of the data rate spectrum, we are driving and working with customers on 5G transformation and that will enable a data-rich IoT in contexts that require data rich applications such as the autonomous vehicle. Connectivity in its various forms is a necessary enabler for the transformations we have discussed, i.e. the move towards a service-centric IoT. SR: IoT platforms and their enablement services are another important element. How has Ericsson’s IoT platform evolved and how will it evolve in the future? Are data management and security key elements for the future of platforms?

ES: The IoT service platform is the essential service creation, enablement and transaction layer that enables us to achieve three important objectives: flexibility – being able to deploy things in different contexts; usability – being able to make the user experience easy; and productivity

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– enabling service creation. Ericsson’s service platform is designed around those objectives. We can be the E2E transformation partner for customers as they move from connectivity and device management features up to other services, for example supporting new business models resulting from analytics from smart devices. We have focused a lot of attention on providing an offering inclusive of service enablement, data acquisition, analytics, and data monetisation. We have also not forgotten the importance of security which is applied to all the layers of the platform from devices to applications.

Data management services and security services are certainly key areas of further development for IoT platforms. But I also believe application and service enablement services will be another important area for IoT platforms, which will drive the wider transformation of enterprises.

SR: What do you expect from now until 2021 and what’s going to be the role of Ericsson?

ES: The transformative power of the IoT vision just starts to appear with more clarity in the eyes of organisations of every type. That awareness is important and necessary. The next step is being able to design an IoT strategy that fits with the organisation’s objectives. And, finally, there’s the actual implementation of the IoT strategy. There are organisations already moving along this route, while others are trying to figure out how to do it.

Ericsson is in the market to support that journey, drawing on our strong information and communications technologies background. We will carry on being a reference point for mobile network operators but, increasingly, we will become the IoT reference point for enterprises across all sectors. Our attitude towards innovation and our partnership-led ethos will also enable us to be at the forefront of the technological developments and business innovation that will characterise the evolution of the IoT vision from now until 2021 and beyond.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

INTERVIEW

Valerio Carta, Telit Communications

Knowing where you and your assets are – MEMS lend a hand to GPS For the Google Earth generation that’s now growing up, the many children’s stories and fables from around the world that centre on the hero or heroine being lost in deep, dark woods must seem increasingly ridiculous. Surely Snow White – or any number of other characters – would surely have a GPS-enabled smartphone to get her out of trouble, wouldn’t she? canyon’ effect – or even by thieves using GPs jamming and spoofing technologies to confuse police trying to track and trace stolen trucks and cars.

Fortunately, as Valerio Carta, product manager at Telit Communications explains to Alun Lewis, IoT Now’s editor in the following interview, it’s now

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Unfortunately, despite their apparent global ubiquity, the GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite Systems) that provide GPS location information can all too easily get blocked. In Snow White’s case, it could be the thick foliage of the archetypal deep, dark wood. In the real world that we all live and work in, the signals might be blocked by tall buildings – the so-called ‘urban

IN ASSOCIATION WITH TELIT IoT Now - April / May 2016

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INTERVIEW Automotive dead-reckoning navigation test drive with the Telit SL869DR under severely obstructed GNSS signal conditions

“...there’s nothing ‘wrong’ as such with GPS – just the natural limitation imposed by the laws of physics when it comes to delivering positioning information anywhere and everywhere!”

become possible to complement GPS positioning by exploiting recent advances in MEMS (MicroElectroMechanical Systems) to deliver highly accurate positioning information without continuous GPS coverage. In particular, he says, the company’s new MEMS-Only Dead Reckoning (MoDR) GNSS module has potentially huge benefits for the IoT sector – and not just in traditional telematics and asset tracking applications.

IoT Now: Valerio, navigation aids have progressed in leaps and bounds from the earliest attempts such as the Chinese with magnetic lodestones, the polarising crystals used by the Vikings to see the sun even in overcast conditions and, of course, the sextants of the last few hundred years. WW2 saw the introduction of terrestrial positioning technologies such as LORAN, while GPS functionality has become one of those invisible technologies that we all take for granted.

What’s wrong with GPS – and how can new MEMS technologies help?

VC: I’d like to start by saying that there’s nothing ‘wrong’ as such with GPS – just the natural limitation imposed by the laws of physics when it comes to delivering positioning information anywhere and everywhere! It was estimated that, for example, in the US alone, GPS delivered around US$56 billion of economic benefits in 2013, and that’s only for just some of the applications that it can support.

Now, some technologies have emerged to help resolve this problem, such as A-GPS (Assisted GPS) that adds information from cellular networks to enhance positioning. There are problems with this however, not least the need to have a cellular signal, which, as we all know, can suffer from the same problems as GPS in the previous scenarios that I outlined.

As a result, a lot of work has been going on in recent years to enhance GPS with sensors and gyroscopes that are able track the speed and direction of a vehicle and calculate its current position from the last GPS fix. Historically, these have been known as INS (Inertial Navigation Systems) and evolved from the early days of rocketry. With a nice bit of synchronicity, I actually started my professional career in the avionics sector and even had responsibility for anti-aircraft missiles during an earlier stint in the Italian Army as a young lieutenant.

In parallel, we’ve also had developments in what’s known as Dead Reckoning (DR) systems. Some vehicle manufacturers have developed some forms of non-GPS tracking, taking data such as wheel tick, the industry term for a wheel’s

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rotation, and combining it with other data gathered from the CAN-bus network in the vehicle and sensors and gyroscopes. These solutions obviously had to be pre-integrated, designed specifically for that vehicle, and were impossible to upgrade.

IoT Now: So what’s changed?

VC: While MEMS able to support INS have been around for a while now, it’s only in the last few years that the supporting technologies have advanced enough for truly mass deployments. As ever, there are numerous factors to be taken into account when deploying these sorts of technologies: size, form factor, susceptibility to electrical interference in a typically ‘noisy’ automotive environment and, of course, issues that arise when you actually try to put a device into a vehicle of any sort and integrate it with the supporting IT telematics systems.

While Telit’s obviously been supplying GNSS modules for years to a wide variety of customers, we were always keenly aware that there were some of those for whom GPS simply wasn’t reliable or secure enough for their particular use cases. Some examples include companies transporting very high value or dangerous goods and substances, or those protecting politically important people and VIPs. Entering a tunnel, going under flyovers and bridges and other urban

IoT Now - April / May 2016

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It is obviously true however that those laws of physics mean that GPS only works properly when it can get sight of sufficient satellites for long enough to get a proper fix. In practice, that means that when the satellite signals are blocked – by tall buildings, mountains, in tunnels, by dense vegetation and so on – your GPS-supported location is only as good as its last fix.

Issues like this really came to the forefront a couple of years ago when we were bidding for a telematics contract with a car rental customer.

Although they were aware of in-car DR technology to enhance GPS to track and even sometimes find their vehicles after they’d been effectively dumped, they were aware of the drawbacks I highlighted a few minutes ago, didn’t want a CAN-bus linked system and so were looking for a standalone plug and play solution.

As a result, Telit, supported by some of the technology that had become available to us through our acquisition of Navman Wireless, a GNSS specialist, decided to accelerate our R&D in this area. Like most technology developments, it’s an evolutionary process, so it’s probably best to start at the beginning.

What we did in our first MoDR iteration was based on our SL-869-DR module. This is a 12x16 mm GNSS module that, in conjunction with an external 3-axis gyro, a 3-axis accelerometer and a wheel tick pulse from the car, provided an accurate dead reckoning solution. We called it ‘Automotive DR’ as the solution wasn’t fully

IoT Now - April / May 2016

independent from the vehicle as a wheel tick pulse was still required to estimate the travelled distance.

Drawing on our years of experience in this sector and our Navman acquisition, we then developed our MEMS-only Dead Reckoning (MoDR) concept. This can autonomously compute all the parameters involved in precise positioning – but without needing any link to the vehicle itself or input from its subsystems. This means that it’s a fully portable, standalone solution that can be easily fitted to almost any vehicle in almost any place and in almost any position.

Drawing on our years of experience in this sector and our Navman acquisition, we then developed our MEMS-only Dead Reckoning (MoDR) concept

Thanks as well to further advances in the underlying MEMS technologies, Telit’s been able to integrate into the same 12x16 mm form factor the GNSS core, a new 6-axis sensor and a barometer as well. This is a truly game-changing development, meaning that customers can benefit not only from the Telit MoDR functionalities, but also from a solution that’s fully integrateable and easily installed. This avoids delays and extra costs and also saves the customer from having to carry out extensive solutions testing themselves. It can be retrofitted to even the oldest vehicles and can run off a battery in case the vehicle’s electrical system is dead. This module is known as the Telit SL8693DR to emphasise both the DR feature as well as the three dimensional tracking functionality. ▼

infrastructure, or moving through dense cityscapes could mean their asset was temporarily lost from view. This could in turn affect insurance premiums, not to mention the potential for loss of life or valuable property.

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INTERVIEW

Telit’s Jupiter SL869-3DR module

The new MoDR technology will be embedded into the new SL869-3DR in a series of steps

IoT Now: Despite a few people still apparently believing that we live on a flat earth, it’s a 3-D world out there and there are some application areas where a vehicle’s height above sea level is also important. How are you addressing this issue?

vehicle’s owner or controller that an anomaly has occurred that needs checking and resolving. For instance, a spoofed GNSS might tell you that you’re leaving a motorway, while the on-board MEMS knows that you haven’t made any turns and are still heading straight ahead.

VC: Thanks once again to advances in miniaturisation we’ve also been able to incorporate an incredibly small but highly accurate barometer into the module. That instantly makes multi-storey car parks transparent to vehicle tracking systems as you can instantly tell which level a vehicle is on. Even without the barometer, our systems are still able to calculate height via the gyroscope, it’s just not as accurate.

IoT Now: So how’s the product roadmap shaping up?

IoT Now: Vehicle tracking technologies are increasingly becoming monetised in some form or another – I’m thinking here of toll roads in particular. There are also, as you highlighted, situations where high value goods or people need to be tracked constantly. Both in their own ways have become vulnerable to a new generation of high technology criminal, sometimes funded by the very deep pockets of organised crime…

VC: Precisely – and these issues form another very strong argument for adding DR to GNSS solutions. GPS jammers have been around for a while and, despite their illegality and financial penalties for use in many countries, are used by both thieves and by truck drivers who want to go ‘off map’ for a while, possibly for a nap or a coffee. Telit GNSS devices however are equipped with technologies that detect jamming, mitigate its effects and report the attack back to the central processor.

Where things get more problematic is where GPS spoofing is concerned. Here, by gradually increasing the strength of a GPS signal and synchronising it with the true signal, it’s become possible to fool a device into thinking it’s somewhere else. It doesn’t take much imagination – and probably not even that of the average Hollywood screenwriter – to imagine a scenario where the police are lured into believing that a stolen truck is heading the wrong way down a motorway, when in fact it’s proceeding serenely and safely in the opposite direction!

This is where MEMS-enabled DR provides an invaluable reality check and can send an alert to a

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VC: The new MoDR technology will be embedded into the new SL869-3DR in a series of steps. The first MoDR release will be focused on generic 2D tracking applications for vehicles. The second step will involve the addition of the 3D DR capability – that’s still running in lab, but not mature enough yet for a full deployment. This will eventually allow vehicle owners to track their units inside multi-level parking or delivery bays, for example.

The next evolution of our MoDR solutions will be a dedicated variant specifically for tolling systems. This has an enhanced capability that’s able to distinguish a true GPS signal from any spoofing. In fact, this ability to separately manage two different data streams, one coming from GNSS and the other coming from MEMS, will allow the system to cross-check if the data coming from the GNSS is consistent with the kinetic data from the MEMS. A further step will be what we’ve termed Pedestrian Dead Reckoning (PDR) that, we believe, will answer the need for an enhanced MEMS sensor and a tailored MoDR that’s able to track very slow moving entities like humans or pets. GNSSs work very well above a certain speed threshold, but when the speed is too low, the correct solution is literally submerged in noise. The new MEMS and the enhanced MoDR solution will enable Telit to provide a reliable solution for personal trackers and pet and animal trackers, both indoors and outdoors.

Finally, last but not least, we’re also going to be adapting the solution to work with Bluetooth and Bluetooth LE beacons. This concept has been already tested in the field and provides benefits both in indoor asset tracking, such as multilevel parking, as well as with outdoor, beacon-based tolling systems, such as at the entry points to a city centre.

Finally, to see our MEMS-only DR-MoD automotive navigation in action, please point your browser at: www.telit.com/dead_reckoning/

IoT Now - April / May 2016

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MWC REVIEW

Memories of the future – the MWC roundup And so it’s over for another year. Once again, Barcelona airport saw tens of thousands of visitors pass through its gates. A few days later, those same crowds returned, weary, foot-sore, undoubtedly hungover in more than a few cases, and all trying to comprehend the visions of the future that had been flashed before their eyes.

Jay Whitehurst, Comtech

Edward Kulperger, Geotab Inc.

Rafi Zauer, Essence

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The GSMA Innovation City was one focal point for this, with AT&T, the GMA, Jasper, KT Corporation and Sierra Wireless partnering with the GSMA to showcase various IoT products and solutions. The GSMA announced its Mobile IoT Initiative which demonstrated Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) solutions for licensed spectrum: NB-IoT, EC-EGPRS and LTE Cat-M. Complementing – or competing with - this, the LoRa Alliance supported a very busy set of booths, while SIGFOX was also present with a stand close by.

A multiplicity of markets targeted Karthikeyan Natarajan, global head of Engineering & R&D for Tech Mahindra, gave his perspective, “Reflecting the changes that IoT is driving in key industries and sectors, we found that there was particular interest in the solutions that we demonstrated for connected vehicles, factories and healthcare, fresh produce traceability, Microgrid as a Service, and smart city and home platforms. Another major attraction was our VR demonstration. For us, it was a great event and we developed a lot of important connections with decision makers across the industry spectrum.”

Jay Whitehurst, president of Enterprise Technologies Group at Comtech, also reflected this market aspect: “Companies we spoke to looking to build IoT solutions were most focused on the industrial, automotive, healthcare and telecom markets. Monetisation remains the biggest challenge, along with fragmentation and the lack of unifying standards, particularly on the consumer side. The industrial sector has matured greatly and offers the most well-defined vertical

applications, most notably in asset tracking.

Healthcare also continues to gain a lot of interest, especially among telecom companies. Location too is becoming a larger part of the conversation, with indoor location becoming even more important, especially on the industrial side.”

“At MWC,” said Edward Kulperger, VP Europe at Geotab Inc., “we connected with the global carrier market, as well as creators of IoT devices and software for smart mobility and connected fleets. Fleet connectivity is increasing with tools to lower operational costs, increase fuel efficiency, and improve driver safety. Collectively, we will see the use cases of telematics extend further as more people discover the benefits of telematics for society at large, such as reducing carbon emissions, predicting traffic congestion, increasing road safety, and reducing accident related costs. The richness of data available through telematics is also ideal for predictive maintenance — Geotab alone collects over 255 billion points of data annually. Another advance seen at MWC was a device that uses Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) to track the location, temperature, and light exposure of critical assets such as emergency equipment, pharmaceuticals, or pallets.”

For Rafi Zauer, head of marketing at smart home company Essence, “This year marked our third time at MWC and we discovered a new-found maturity in attitudes towards smart home opportunities, with telcos worldwide dipping their toes in the water. We saw a lot of interest in connected health, targeting the growing demand for care monitoring solutions for the aging population. Outside of our booth was a heavy influence on both VR and AR. Many large companies such as AT&T and Samsung used VR to attract visitors and as a way to present current product lines and where they predict these technologies will lead us in the future.”

Mark Cratsenburg, VP Sales, Aeris, echoes other comments about the show’s focus, “This year’s MWC could easily have been renamed ‘IoT World Congress’. If you looked at the exhibition booth messages, the larger suppliers to the mobile industry and enterprises are investing in the IoT space at deeper levels than before. Many of the

▼

Karthikeyan Natarajan, Tech Mahindra

Stating the most obvious, MWC is now about far, far more than simply cellular networks and handsets. More than 100,000 attendees from 204 countries were present, with over 3,600 from the world’s media. Naturally, amongst all the connected cars, 3-D printing, Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR), drones and wearables, IoT-related messaging was pretty ubiquitous - even to the extent of being used by companies who had no direct involvement with it.

The Cloud is simply so last year, don’t you know…

IoT Now - April / May 2016

analysts I spoke to also had LPWA on their minds.

Several felt that narrow-band LTE will hit those technologies hard - think WiMAX and LTE. They did feel, however, that some of these technologies do have a future for private networks in things like mining or oil industries, but larger public network types such as SIGFOX still have some major hurdles.

“Finally, I was shocked at how crowded the aisles were in Hall 5 even at 6 pm on Tuesday evening, for example. Perhaps the size of the event makes it a potential target, but I’m glad that the event was safe and well managed.”

IoT challenges for the network infrastructure For Accedian’s, Scott Sumner, VP Marketing: “All operator discussions focused on how they could overcome enormous complexity to deliver high quality IoT service performance consistently and without impacting existing lucrative services. At MWC, we had discussions with the CTO teams of SK Telecom and NTT, Telefonica, and several other Tier-1 operators.

“Unfortunately for operators,” he adds, “the IoT does not come in a single ‘one size fits all’ package. Video security surveillance and telemedicine have a relentless need for bandwidth. Critical patient monitoring sensors, industrial automation and connected cars require relatively little in the way of network capacity, but require ultra-low latency transmission, high mobility - or both. Failure for operators to deliver this quality of service could literally have life or death implications. Some apps are ‘chatty’, some stream at a regular rate, and many use proprietary protocols. This enormous variation is incredibly challenging and operators must strike a real-time balance between the different traffic types in their ever more complex networks - at a time when quality of experience is more than ever becoming an operator’s prime differentiator.”

Echoing the growing demands that the IoT is placing on service providers, Hemant Minocha, executive VP, Device & IoT at TEOCO said, “Among operators at MWC this year, network efficiency, CEM, and cost reduction were all priorities, as was NFV (Network Function Virtualisation) and SDN (Software Defined Networking) and the IoT. We saw significant interest in: firstly, solutions that improve network performance and reduce operating costs; secondly, those which assist the migration to NFV and SDN; and, finally, solutions that enable operators to prepare for the exponential increase in connected devices that the IoT brings.

Customers from Asia were especially interested in learning how to incorporate these solutions into

IoT Now - April / May 2016

Smart Cities initiatives, which many governments there are investing in.”

A hyper-connected future beckons…

According to Dr. Natasha Tamaskar, VP and head of Cloud and Mobile Strategy and Ecosystem at GENBAND, “A few things stood out for us at MWC, especially in the IoT space where our Kandy ‘Platform as a Service’ and open APIs help enable a host of IoT applications. In the healthcare sector, customers are looking to develop applications like remote screen sharing for long-distance diagnostics, or health sensors that enable real-time measurement of critical body functions including heartbeat and blood pressure. Manufacturing clients also look to these capabilities for remote analytics and field service, embedding capabilities into smart glasses to transform customer support.

“Of course,” she adds, “security remains a major concern. We use the latest encryption technology such as SSL, HTTPS and Secure Real-Time Protocol (SRTP) for data privacy and end-to-end security, as well as advanced authentication mechanisms such as SMS and IVR-based twofactor authentication through simple and flexible APIs and SDKs.” For Sanjay Khatri, Global Product Marketing, IoT Cloud, at Cisco, the event was a preview of a ‘hyper-connected’ future: “At MWC 2016 the usual parade of smart phones ceded centre stage to the IoT – from consumer wearables to industrial ‘things’. Also, if last year’s ‘prop du jour’ was the connected vehicle, this year it was AR and VR gear, using data to help companies visualise their physical assets. A recent study quoted by Boeing at MWC found that engineers relying on AR tablets were able to complete tasks 30% faster and 90% more accurately than when using a PDF guide.

“Naturally, many of those AR devices require significant bandwidth to deliver HD views. And that’s where 5G comes in. 5G is about higher throughputs and that will help with bandwidth intensive use cases like AR. But it also addresses other IoT needs as well, including the need for low latency, low power and long range.

“But what about managing the rest of the network infrastructure to cater to such diverging application needs?” Khatri asks. “That’s where MWC’s third noteworthy topic relevant to the IoT comes in - NFV and SDN. The IoT will require mobile operators to be flexible with both their Radio Access Network (RAN) and core network.

NFV and SDN are two developments that will help operators adapt to the changing demands put on their communications infrastructure.”

Mark Cratsenburg Aeris

Scott Sumner, Accedian

Hemant Minocha, TEOCO

Dr. Natasha Tamaskar, GENBAND

Sanjay Khatri, Cisco

51

PERSPECTIVES

When worlds collide – in a good way!

Augmented and Virtual Realities meet the IoT One recurring theme of the IoT vision is the creation of another world, parallel and complementary to our own, composed of the digital attributes of the ‘things’ that we’re now creating and connecting, writes IoT Now’s editor, Alun Lewis. When it comes to gaining access to that world, our vision is currently limited to the graphs, charts and spreadsheets produced by analytic tools that try to extract meaningful information from the white noise surrounding the exabytes of data involved.

Jay Wright, Vuforia/PTC

But that was then and this is now and it looks like VR headsets and games will be next Christmas’s hot present for the kids. Facebook spent US$2 billion acquiring Oculus Rift, a headset manufacturer, in 2014 and has just started shipping its US$600 headsets to customers in March this year. Various other major players such as Google with its Google Glass and Cardboard offerings, HTC and Sony have also entered the consumer market and venture capital funds are flooding into the consumer VR space.

With much less fanfare, both VR and AR have been used by many other business, industry and academic sectors for many years with varying degrees of success in applications such as architecture, product design, training, medicine, the military and archaeology.

When it comes specifically to its application in the IoT sector, interesting things are starting to happen. Significantly, in November last year, PTC announced that it had acquired the Vuforia AR business from Qualcomm. More recently, PTC has also announced that the Vuforia platform - which already has more than 200,000 registered developers - will now support Microsoft’s just released HoloLens mixed reality glasses and software.

The view – in more ways than one Behind all this lies an incredible engineering story, where a number of different technologies have to be just right to be able to interface smoothly with the human nervous system. After spending just twenty minutes or so in one of the early VR worlds myself, it was very much a case of ‘not driving or operating heavy machinery’ for some

▼

Valerie RiffaudCangelosi, Epson

Fortunately, technical advances in a number of areas now mean that Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) tools are starting to make it affordable for even small companies to interact with the digital IoT universe in new and exciting ways. It’s also an opportunity for me to write about a topic that I first covered back in 1993, when I was lucky enough to be involved in researching one of the very first books on the topic of VR – ‘Glimpses of Heaven, Visions of Hell’.

We even hired an early VR machine for the book launch and I still have vivid memories of fighting off giant, polygon-generated pterodactyls in the middle of the Covent Garden piazza in London.

Mike Crook, Mubaloo

Epson’s BT-300 AR glasses

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IoT Now - April / May 2016

KTM speeds motorcycle repair with IoT Augmented Reality from PTC

time afterwards as a result of the ensuing disorientation. One of the pioneering companies in this area is Epson which took its expertise in displays and other areas to develop and launch an AR headset back in 2011.

Since then, as Valerie Riffaud-Cangelosi, Epson’s EMEA New Market development manager, Wearables and Connected Devices, explains, their AR glasses and headsets have continued to shrink in size and weight while simultaneously improving in performance: “We recognised right from the start that AR glasses had to be designed for the kinds of workspaces that people like maintenance engineers were going to be operating in. For a start, that meant that the actual displays had to have the highest resolution and image synchronisation possible to support human binocular vision if we were to avoid blurring and tiredness and not interfere with the ‘real’ world background. The latest device in our Moverio range to be launched later this year – the BT-300 – will be using Si-OLED technology to provide HD quality, but still weighs around 60% less than the previous model, a critical issue given that some people will be wearing these for significant lengths of time.”

She adds, “Our BT-200 smart glasses solution already incorporates a VGA camera, GPS, a compass, a gyroscope, an accelerometer and a microphone, supported by Bluetooth and WiFi connectivity and running Android-based apps. Last year, we also launched our BT-2000 professional headset specifically for industrial applications. This includes a depthsensing stereo camera for 3D mapping, image or product recognition, and gesture control, while voice control is also supported for truly hands-free operation. Although Epson is concentrating on the hardware end, we’re actively building a developer and applications ecosystem to support areas like logistics and manufacturing.”

X-Ray vision - without being Superman For PTC, with its heritage in CAD/CAM, the Vuforia acquisition was a natural evolution as Jay Wright, senior VP and general manager, Vuforia, explains: “With the IoT, it’s essential that we can also let people actually experience the data that’s generated and AR completes that value chain – but we’ve got to make using it as easy as possible. If you look at the entire product life cycle of create, build and service, AR and VR can play critical roles at each stage, both in standalone activities and in collaborative group working.

“We also believe that AR has the potential to have a huge impact on cost and time issues,” Wright adds, “when it comes to servicing and repairing complex equipment and in training and supporting less skilled staff. A number of our customers are already deploying systems to do exactly that. Via AR glasses or a tablet, engineers can not only diagnose problems from internal sensors, but also see exactly what remedial action to take – even down to which way to turn a bolt. If the solution isn’t immediately available, they can then share that real world dynamic image with a remote expert for a quick resolution with no added truck roll or delay.”

Mike Crook, head of Mubaloo Innovation Lab, echoes this potential: “Where IoT comes to AR/VR is that machines have moving parts. For example, current motor status, internal temperature, fluid levels etc. that the machine can report to the engineer, though in many cases these machines are providing data feeds that are not necessarily used so far.

Assuming the data is available either by an app querying a database, or locally over Bluetooth, then AR suddenly has a third dimension to it. Equally a VR experience could leverage this data making the experience focused and in real time.”

KTM uses IoT Augmented Reality from PTC to speed motorcycle repair KTM develops and produces race-ready, off-road and street motorcycles that are distributed via more than 1,700 independent dealers around the world. One of the challenges in new growth markets is the lack of experience and this can make it challenging to get repairs made correctly and on time. KTM sees huge potential in Augmented Reality as a way to help them address this. Their vision for technicians is to be able to run diagnostics and know exactly what the issue is with the bike before they even begin. They also expect lower translation costs – since the manuals will require less text.

For example, a new technician without having a lot of experience working on KTM bikes can manage his work from one dashboard on his iPad, using the KTM Service Technician’s App, built by PTC and KTM, using ThingWorx. There he sees a list of all the bikes that need servicing on a specific day. He chooses the first one via scanning the Vumark and sees detailed information about this bike. Normally a technician would listen to the customer complaint and make his diagnosis based on his experience and the information he can locate in the manual. But now the technician can use the App's diagnostic feature to identify the problem. The AR ‘show me’ function then guides the technician through a step-by-step process to easily make the repair.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

53

INTERVIEW

Introducing LPWA Public Service Categories: matching services to applications A new report just published by Beecham Research: ‘An Introduction to LPWA Public Service Categories: Matching Services to IoT Applications’, proposes creating service categories for different types of providers of LPWA (Low Power Wide Area) public services. The aim is to make it possible for enterprise users to match the applications that they want to the most appropriate connectivity services required to enable them. In addition, the report proposes a new name to refer to this new class of providers.

Through discussions with the key market players who offer LPWA-based public services, Beecham proposes using the term ‘Public LPWA Services Provider’ (LSP) for a provider that offers LPWA-based connectivity services directly to users. In addition, when services offered by these LSPs are themselves enabled through a cloud-based service, they then propose using the term LPWA Services Enabler (LSE) for a cloud-based services provider.

To explore how these service categories will aid market development in this increasingly important area of the IoT market, Robin DukeWoolley, CEO at Beecham Research, interviewed Thomas Nicholls, EVP Communications at SIGFOX, one of the leading players in this sector.

RD-W: Do you see it helpful that the report calls for a service focus rather than a technology focus?

TN: Customers care about what they buy, much more than how it’s built. For example, very few people care about how 2G, 3G and 4G networks actually work. They just want a cheap data subscription that they can use wherever they go.

In the LPWA space there are a lot of discussions around technologies and protocols. These discussions are interesting for the engineers involved - but not so much for the customers, so we warmly welcome the idea of shifting to a more customer-oriented service description.

By the way, for LPWA use cases, the key attributes are often expressed through the concept of the 4Cs: coverage; commitment, e.g.

SLAs; and cost and consumption, e.g. battery life.

RD-W: The report categorises key service attributes that can be matched to different

types of application. Do you see that as an aid to market development?

TN: The IoT covers a wide range of applications.

Some are addressed very well by traditional cellular connectivity, some by WiFi or Bluetooth and some by LPWA. When it comes to connectivity there is no one-size-fits-all.

In that context, it's very relevant in terms of being able to guide users of connectivity to an optimum solution that’s based on their actual application requirements.

RD-W: How would you define the applications that SIGFOX is focusing on and how do these differ from others that you see in the market?

TN: The market is broad, very broad. What we see is that the applications that use our services are very different from the ones that use traditional connectivity solutions. These range from cost saving applications, ones that will maximise the revenues of our customers, through to ones that are supporting new and disruptive business models.

Many of the applications that we enable require nationwide or international coverage. This includes tracking solutions as well as B2C products. ▼

The IoT covers a wide range of applications. Some are addressed very well by traditional cellular connectivity, some by WiFi or Bluetooth and some

by LPWA

IN ASSOCIATION WITH SIGFOX 54

IoT Now - April / May 2016

Many of the applications that we enable require nationwide or international coverage.

This includes tracking solutions as well as B2C products.

Thomas Nicholls, SIGFOX Thomas Nicholls is EVP Communications at SIGFOX. He worked alongside SIGFOX CEO Ludovic Le Moan at Goojet/Scoop.it, where he was director of engineering on one of the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s first successful mobile social B2C mobile apps. As part of the architecture team, Thomas helped define the technical architecture for distributed scalable data storage for the Joost startup, started and managed by the founders of Skype. Before that, Thomas worked on a wide range of software based projects, ranging from embedded software to web applications, in several different countries. Thomas can be followed on Twitter at @thomasnicholls.

We also see a lot of combinations of SIGFOX and traditional connectivity solutions, such as cellular, WiFi and Bluetooth. The goal can be to have backup connectivity, avoid GSM jammers, automating pairing and so on.

And, last but not least, there's also a huge retrofit market, which is due to the fact that SIGFOX is compatible with all of the existing sub-GHz transceivers in the market. This means that customers who already use chips from the likes of Texas Instruments, Atmel, Silicon Labs and others can use SIGFOX without any changes to their Bill of Materials (BOM). Some customers have even installed SIGFOX via Firmware Over The Air (FOTA) upgrades using a GSM connection.

RD-W: What are some of the key differentiators for how SIGFOX enables these types of applications?

TN: SIGFOX provides a very high performance method for resolving the 4 Cs that I mentioned before: coverage, commitment, cost and consumption. B2C alarm systems will, for example, require country-wide coverage - or even international for some customers.

You also need to be able to commit to an SLA when you manage critical communications, which is something that only SIGFOX provides. SIGFOX

IoT Now - April / May 2016

even provides SLAs for global connectivity. Our costs for connectivity subscriptions and end points are clearly market leading, while our open chip vendor approach allows customers to choose the cheapest and most appropriate chipsets for their specific applications. Energy consumption has always been one of the key focus areas for SIGFOX and we are more than willing to benchmark against any other operated LPWA solution to show just how much further we push the limits of battery life.

Robin Duke-Woolley, Beecham Research Robin Duke-Woolley is founder and CEO of Beecham Research, drawing on over 40 yearsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; experience in the telecom/IT industry. He was director of Telecom Research at Dataquest/Gartner and a principal at other leading consultancy and research firms before founding Beecham Research. Specialist in market analysis and strategy consulting in the M2M/IoT Connected Devices market since 2001, Beecham is an internationally recognised thought leader. His background includes a BSc Honours degree in Electronics and an MSc in Management and Business Studies from Warwick University, plus an Advanced Management Programme at INSEAD in Fontainebleu, France.

55

PERSPECTIVES

Blockchain and the IoT Hype or reality?

Every so often a technology concept appears, seemingly out of nowhere, that, in the jargon of our industry, might be said to ‘challenge the existing paradigm’, writes IoT Now’s editor, Alun Lewis. We’ve seen it recently with NFV/SDN, effectively deconstructing traditional telecom architectures to turn the planet’s networks into what looks like one giant motherboard.

While most coverage of blockchain implementations so far has focused on their role in supporting the so-called cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, the concept itself represents another step in our journey towards decentralisation, initiated by the peer-to-peer worldview of the internet. Rather than having one central system tracking and authorising transactions, blockchain technologies work as ‘a programmable distributed trust infrastructure’, with built-in features providing trackable audit trails that all users can see and share – hence the term ‘Public Ledger’, which is also sometimes used.

This in turn is leading to the evolution of a number of other concepts that should definitely be of interest to the IoT world, such as Decentralised Autonomous Organisations, an idea promoted by Slockit who envisage a world where we can rent, sell or share anything – without middlemen. There’s also growing interest in the possible role that blockchain might have in dealing with the increasingly critical issue of security in an IoT world.

So what is it?

Christian Cachin, IBM Research

Gareth Stephens, GBG

56

Blockchain has started on a familiar journey: initial debate in odd corners of the technology blogosphere; trial projects by the R&D operations of a few large companies; a wave of innovation and start-ups; and the appearance of dedicated conferences on the topic. As a result, this got the editorial whiskers of IoT Now twitching a few months ago and we decided to canvas some opinions on how things might play out from a few experts. Now read on…

One of the companies that has been pioneering research into blockchain has been IBM, as Dr. Christian Cachin, cryptographer, at IBM Research in Zurich explains: “Blockchain is a promising new method for securing online transactions among mistrusting entities. A blockchain is a distributed ledger shared via a peer-to-peer network that contains an ever-expanding and immutable list of data records. Each participant has a copy of the ledger; additions to the chain are propagated

throughout the network and agreed on by the participants. Even if some participants try to influence the system and gain an advantage for themselves, a cryptographic protocol ensures that one commonly agreed blockchain emerges, which holds only valid records, reducing the need to establish trust using traditional and expensive methods. At IBM's Zurich lab we’re developing cryptographic protocols for the Hyperledger Project to create an open blockchain for business using Byzantine fault tolerant replication.”

With us so far, dear layman reader? Don’t worry, Dr Cachin now makes it tangible. “One of the more intriguing blockchain applications is supply chain management,” he adds. “This involves managing many relationships with direct suppliers of goods—and companies also have to be aware of what’s going on with their suppliers’ suppliers. It’s not just financial transactions, but also planning and managing each step in the process of going to market. Because of these separate but related interactions, there’s a tremendous amount of overhead—time delays, pile-on costs, and the potential for mistakes to be made.

“Imagine instead supply chains where blockchain is used,” he suggests. “An aircraft manufacturer might create a blockchain-based system for holistically managing all of its relationships with its suppliers. These will all share the exact same information about a new aircraft model – every step in the process of planning, designing, assembling, delivering and maintaining it. At the same time, the manufacturer will use other blockchain-based systems for managing financial transactions connected to each step. Trust, accountability, compliance with government regulations, and internal rules and processes get built into supply chains. The result: reductions in cost and time delays, improved quality, and reduced risks.”

Making sure who is who – and what is what Another critical building block of the IoT – identity – is also apparently ripe for blockchain.

Gareth Stephens, head of Proposition Development at identity management company GBG, says, “With its highly secure and decentralising characteristics, blockchain can enable a single digital identity, allowing people to verify themselves once and then use this many times. But this also extends into ‘things’. Think of a chair that could relay data about the person using it to reflect the length of time in use, weight, ▼

The latest new ‘new’ idea to start filtering into the IoT community’s collective mind involves the application of Blockchain technologies to the IoT/M2M world – and it’s currently causing a lot of the individual heads that make up that collective mind to do some intensive scratching.

IoT Now - April / May 2016

CASE STUDY

movement, etc. and assigns it to the individual sitter. How do we stop people intercepting this information and how do we know it was the right chair/thing sending that information?

He adds, “In blockchain, people can create a single federated identity to authenticate themselves with services all over the globe, whether it be to login or to confirm a payment.

Such solutions are decentralised, meaning that no companies hold all the keys to unlock these identities. Should a data breach occur, no one can take over an identity. We can also verify ‘things’ and their relationships to people. Each time they send/receive information from the IoT, the unique keys can be verified using the blockchain and only passed through when these match up.

Blockchain alone often isn’t the answer, but it is a key part of the overall solution.”

An autonomous world of things Matthew Coward, manager at Sytel Reply, also focuses on the role of blockchain in supporting the growing independence that we’re assigning to things and systems: “Think about a production line able to talk with other production lines around the world, ordering parts and organising production on its own; think about networks able to reconfigure routing without human participation; think about machines communicating autonomously with the human world. The only grey point is security; IoT networks are huge, distributed and often built on top of existing unsecure protocols. Furthermore, they are built for interconnection and interoperation, dangerously linking different networks to each other.

“Blockchain, Coward proposes, “offers a compelling IoT solution as the greater the number of devices, the greater the inherent security. Why? Because the protocol acquires strength as the network grows, guaranteeing identity, security and provable information exchange. Reply has already designed some proofs of concept, based on blockchain, to accelerate our clients’ own IoT development. Firstly, there’s Blokcom, a messaging protocol based on blockchain, which transforms any untrusted environment into a trusted one where all data exchanged is verified and guaranteed against mutability and falsification. Then there’s Securechain, a system to bring scalability and auditabilty to Software Defined Networks (SDN), using the Ethereum blockchain as a programmable security gateway to allow or reject changes on the SDN. Finally, there’s Authentichain, a physical authentication protocol for the IoT world using any RF communication, providing secure access and mutual recognition for any smart device connected to every network.”

IoT Now - April / May 2016

He concludes, “Blockchain does however carry some challenges, like network growth management, process time to secure information and computational power. The last is one of the most important in an IoT context, since we deal with low-consumption devices with limited CPU power. Although a blockchain network requires a number of relatively ‘heavy’ miners to function correctly, very small and low-power IoT devices can participate as verifiers, providing a relatively light verification mechanism for the blockchain known as consensus.”

“The IoT requires security from the edge to the enterprise”, says Haydn Povey, founder of Secure.Thingz. and executive board member of the IoT Security Foundation. “We believe that security needs to be enhanced at every level of IoT implementation, from delivering confidentiality of data in transit and at rest, through to delivering high integrity and availability in the nodes - and blockchain is a potentially critical component in this. Providing transactional logs between nodes to prohibit non-repudiation and underpin financial interactions is going to be critical in building trust. For example, blockchain may enable adaptive white goods, where peak load on the electricity infrastructure demands that appliances pause to reduce load. This has real world benefit to the electricity utilities, but also may save costs for consumers if the transaction is formally captured and is non-repudiable.”

Matthew Coward, Sytel Reply

Haydn Povey, Secure.Thingz.

Putting blockchain to work One interesting initiative currently underway is Chain of Things (CoT), a consortium of individuals, companies and organisations seeking to determine if blockchain can provide the best security solution for the IoT. In addition to security, the broader goal of CoT is to create a nexus for discussion and development at the intersection of IoT and blockchain.

Conor Colwell, Chain of Things

Conor Colwell, one of CoT’s founders explains, “Our initial focus is a use example that will document the layers of a full stack blockchainbased IoT solution for logging solar power generation to a distributed ledger. CoT will explore three segments critical to security: securely sending data from logger to ledger; maintaining ledger data securely; and, finally, securely sharing/transacting that data. This will be the first in a series which will use real world IoT deployments to both identify and explore potential security vulnerabilities while clearly establishing formulas for modular blockchain+IoT stacks. We’re also actively seeking partnerships with a variety of groups - blockchain, IoT, security, or otherwise - who have an interest in testing real world implementations.”

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EVENTS

IoT Evolution, July 11-14, 2016 CAESARS PALACE, LAS VEGAS IoT Evolution gathers together a worldwide community of IoT thought leaders, technologists and end users to secure knowledge, strengthen partnerships and learn how the IoT will transform their business and drive revenue. IoT Evolution’s unmatched conference content ensures attendees get a complete understanding of how to successfully implement solutions to drive improved business processes, new products and services and revenue within their company.

IoT Evolution by the numbers: 4,000 attendees • 750+ companies • 65+ speakers • 50+ exhibitors • 90+ companies represented IoT Evolution includes the following Collocated Events: • IoT Security Track • Enterprise IoT Track • Connected Home and Building Conference • Connected Transportation Conference • IoT Evolution Developers Conference

IoT Evolution Keynotes Business leaders will discuss deployments, business analytics and transformation through the IoT, including: Kore, The Weather Company, Goodyear Tire and Rubber, AT&T, Ingenu, VMWare, Eurotech, Intel Security

IoT Evolution Special Events Focused on knowledge, networking and fun, these include Battle of the Platforms * Business Impact Awards * Case Study Theatre * IoT Full Day Certification Tutorial

EVENTS

Staying connected on everything wirelessly connected CTIA Super Mobility 2016, LAS VEGAS, SEPTEMBER 7-9 The IoT has gone from sci-fi for consumers and businesses to a reality and many are already enjoying the benefits, from home automation to fleet management. This is now a pervasive part of our ‘everything wireless’ world.

That’s why the wireless industry – from the wireless providers and their suppliers to the device manufacturers and apps to content developers and policymakers, convene every year at CTIA Super Mobility. By attending CTIA Super Mobility 2016, executives can develop plans to better serve their customers, grow their businesses and beat their competition by keeping up with dynamic change. With hundreds of hours of educational sessions, numerous networking opportunities and an impressive who’s who of keynote speakers under one roof, attendees will be fully immersed in the IoT. More than a thousand companies will be exhibiting at CTIA Super Mobility 2016, and among them is AT&T, which is one of the leaders in developing and encouraging consumers and

TM Forum Live! 2016 Nice, France 9-12 May 2016 www.tmforumlive.org

businesses to use IoT to make their lives easier. Since IoT will be core to everything at the show, AT&T Mobility and Consumer Operations president and CEO and CTIA chairman Glenn Lurie will be a keynote speaker at CTIA Super Mobility 2016.

To make this year’s event even better, the show floor is transforming into a replica of a Smart City with Smart Experiences so that you can participate in a fully-connected community. For example: •

• •

The Smart Office will show the latest ways to maximise productivity, including M2M advances, security and conferencing capabilities and app services that advance and streamline successful enterprises The AR/VR Arcade will feature cutting edge augmented and virtual reality gear, devices, content and games The 5G Launchpad will explore next-generation network technologies

IoT will be an integral topic at CTIA Super Mobility 2016 in Las Vegas, September 7-9, where we’ll explore the latest advances and opportunities. You can’t afford to miss it.

GSMA Mobile 360 Series – Privacy and Security

ACI’s European Smart Homes 2016 Conference

The Hague, Netherlands 10-11 May 2016 www.mobile360series.com

London, UK 11-12 May 2016 www.wplgroup.com/aci/event/smarthomes-europe-summit/

IoT World 2016 San Francisco, USA 10-12 May 2016 www.iotworldevent.com

Connected Cars Europe 2016

Internet of Things Summit

Brussels, Belgium 17 May 2016 www.iotevents.org/connected-carseurope-2016

London, UK 10-11 May 2016 www.theinnovationenterprise.com/ summits/

Future Connected Cars USA San Francisco, USA 10-12 May 2016 www.usa.connectedcarsworld.com

Smart Cities India 2016 Exhibition and Conference New Delhi, India 11-13 May 2016 www.smartcitiesindia.com

SoftSummit Europe

Apps World North America

7th Annual Internet of Things European Summit

London, UK / Frankfurt, Germany 10-12 May 2016 www.learn.flexerasoftware.com

San Francisco, USA 11-12 May 2016 www.na.apps-world.net

Brussels, Belgium 18-19 May 2016 www.eu-ems.com

IoT Now - April / May 2016

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IoT MASTERCLASS

European Union IoT policy - aiming at a European IoT space The European Union, specifically through the European Commission, has dedicated attention and efforts on the IoT for some time, writes Saverio Romeo, principal analyst at Beecham Research, in the latest of IoT Now’s IoT Masterclasses.

2000-2013 – Exploring different issues, but without much coordination During the first part of this new century, the European Commission, through what was once the Directorate General (DG) Information Society, put a lot of emphasis on an RFIDbased IoT. The EU’s research programme FP6 (Sixth Framework Programme) that ran from 2000-2006 was particularly focussed on concepts such as pervasive and ubiquitous computing that today represent the foundation of what we define as the IoT. That effort continued during FP7 (Seventh Framework Programme), running from 2007-2013, which focused on technological issues and on the impact of the IoT in vertical markets. IoT-A (IoT Architecture) is a very well-known FP7 project that focussed on IoT platforms and IoT reference architecture. However, despite the effort, the policy put in place was fragmented and was therefore not able to provide a holistic view of IoT for Europe and, consequently, unable to strongly define an IoT strategy for the region.

2014-2020 – Moving towards a European IoT space This new programme period, designed by the D.G. Connect, has been formed to enable the integration of ideas and define common objectives for creating a EU IoT space. This approach complements the development of the EU’s Digital Single Market (DSM) initiative, launched in May 2015. The overall objective of the DSM is to harmonise digital markets by moving from 28 separate ones to a single European one.

This should be achieved through three policy pillars: better online access to digital goods and services; creation of an environment in which digital networks can grow and enable new services; and defining digital technologies as an engine for economic growth.

The IoT vision is seen as an important element in achieving the DSM objective. In order to enable the power of the IoT, in May 2015 the European Commission launched the Alliance for IoT Innovation (AIOI). AIOI is an organisation that should

coordinate IoT activities by working closely with stakeholders and actors involved in this space leading, it is hoped, to the creation of a European IoT ecosystem. This process is also nourished by the work of the IoT European Research Cluster (IERC) which aims to coordinate on-going and future IoT activities and projects.

IERC projects move along two lines. The first regards horizontal technologies and innovation such as FIWARE, as well as vertical innovations such as the Factory of the Future in the manufacturing sector, and Sensing Enterprise for the overall European business environment. Several initiatives involve the Open Data approach embraced by the EU, which is also a fundamental element of privacy and security in DSM. Finally, there is a lot of attention concentrated on designing pilots. The IoT Large Scale Pilots, run under Horizon 2020, the research programme for the period 2014-2020, will drive work in areas such as wearable technologies, assisted living, connected vehicles, smart cities, smart agriculture, and water management. April 12, 2016, was the deadline for the first round of IoT Large Scale Pilots and investment of €140 million is planned for the period 2016-2017. A second call will also happen in 2017 and this will probably focus on embedded intelligence and platforms. There will also be opportunities to have international involvement with organisations from Japan, South Korea, Brazil and China.

Conclusion This above text has only very briefly highlighted the key initiatives underway by the EU for the IoT community for the period 2014-2020. Each of the items discussed deserves more attention and the European Commission’s Digital Single Market website (https://ec.europa.eu/digital-singlemarket/en/internet-things) is a good place to start. The overall policy objective involves creating a European IoT ecosystem that’s primarily able to compete primarily with the US IoT space, but also with the emerging Asian IoT space. It’s obviously too early to say if that objective will be reached, but the EU’s IoT policy currently looks more solid and more open to the community through the work of the AIOI.

Saverio Romeo, Beecham Research

Saverio Romeo runs research in the areas of M2M, IoT, wearable technologies and smart solutions for vertical sectors. He has done extensive research and published in areas such as mobile healthcare, smart cities, mobile and wireless innovative services, data analytics in the mobile industry, wearable technologies, smart farming and M2M/IoT.

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IoT Now - April / May 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

APRIL/MAY 2016 • VOLUME 6 • ISSUE 2

SAP From Things to Outcomes

IoT Now Guide to Business Transformation

INSIDE: Insights into IoT transformation from PwC, Cisco, Flexera, ServiceMax, Accenture and many more

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CONTENTS

Business transformation and the IoT Over the last couple of years, as M2M has slowly morphed into the all-encompassing IoT vision, the term ‘transformation’ has started to become used more and more in all the marketing material, exhibition signage and conference papers that our industry seems to generate by the ton. When it comes to filtering out reality from the hype, things get more problematic. It’s certainly true that huge short and long term benefits will accrue to those companies that get things right. Unfortunately, it’s also true that recent history is littered with many examples of companies who got things wrong, sometimes with devastating effects for their shareholders and employees.

Although IoT Now regularly covers the challenges of IoT-related change, we thought that it would also be good to take a more focused look at the IoT and corporate transformation.

Firstly, we spoke with Nayaki Nayyar of SAP, a company that’s been around for over 45 years, has 300,000 customers in more than 190 countries, and has an equally long history of applying innovation to help organisations of all shapes and sizes transform the ways that they do business.

Secondly, we also approached a number of key players in the IoT sector, both large and small, to get a range of diverse insights into what is a truly multi-faceted issue that involves deeply human factors of perception and motivation as well as the harder, more tangible ones of technology.

4 News

5 Nayaki Nayyar, GM and global head of IoT and Innovation GTM at SAP, shares her experiences of transformation and how to achieve it successfully, based on her early experiences in the petrochemical industry and more recent roles with SAP, where she now also has responsibilities for the complementary fields of machine learning and artificial Intelligence

10 IoT Now’s editor, Alun Lewis pulls together a patchwork series of insights into key aspects of the transformation journey from a wide range of vendors, solution providers and consultants

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TRANSFORMATION NEWS Bosch launches its own IoT cloud

IBM and SAP partner for client innovation IBM and SAP have announced plans to drive the modernisation of clients’ systems and processes. The companies will co-innovate solutions that increase customer value through cognitive extensions, enhanced customer and user experiences, and industry-specific functionality — all enabled with SAP Business Suite 4 SAP HANA software, available on-premise and in the cloud.

The two companies will co-locate resources in Walldorf, Germany, and Palo Alto, California, and showcase new solutions to clients in IBM and SAP innovation centres around the world.

“The future of business strategy and business value will proceed from the foundational elements of this announcement — cognitive, cloud and the design of consumer-quality

experiences in every industry,” said Bridget van Kralingen, senior VP, IBM Global Business Services. “We’re formalising a complementary set of capabilities to simplify and speed outcomes for those clients evolving to become cognitive enterprises.”

Volkmar Denner, Bosch

“We now offer all the ace cards for the connected world from a single source.

The Bosch IoT Cloud is the final piece of the puzzle that completes our software expertise. We are now a full service provider for connectivity and the IoT,” said Bosch CEO Volkmar Denner.

Bridget van Kralingen, IBM

Tech Mahindra to build industry-specific IoT solutions with Microsoft’s Azure IoT suite Tech Mahindra has announced plans to build IoT solutions by using the Microsoft Azure IoT Suite. This announcement aims to create a set of new CP Gurnani, customer experiences Tech Mahindra by integrating the entire value chain of client businesses through product conceptualisation, development, manufacturing, supply chain and aftermarket services.

Tech Mahindra plans to launch an IoT Centre of Excellence in Bangalore, India, to focus on building solutions across industry with the Microsoft Azure IoT

Suite. The company also plans to launch Customer Experience Centres in the US, Europe, India and China to allow customers and organisations to experience digital solutions with measurable outcomes.

CP Gurnani, MD and CEO, Tech Mahindra, said, “We believe IOT-enabled digital business transformation will create significant opportunities in the manufacturing, healthcare, transportation and energy segments for both organisations. We are excited about enhancing our relationship with Microsoft, which will enable our clients to derive significant value in their transformation journey.”

Cisco acquires Jasper Cisco has announced that it has closed the acquisition of Jasper, an IoT service platform company that supports more than 3,500 enterprises worldwide.

According to Jahangir Mohammed, founder and CEO of Jasper and now GM of the newly-formed IoT Cloud Business Unit at Cisco, “Our customers are enthusiastic about the combined value that Cisco and Jasper will bring to their businesses. With the IoT Cloud Business Unit, Cisco is moving up the stack to deliver a complete portfolio that simplifies the launch, management and monetisation of IoT services.”

He added, “A great example is Telular, a leading provider of solutions for

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Bosch is launching its own cloud for webbased services to run various applications for its connected mobility, industries, and buildings businesses.

The first cloud is located in Germany.

commercial telematics, security, and bulk storage management, whose TankLink business delivers information on temperature, liquid Jahangir levels and Mohammed, Cisco geolocation for the oil and gas industry.

Using the Jasper IoT service platform, TankLink’s remote inventory management solutions deliver the highly-accurate, 24/7 tank level information that is necessary for efficient and cost-saving replenishment decisions.”

“A major factor in the success of connected solutions is their scalability.

The Bosch IoT Cloud means Bosch now has the relevant infrastructure and we see this as a major milestone,” added Denner. The Bosch IoT Cloud comprises technical infrastructure as well as platform and software offerings and from 2017 it will also be made available as a service to other companies.

European Commission: Helping European industry to go fully digital In a speech at the start of April, European Commission VP Andrus Ansip, in charge of the Digital Single Market, highlighted the EC’s drive to boost innovation in new growth areas including the IoT. “In the coming days,” he said, “we will present a package of Digital Single Market initiatives designed to achieve this. It will strengthen digital innovation and technology across all economic sectors to make sure that European industry is in a position to compete strongly in digital technologies.”

Ansip added, “In concrete terms, this is about: building and expanding infrastructure for data analytics in Europe; giving our businesses interoperable cross-border systems; strengthening trust in cloud services for SMEs; making standard-setting a strategic priority for Europe; and creating a seamless plug-and-play environment for the IoT. Already, over 30 national and regional initiatives for digitising industry have been launched over the last few years, like Industrie 4.0 in Germany, Smart Industry in the Netherlands, and Industrie du Futur in France.

IoT Now Transformation SUPPLEMENT - April / May 2016

INTERVIEW

Nayaki Nayyar, GM and Global Head of IoT and Innovation GTM, SAP

From Things to Outcomes: SAP’s Nayaki Nayyar on the transformation journey ‘Transformation’ is one of those awkward words that often gets carelessly thrown around.

Everyone knows what it loosely means, but when it comes to putting it into real-world practice – especially in the worlds of business and industry – the devil truly is in the detail…

Technology is applied to enhance existing customer relationships, improve product design, manufacture and distribution, and automate previously labour-intensive processes – but doesn’t really change the core of the business model. The scope of the transformation currently being wrought by the IoT is going to be far, far wider.

It was with this background in mind that IoT Now’s editor, Alun Lewis, recently sat down with

▼

This is especially true when it comes to the IoT, the enabling role that it can play in corporate transformation, and the impact that it’s already having on enterprises around the world. Previous iterations and technology cycles have gone a long way to reducing the friction and cost involved in business processes and have already radically changed the ways that we work and live. That said, in many enterprise cases, especially for SMEs, it has largely been a case of ‘business as usual’.

IN ASSOCIATION WITH SAP IoT Now Transformation SUPPLEMENT - April / May 2016

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INTERVIEW

Nayaki Nayyar, GM and global head of IoT and Innovation GTM at SAP, to talk through her – and SAP’s – perspectives on the current sea change underway.

IoT Now: As you highlight, we need new ways of thinking and these often involve new roles, job titles and responsibilities. What’s your take on this aspect of transformation?

IoT Now: Nayaki, before you joined SAP, you’d spent around fifteen years deeply involved in IT in the petrochemical energy sector with Shell and Valero. More than many, that sector has regularly had to undergo huge and often unexpected change as a result of shifts in many socio-economic, regulatory and political factors. What lessons did you learn there when it came to managing rapid change from the IT perspective?

NN: There has to be a specific C-level focus on well-defined outcomes, not just the enabling technologies that are going to get you there.

That, in some cases, is going to involve creating a new position – such as Chief Digital Officer - as it’s going to require a different skill set and mind set to that usually needed by, say, someone focused on running an IT department.

NN: Looking back, it was really invaluable experience, understanding where the very real and often gritty world of petrochemical engineering met the abstractions of IT system design – and the almost inevitable room for misunderstandings from both sides.

Transformation always has a cultural element as well as the changes to the processes and systems involved and, if companies are to make a successful IoT integration journey that reaches from ‘shop floor to top floor’, as SAP defines it, then these cultural factors are implicit to any programme.

Every department within every company has its own views of the world, its own organisational memory and its own semantic shorthand that’s often difficult for outsiders at first to engage with – even if they work for the same company. In the past, these different departments often used to be co-located on the same site and people could interact and share more easily and equitably.

Now, thanks to the power of networks, they can be thousands of miles apart, but have to work together even more closely to successfully synchronise often highly distributed activities and resources. One key factor in enabling any transformation involves breaking down traditional silos that segregated people and functions into sharply defined roles. Fortunately, we now have new technology tools that can support these new management processes and structures. The IoT isn’t just about communications infrastructure – it’s about making the transition to a kind of ‘things to outcomes’ way of thinking.

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In my experience, that doesn’t always involve having to recruit from outside for this type of role. There’s very often internal existing talent that’s already familiar enough with the company to guide them through what is inevitably going to be a multi-faceted transformation programme.

Whatever the recruitment policy, companies usually need some underlying continuity to reassure employees, partners and customers.

Entering the IoT is a long term project and that involves having a long term vison for the next five to ten years and, I’ll emphasise, a vision grounded in commercial and achievable reality.

IoT Now: So how is this going to affect the kinds of skills sets that are needed?

NN: While these emerging job roles will require people able to balance technology and business, new skills and disciplines are also becoming essential. In this context I’d suggest that Data Scientists in particular will be at the top of the hiring tree. With systems that are now capable of sucking in vast amounts of data, not enough attention is being given to the use that can be made of those data pools, lakes, streams and torrents, to use some of the terms that have recently become popular. We’ve not only got to find ways of filtering, storing, classifying and analysing that data, but we also have to find appropriate and mission-focused ways of sharing it with the many different players involved in any product, service or customer and partner relationship. That, in turn, is going to involve applying new visualisation tools to the data to turn it into truly context-sensitive, actionable information that can provide fresh insights to existing ▼

There has to be a specific C-level focus on welldefined outcomes, not just the enabling technologies that are going to get you there

IoT Now Transformation SUPPLEMENT - April / May 2016

problems and identify impending trends before they impact the business model and revenues.

that allow him or her to drill down into the data, spot anomalies and trends, and decrease all the friction and delay usually associated with these processes.

NN: One great example of this is the current shift by product companies to what are called ‘servitisation’ strategies. Whereas in the past, a company might have had a simple pay/buy relationship with its customers, the IoT now makes it possible to transform that into an ongoing relationship where they pay for what they consume in a dynamic real time way. To a certain extent, this has been done already by the PC printer market, where the cost of initial purchase is low, and the initial cost of the device is recouped over a long period. Advances in sensor technologies in particular, both across manufacturing plant and in the finished product, are helping drive this other key strand of technology-based, but essentially commercial, innovation.

For example, a car manufacturer – or even a maker of industrial tyres - could move to a ‘mileage as a service’ model, tracking how much wear their tyres are going through and charging accordingly. One of our customers, Kaeser Compressors, a major manufacturer of air compressors, has already successfully made this shift. Firstly, they used IoT principles and our software to improve maintenance and productivity in their factories, and they’re now moving to a ‘compressed air as a service’ business model, rather than just selling equipment. As a result, not only have they lowered their maintenance costs, but they’ve also radically transformed the experience of their customers when they interact with Kaeser.

The data that drives these new models – and all the analytic and decision support tools that turn it into actionable information - are also in turn driving cultural and organisational change. The COO no longer has to try and gather information from lots of different sources, all in inevitably different formats, to produce daily or weekly reports in plant performance. Instead, a dynamic and up to date snapshot can be delivered right to his tablet in a board meeting, along with the tools

IoT Now: You touched there on manufacturing which I know is one of your key markets. Can you talk us through the other sectors that you’re involved with?

NN: Logistics operations are one major beneficiary of IoT transformations. One big customer of SAP is Hamburg Port Authority, Germany's largest seaport. Both local port and city traffic can be impacted by up to the 40,000 truck trips that happen daily around the site which has around 900 related businesses in the area. Real-time data accessible through the cloud reveals exactly when containers are ready for shipping and receiving. Train and truck routes for incoming and outgoing goods are optimised and better organised. This maximises mobility to efficiently connect all stakeholders and processes, empowering a ripple effect of benefits for Hamburg and beyond. More generically, the IoT helps vehicle fleet owners get the maximum value from their investments by optimising route deliveries in more dynamic ways.

One sector where IoT-enabled logistics is also having a growing impact is in the pharmaceutical industry. It’s now becoming possible to track medicines from the point of production to the point of sale and even the point of use. Sensors can be included in the packaging to monitor the temperatures that they’ve been exposed to – a critical issue with many medicines such as antibiotics and vaccines. This transparent tracking process also helps block counterfeit medicines from entering the delivery chain, a major problem in many countries.

IoT Now: SAP used the recent MWC event in Barcelona to announce an initiative aimed at the automotive sector where you joined forces with Spanish car manufacturer SEAT and Samsung. Can you tell us something about SAP’s work in this sector?

NN: We showcased two connected car scenarios: Digital Key and Park & Pay. With the digital key

▼

IoT Now: So how can an IoT transformation project actually change the business model?

One sector where IoT-enabled logistics is also having a growing impact is in the pharmaceutical industry

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INTERVIEW

With Park & Pay, by using a smartphone app controlled by the car’s head unit, the driver can find and reserve a parking space

concept, drivers are able to lock, unlock, and even operate their cars from their smartphones. The owner can digitally share the key with someone else, such as a family member or repair mechanic, and can revoke the key when the person is done.

With Park & Pay, by using a smartphone app controlled by the car’s head unit, the driver can find and reserve a parking space – and pay for it – in advance without ever having to get out of the car. The SAP Vehicles Network - powered by the SAP HANA Cloud Platform for the IoT means never having to circle the block again for parking. Payment is made via Samsung Pay, which integrates with MirrorLink technology to display data in the car’s head unit. Drivers can authorise payment with the touch of a finger – on a finger imprint pad conveniently located on the car’s central console. This is a new feature from SEAT and not yet available in the market.

Samsung Pay is already available in Korea and the U.S. and on its way to Europe later this year.

This is also an excellent example of how SAP is working with specialist companies in adjoining sectors as one key aspect of transformation is understanding how real value comes from being able to interwork with other systems and suppliers. For example, we’ve recently formed a strategic partnership with Vodafone and this aims to allow enterprises to connect and manage devices using Vodafone's IoT connectivity platform and to collect and move data from the devices into the SAP HANA platform.

IoT Now: So that’s manufacturing and logistics, What are the other sectors?

NN: The energy and the utility markets are also embracing the IoT, addressing multiple issues in multiple ways. Given the scale that most work on, even the smallest percentage increase in efficiency and asset and resource management can add up to substantial amounts of money. One of our major customers here is Alliander N.V. in the Netherlands. They’re a €1.7 billion company, building and supporting the infrastructures that carry electricity and natural gas to more than 3.5 million customers, making it the largest electricity and gas network company in the Netherlands.

With SAP HANA, it ‘s gathering and analysing massive amounts of data to better maintain assets, optimise its grid, and help customers save on energy bills. In application areas like this, machine learning and artificial intelligence have the potential to deliver even more efficiency gains, especially where natural power sources are involved, balancing generation and consumption cycles in more elegant ways.

This is also an area where SAP Edge solutions are particularly appropriate. Devices and sensors can obviously generate vast amounts of data and it’s rarely cost-effective to transport all of this back for central processing. We’re now able to filter and process data closer to the edge of networks,

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only extracting and transmitting what’s really needed.

IoT Now: Retail and consumer-facing IoT also seems to be getting a lot of attention. What are your thoughts here?

NN: This sector’s started talking about the Connected Store concept. Essentially, this involves bringing together a number of complementary systems, processes and technologies to create a connected store, complete with connected products and connected customers. In the process, you can support ever more real time demand-based supply chains, optimise on-shelf availability, increase the flow of product recommendations both by the store and by users via social networking, and, of course, avoiding frustrating out of stock scenarios. In the pharmaceutical and healthcare markets, for example, customers can now generate and share biometric data gathered through wearables, sleep monitors, and other sensors and apps. It therefore becomes possible to link this with particular product promotionlinked activities, such as making healthy menu suggestions or providing more generic healthy lifestyle advice.

Finally, a healthy lifestyle also depends on the food that we eat - and here SAP and the IoT are playing their part in what’s becoming known as precision farming. We’ve recently introduced a new digital farm app that allows field sensors to transfer data directly to the farmer - with important information on water needs, moisture level, fertiliser supplies and the right time to harvest in real-time. The app is built on SAP’s platform as a service offering HANA cloud platform (HCP) which enables customers and developers to build, extend, and run applications on SAP HANA in the cloud. The ‘things’ here might be green and alive, but that doesn’t mean that they – and the outcomes of more efficient farmers and our satisfied stomachs - can’t benefit as well!

Nayaki Nayyar is the general manager and global head of IoT and Innovation GTM at SAP. During her 20 year career, Nayaki has held various leadership positions at SAP and in the industry.

In her most recent role, Nayaki was heading up SAP’s Cloud for Customer Engagement – comprised of sales, service, and social capabilities – and significantly grew the business over 10 quarters. Prior to joining SAP in 2011, Nayaki was CTO at Valero Energy Corporation where she led the Enterprise Architecture and Development department during the company's rapid growth into the largest independent refining company in North America. She started her career at Shell where she gained tremendous industry experience. Nayaki has a Bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering, a Master's in Computer Science, and is a graduate of the Stanford Executive Program.

IoT Now Transformation SUPPLEMENT - April / May 2016

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EXPERT OPINION

The IoT Now Guide to Business Transformation It’s become a favourite cliché of many at the top in the business strategy world to reassuringly say that change is the only true constant, writes Alun Lewis, editor of IoT Now. As postEnlightenment thinking has progressed over the last few centuries, what was once seen as a divinely ordered, steady-state kind of universe has been replaced, for some people at least, with a far more dynamic and uncertain model. In the process, traditional world views have been overturned, revolutionising almost every field of human endeavour, from science and economics to the arts and politics. Indeed, drill down far enough into the high-tech systems that we now rely on and you’ll soon find yourself in a world of quantum uncertainty that’s very far from everyday common sense.

This kind of approach is becoming increasingly important in the infinitely interconnected environment of the IoT that we’re now starting to surround ourselves with. To take just one often used example from the non-linear world of complex systems: the ‘chaos butterfly’ whose single wingbeat ends up causing a hurricane on the other side of the world. In an IoT world, one small change in only one part of a multidimensional IoT value chain has the potential to reverberate across an entire ecosystem with unexpected and possibly unpleasant consequences.

The past might be another country – but it’s rich with lessons for today We have only to look back fifteen years or so in our industry to see the effects of the dot.com crash. A series of political, economic, social and technological factors came together to

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create a perfect storm that wrecked careers, pension plans and companies and damaged entire economies.

For any company now looking to exploit the very real benefits of the IoT, the issues of complexity touched on above should present warning signs. According to IDC’s 2015 ‘Global IoT Decision Maker Survey’, 58% of organisations worldwide see the IoT as strategic to their business, while another 24% see the IoT as transformational for their business.

However, spend even a short amount of time on the web searching under ‘business failure’ – especially where major IT projects are concerned – and it soon become clear that, while our technology has improved in leaps and bounds, Moore’s Law unfortunately doesn’t seem to apply to human skills in project management. In an excellent 2015 global report from PA Consulting ‘Innovation as Unusual’, the company estimated that in the UK alone, organisations wasted some £64.7 billion on failed innovation projects.

Supporting this is a wealth of human anecdote. One recurring theme often seems to be the new VP appointed to ‘transform’ some part of a company. He or she spends a year taking things apart, often with the help of a management consultancy hired for various Machiavellian reasons, before ▼

In academia, an entirely new field has emerged in the last couple of decades that aims to try and address some of these issues – Complex Systems. Implicitly multidisciplinary and exemplified by the work of organisations like the Santa Fe Institute in New Mexico, complex systems concepts try to break down the traditional siloed thinking and over-specialisation that exists in almost every organisation and profession to hopefully give us new ways of understanding the world.

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So what’s a company to do? Fail to transform and you’re dead in the water. Try and transform and it’s very much a case of ‘here be dragons’, as you step into unfamiliar and possibly hazardous terrain…

In the interests of trying to keep our readers aware of both the pitfalls and the possibilities that come with an IoT-related transformation, we thought we’d canvas some views from a range of companies. As there’s an almost infinite set of different topics and industry sectors to consider, we’ve tried to create a snapshot of the many different factors involved in a strategic IoT transformation.

The Telecom Service Provider perspective When it comes to the telecom service providers themselves, the IoT presents the classic threat/opportunity scenario that’s been played out on their turf in a number of different forms since the emergence of IP as the maid-of-all-work protocol in the late 1990s. What should have been a relatively happy symbiosis with the OTT world of content and the web has however turned instead into a relationship that’s often far more parasitic in nature.

Scott Puopolo, VP and Global Lead, Service Provider Transformation Group, at Cisco, board member at the Center for the Development and Application of Internet of Things Technologies (CDAIT) at Georgia Tech, and chair of its newlyformed Working Group on IoT Thought Leadership, shares his thoughts on transformation from the telecom operators’ perspectives: “I and my team work very closely with C-level executives amongst the telecoms service provider community and it’s now clear that many of these are now seriously targeting the IoT space in ways that haven’t really been tried before. Obviously, each sees different opportunities to exploit and, while some might have started simply by selling SIM cards, they’ll grow from this to expand their roles much further. While strategies will vary, it’s already clear that many are looking to monetise a far broader range of offerings than they have in this space before, and they’re going to move increasingly to a ‘as a Service’ model as well.

“The telecoms world has a number of important cards to play in this space: familiarity with mission-critical service quality and availability, end-to-end security, the ability to routinely handle huge amounts of very diverse data gathered from devices, networks and users and a range of built-in competencies that fulfil many of the IoT sweet spots in what’s an increasingly complex and diverse value chain.

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“That said,” Scott adds, “telecom operators will have to make changes in their own organisational structures to innovate and adapt successfully.

Some for example are setting up dedicated IoT innovation teams outside their core business in a Skunk Works kind of way, and this strategy can help in recruiting, motivating and managing the kinds of people who wouldn’t even think about taking a job with a large corporation – you might call it the Dilbert Effect. Entirely new skill sets are also in demand, such as data and software scientists, not to mention the supporting but equally valuable disciplines of business process design, macro-economics and specialist sector marketing. They’ll also have to learn to work much more nimbly and more effectively with small companies who might have a tactically useful application, but don’t fulfil the same kind of business criteria that large telcos typically look for in a partner. All in all, they already have a great place to start from – and they also have plenty of lessons from their recent past to learn from when it comes to innovating successfully.”

Scott Puopolo, Cisco

Starting with the basics So how do you actually initiate an IoT strategy?

Jouni Leskinen, director, R&D at Finnish IoT data analytics company Avarea suggests, “Set-up a team of people who have the knowledge and skills to deliver results, with skills that complement each other and include technical people and business and strategy experts. Once established, the team should consider how the project is aligned with the company’s mission, vision and strategy, and identify a real world business case based on that.

“To get practical results, theories should be turned into practice by making a proof of concept or prototype to test the business value.

Roll-out happens by gaining small wins with scoped business areas and business units, before scaling out to other parts of the company. Using IoT analytics often requires changes to the company culture and this is achieved by small, fast wins that demonstrate business value, showing how the new way is better than the old and communicating that to the whole organisation. It’s also very useful to find a pilot customer who’s happy to be involved in this.

Jouni Leskinen, Avarea

“To get practical results, theories should be turned into practice by making a proof of concept or prototype to test the business value”

“We’ve developed a six-stage, practical process: interviews - gathering of expectations; use case innovation - identifying opportunities; use case prioritisation - analysing the value and viability of the use case and selection of proof of concept; proof of concept planning; proof of concept implementation; results and next steps.”

As far as pitfalls in implementation go, Jouni concludes: “These usually involve trying to do everything internally from scratch and without experienced help; no real world business case and an inability to identify where to start; no management buy-in; lack of quality data; lack of analytics skills; the wrong tools and using Microsoft Excel for everything; an inability to apply the results to business processes; and, finally, immature company cultures when it comes to using analytics.” ▼

being lured away to another company based on their ‘success’. A new VP then has to be brought in to clear the mess up. Indeed, there’s a famous saying in the British Army that after the enemy, the next most dangerous thing is a young lieutenant with a map. In the business world, that map is often an MBA held by someone with little real world experience.

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EXPERT OPINION

Mohamed Kande, PwC

“In terms of practical steps, they’re simple: have an idea – draw the idea any way you want – present the idea to real customers – redraw the idea – reshow – pivot/redraw– reshow – pivot/redraw – prototype/Proof of Concept – show and pivot – release the minimum viable product – get feedback – and grow the Minimal Viable Product (MVP) into a complete service or solution. When it comes to implementation, the biggest pitfall is that you’re implementing something that people didn’t want as all technical issues in an implementation are resolvable. Keep building and developing through feedback post implementation.

Implementation is the start not the end.”

Follow my leader – with the right people behind Jim Ryan, Flexera Software

“When companies from the ‘internet world’ expand into the ‘industrial world’, they can trigger a paralysing clash of cultures”

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As already highlighted, good management and effective and inspiring leadership are essential for successful IoT innovation. Mohamed Kande, Global TMT Advisory leader at PwC shares his thoughts on the topic: “As this transformation – often referred to as the Fourth Industrial Revolution – unfolds, it’s the development of a far more human attribute that most concerns me: leadership. The fusion of the industrial and internet worlds not only requires new algorithms, new supply chains, and new analytical capabilities, but also new types of leader. The differing objectives and speeds of decisionmaking in these two worlds signal the changes that need to happen in the C-suite.

“When companies from the ‘internet world’ expand into the ‘industrial world’, they can trigger a paralysing clash of cultures. As the lines between manufacturing and digital capabilities blur, we need leaders who can strike a delicate balance to maximise production and innovation without ignoring human resource factors. As such, recruitment is one critical area. Industrial companies are struggling to attract a new type of digitally savvy talent because of their long established brands. As a result, companies will need to change how and from where they source talent, with industrial companies needing to think

about how to appeal to software engineers – and that involves rethinking their brand, corporate structures, culture and physical locations.”

Kande sums up, “We need leaders who can span both cultures. CEOs need to surround themselves with a diverse mix of advisors so they can make decisions both at industrial and internet speeds, but also so they can attract the right talent to prepare for the future. This is a certainly a focus for us now at PwC, helping companies better understand these recruitment and leadership challenges.”

The emergence of Servitisation - the ‘Any Thing-As-Service’ model Jim Ryan, CEO, Flexera Software, says that the IoT is ushering in an era of ‘Any Thing-as-a-Service’.

“Manufactured goods,” he comments, “used to be designed and built to perform a particular function. When needs changed, the item became obsolete and a replacement was required. In contrast, IoT goods are intelligent devices replete with data-gathering sensors, powered by software and connected to the Internet.

“Indeed, auto-manufacturer Tesla recently proved this when it announced that for US$2500 it was allowing customers to download a software update that would upgrade their existing car with an autopilot feature. In doing so, Tesla solved a problem afflicting most device manufacturers – how to reduce manufacturing costs, uncover new revenue streams, and make the supply chain more agile and responsive to changing market conditions and customer demands. Tesla used software to deliver new products, features and enhancements to existing customers; differentiated its product from every other automobile; created a new revenue stream by monetising its software upgrade; minimised manufacturing costs by offering this functionality via software; and established a deep, direct and ongoing relationship with the end-customer.

“Manufacturers however,” he warns, “will have to alter their business models and software monetisation - those licensing and entitlement management systems needed to protect and monetise the software and services revenue streams being created by the device – will be critical for this. Manufacturers must be able to sort out which device features, functions and services a customer has paid for and can therefore access.”

The Golden Goose of Servitisation ?

Mark Homer, VP, Global Customer Transformation for field service management company ServiceMax, adds to the debate on this topic: “According to Ashton Business School, servitisation delivers a 5-10% jump in annual services revenue, profits two to three times greater than those on product sales alone, cost reductions for customers as high as 30%, as well as the opportunity to increase service revenues by supporting existing third party or competitor

▼

Cliff Moyce, DataArt

These suggestions are echoed by Cliff Moyce, global head of Financial Services Practice at DataArt: “IoT projects are no different from other projects where best practice involves the early development of multiple ideas, scenarios and use cases; the rigorous testing of those ideas; and development of strong business cases. It’s important to remember that 80% of IT projects fail – the same for around 80% of new product development initiatives. In my experience none fail because someone did bad work half way through, but because they were doomed from the start. The solution wasn’t fully socialised and tested with genuine potential customers, both internal and external. Luckily, modern product development methods using an agile iterative approach are designed to reduce massively the risk of failure - typically down to 20% - but unfortunately those modern methods are often used in a very old-fashioned waterfall sort of way, so the problem persists.

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“But shifting business models requires thought and planning,” Homer advises. “Firstly, validate your business model. Chances are you’ll be making potentially more money - but in different ways - which will require a rethink. Machines, products and consumers are now all able to communicate with each other in real time, which opens up a myriad of possibilities for monetisation. Think through the customer experience and look to add or provide value either upstream, downstream or both. By building a better customer experience or creating more viability in an asset’s usage, you’ll not only unlock new value for your customer, but also potentially profit from it. Be careful however not to create vulnerabilities or add unnecessary technical baggage to a customer transaction or service.

Opt instead for simple logical value. In my view, reliable and consistent wins over ‘cool’ every time, so don't over complicate things.

“Second, look at security. A good reference is the IoT Security Foundation, which is vendor neutral, non-profit and full of expert resources for knowledge sharing, best practice and advice.

“Third, take a look at who owns the captured data. We now have laws that cover data capture, data protection, ownership and the protection of personal information. Talk to your legal department, review these aspects, and include them in your end user agreements - clearly state what data is collected and protection and usage rules.

“Fourth, ensure you understand the technologies you’re using. Have you designed for quality of reporting and for failure, scalability, reliability?

How will you know the sensors are reporting back with valid measurements? It’s really important to test, test and test again - everything from sensor locations, fixings, power supply, communications and circuit redundancy.

“Finally,” Homer suggests, “check Industry 4.0 and similar initiatives for ideas. In other words, check for standards and emerging templates or blueprints. Always build trial or proof of concept projects on a small scale, then methodically learn what business outcomes you can drive or improve – but keep a holistic focus on improving value. And consider how are you going to install, maintain, upgrade, retrofit, or decommission your solution, and once deployed, make sure you recalibrate your expectations on a continual basis.”

Servitisation good – but a disruptive force for others?

For Narry Singh, MD, Digital Strategy, Accenture Strategy, certain caveats remain, even if the future looks bright: “The Industrial IoT (IIoT) has been heralded primarily as a way to improve operational efficiency, but companies can also use it to find growth in unexpected places. 84%

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of C-suite decision makers globally believe the IIoT will generate new, service-based income streams for them. However, 73% said their company has yet to make any concrete plans in this area and only 7% have developed a comprehensive strategy.

“In manufacturing we’re already seeing smart services becoming a disruptive force, with data from billions of smart, sensor-enabled products being collected and analysed to develop entirely new services. These models pose a serious threat to incumbent manufacturers as new market entrants create innovative, value-added services.

Many manufacturers are unprepared for disruption in the manufacturing value-chain, specifically moving from a traditional productcentric model to a service-centric one. 88% of manufacturing executives do not fully understand the underlying business models of IoT, or the long-term implications on their industries. Only 40% indicated that they have developed a digital strategy for IoT.” Singh sums it up: “Whoever controls the smart data wins. The new digital business models being created could see companies gain control of entire platforms, enabling them to become leading suppliers of smart services. These companies will grow by creating digital ecosystems, making their platforms available to third parties who can then develop their own web-based business models. These platforms in turn become even more widely adopted, unlocking even more new revenue sources.”

Mark Homer, ServiceMax

Narry Singh, Accenture Strategy

Who owns the thing – who owns the person?

If we’re creating a virtuous – and virtual – new and transformative value chain, managing the identity of millions of connected devices, assets and users will be a growing problem. For Simon Moffatt, director Advanced Customer Engineering at ForgeRock, “The speed at which organisations reap the rewards of the IoT will depend on one critical factor – getting to grips with identity management. Static and portable devices need to communicate, involving Human to Machine (H2M) and M2M identification and interaction. This all adds up to an extended ecosystem incorporating customers, partners, websites, web pages, mobile devices, apps and the cloud that needs to be both secured and interoperable.

Simon Moffatt, ForgeRock

“However,” he warns, “this scramble to monetise IoT services has already resulted in a number of high profile security failures. Just last November, a website went live giving viewers access to more than 70,000 unsecured security cameras in 256 countries. Other recent targets of IoT hacks include smart phones and TVs, thermostats, home routers, refrigerators, medical devices and printers. Unfortunately, legacy identity systems were not designed to manage digital relationships at such a large scale, or handle the security and privacy challenges that come with the IoT. ▼

products. This creates an ongoing relationship with the customer that effectively locks out competitors.

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EXPERT OPINION

The impact of European Data Protection Regulation (GPDR) on the IoT Mark Armstrong, Progress Software

Dr. Chris Harding, The Open Group

As the last insight highlighted, privacy is an implicit aspect of security and the forthcoming adoption in the EU of new legislation is no doubt concentrating various minds in the IoT community. According to Mark Armstrong, MD and VP EMEA at Progress Software: “This new regulation aims to streamline and strengthen data protection and data privacy laws across the EU and provide a common framework of reference.

Businesses who get it wrong will face up a fine of up to 4% on their global annual turnover or up to a €20m fine per data breach - plus likely severe reputational damage. According to a recent survey, only one in five businesses are confident of achieving GDPR compliance, which suggests that a lot needs to be done.

“Organisations purchasing software therefore need to ensure that it is compliant with the new legal framework. This means that privacy policies, procedures and documentation will need to be in hand and readily available to the data protection authorities.”

More specifically for the IoT, Armstrong says, “GDPR also has an impact on partner networks and customers. Businesses will need to have a comprehensive overview of their partners’ and customers’ technology, policies and procedures to make sure there are no vulnerabilities, threats or breach risks in the vendor chain. A clear requirement of this is ‘privacy by design’, enforced throughout the systems’ lifecycles. As a result, personal information needs to be able to be deleted across partner software packages or third party data banks. This means privacy controls must be embedded in the end to end product’s system functionality.”

Standards – the IoT building blocks of change “It often helps to look at things from each customer’s perspective,” says Dr. Chris Harding, director for Interoperability at The Open Group, the organisation responsible for developing open, vendor-neutral IT standards and certifications.

“For technology standards, the main customers are enterprise and product architects, but how should they choose these for systems and products in the IoT? “With just a quick web search, I found 42 IoT standards - although they’re not all competing with each other. Some provide basic connectivity, such as LoRaWAN for wide area networks. Some, such as the Open Group Open Messaging Interface (O-MI) provide higher-level messaging.

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Some are oriented towards particular applications, such as Z-Wave for smart homes.

And some, such as the Industrial Internet Reference Architecture, provide standardised descriptions of IoT systems and their components.

“It’s this last category that an architect will look at first. In TOGAF®, an Open Group standard, the most popular open architecture development method in use today, the first phase is the business architecture, followed by the data and applications architectures. These phases determine the overall design philosophy, the logical components of the design, and their interrelationships. Only then are the specific communications protocols considered as part of the technology architecture.”

Frameworks, applications, and protocols – choices, choices, choices Dr. Harding continues, “Then there are high-level standards for different design philosophies. The Web Thing Model being developed by the WorldWide Web consortium follows the philosophy underlying the World-Wide Web, for example, while the OPC Unified Architecture follows the philosophy of service orientation. They may - as in both these cases - specify communications protocols that fit their philosophies.

“An enterprise system or product may be designed for a particular application area. For instance, there are several standards for smart home devices, some ‘owned’ by particular corporations, others by neutral consortia, and business rather than technical factors will most likely determine an architect’s choice. Other areas, such as healthcare, do not have strongly established vertical IoT standards, and choice here involves both business and technical considerations.

“Additionally, many devices will not connect directly to the Internet but instead communicate with internet-connected controllers using protocols such as I2C or NFC. The choice here will be determined by application requirements and available components. Connections to the Internet might use GSM, WiFi, or wired Ethernet, depending on physical location, power availability, and cost. Design philosophy will probably affect the choice of higher-level protocols, such as MQTT or HTTP, though resource constraints might suggest CoAP. When it comes to making informed decisions, an IoT architect must understand standards and their advantages and disadvantages in different situations.”

Still having visions? Treatment is available For Andrew Yeoman, CEO at IoT solutions vendor Concirrus, there will be two types of business in the future: those that leverage the benefits that IoT has to offer and those that used to exist.

However, he says, “According to Gartner’s 2015 Hype Cycle curve, IoT is right on the brink of ▼

“Understanding context therefore becomes a key requirement. Does the customer usually log on in Norway? Do they have a wearable device that is allowed to access their health data? Organisations will also need to prioritise privacy and consent when sharing their users’ personal data.”

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plunging into a ‘trough of disillusionment’. But whether that plunge takes place, and how long IoT remains in a state of disillusionment, remains to be seen. One of the major challenges with the IoT is how do you sell a complex new technology to businesses when they may have a hazy or distorted understanding of what IoT is, let alone the difference it could make.

“Looking at the IoT today in all its chaotic, nascent glory we can see that businesses struggle to articulate their offerings. Hundreds of individual ‘IoT providers’ talk in detail about specific technologies and applications, sometimes using impenetrable jargon and specialised nomenclature that bears little or no relation to the real world. Our focus therefore has to shift from the ‘how’ to the ‘what’: look at what a technology is going to do and the value that it provides to customers, not how it works.

“The second major challenge is one of implementation. Iterative development and stageby-stage on-boarding will be key, with CEOs and CTOs being confident that their existing data and software architectures can continue to be utilised in this road map. Positioning IoT adoption as an act of creative destruction is unlikely to win many converts within large corporations - the need to justify sunk costs will be too strong. This however may be a more viable strategy amongst the startup community.”

“Finally,” Yeoman concludes, “if businesses and organisations start incorporating live data into their current operations, processing this data to make more intelligent decisions that drive efficiency, this will require fundamental attitudinal change. Organisations that adopt this way of thinking will progress faster than those that do not.”

And the wheel turns again And so, after a rapid journey through just a few of the issues involved in IoT-related transformation, we’ll close by returning to the subject of complexity, highlighted at the start of the article, with some shared insights from Wael Elrifai, director for Enterprise Solutions EMEA, at Pentaho, the big data and analytics company recently acquired by Hitachi.

According to Elrifai, “The need to overcome complexity became a cliché decades ago. Today’s companies seek to profit from chaos, whether they call it a ‘journey,’ continuous improvement or all-out transformation. People, process and technology transformation models from the eighties, like management by objectives, project management and relational data are giving way to more fluid, scalable and interconnected approaches like integrated business planning, agile and distributed file systems – and, yes, the IoT. “Since the IoT is part physical, let’s consider the second law of thermodynamics which says that any spontaneous new process increases the overall disorder of the universe. As we strive to create order at the macro level, systems get more

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complex at the micro level. Jeremy England, an assistant professor at MIT, applied this law to hypothesise that under certain conditions, matter inexorably acquires the key physical attributes associated with life.

“In this context, our drive to connect and make smarter all the physical objects in our chaotic, increasingly complex world is natural - inevitable even. Whether it’s predictive maintenance, a smart city initiative or a factory of the future, if your organisation is embarking IoT journey, here are ‘5 Cs’ to consider:

Andrew Yeoman, Concirrus

“Connections that are about capturing data from sources like sensors, controllers, inspection and maintenance logs. These generate massive data volumes whose storage and computational tasks are well suited to Big Data infrastructures like Hadoop. Taking a simple example of a train door, this is where we capture the state of door, ‘open’ or ‘closed’.

“Then there’s the Conversion of data to information, where useful data is mined from a large body of information, much of which is noise. Data must also be synthesised or blended with other relevant data. In the train door example, we need to know whether a passenger has pressed the ‘door close’ button, along with the state of the door.

Wael Elrifai, Pentaho

“Following this comes Centralisation, where data is stored virtually or physically in one place, like a data lake. Only crucial events data needs to be stored - not all the noise. Our train doors, for example, might generate billions of ‘door closed’ signals, but we only need to store the failure case.

“Then there’s Cognition - customising analytics to understand systems and their interactions – such as high temperatures stopping our train door closing. A further correlation could be that our door was produced in 1987 in a specific factory.

Insights acquired over time certainly support improved decision-making. The train operator, for example, might decide after four hot days to decommission the whole carriage and schedule maintenance. Machine learning, statistical analysis and data mining techniques all help us perform intelligent analyses on data and start to bring ‘self-awareness’ to things.

“Finally, there’s Continuous improvement, making the move from the digital world back to the physical and implementing resilient systems that make corrective and preventive decisions. Our train door learns, “The way I’m operating now, I’ll fail in 3 weeks. But, if I send a signal to the humans to lower the air temperature in the carriage by one degree, I won’t fail for another seven months.

“So, progress in the IoT will mirror organic life,” Elrifai concludes. “We establish order by creating pre-conditions and data and let machine learning handle the evolution. As this happens, society should become healthier, safer and happier - the ultimate goal for IoT!”

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