IoT Now magazine september october 2017 Supplement

IoT Now: ISSN 2397-2793

OCTOBER 2017 • VOLUME 7 • ISSUE 4

INNOVATION SUPPLEMENT

MULTITECH INTERVIEW Why one size doesn't fit all when it comes to IoT security and connectivity

PLUS: IoT Solutions World Congress 2017 Preview: Exclusive speaker interview plus testbed previews • What to prioritise at European Utility Week as the industry heads for the Amsterdam shows • Inside Tennessee smart metering deployment • What's the IoT-as-a-service reality? • Latest news online at: www.iot-now.com

Empowering your choice of IoT platform The only completely independent analyst-driven tool designed to help enterprises evaluate and navigate the IoT platform landscape.

Find the best match platform for your enterprise at:

www.iotglobalnetwork.com/iotpilot

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Powered by the partnership of Beecham Research, IoT Global Network and IoTNow

Contact either: Robin Duke-Woolley at Beecham Research rdukewoolley@beechamresearch.com Charlie Bisnar at IoT Global Network c.bisnar@wkm-global.com To include your platform on IoT Pilot contact Louise Opitz at IoT Pilot l.opitz@wkm-global.com

CONTENTS

IoT Now INNOVATION SUPPLEMENT

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S6

CASE STUDY

INTERVIEW

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S16

EUROPEAN UTILITY WEEK PREVIEW

IoT SOLUTIONS WORLD CONGRESS PREVIEW

IN THIS ISSUE S4

NEWS Myriad launches Thingstream, RFID market to reach US$11.2bn, GSMA value IoT revenue opportunity at US$1.8tn

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INTERVIEW Richard Stamvik, who manages ecosystem and partnerships at Multitech, discusses why one size can’t fill all applications and security and connectivity choices are needed to enable business case flexibility

S10 EVENT PREVIEW IoT Now previews this year’s European Utility Week in Amsterdam, The Netherlands on 3-5 October

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CASE STUDY How Beston Country Electric turned to a BGAN M2M system from Inmarsat and Network Innovations

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FEATURE Why IoT as-a-service will provide businesses with the tools to implement IoT

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EVENT PREVIEW As industry executives head to the IoT Solutions World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, we feature a keynote speaker interview and present information on some of the testbeds at the show

Cover sponsor: MultiTech designs, develops and manufactures communications equipment for the Industrial Internet of Things – connecting physical assets to business processes to deliver enhanced value. Our commitment to quality and service excellence means you can count on MultiTech products and people to address your needs. For more information visit: www.multitech.com

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IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

© WeKnow Media Ltd 2017

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INNOVATION NEWS

NEWS IN BRIEF

Myriad launches Thingstream a global IoT connectivity platform built on USSD messaging

Gartner says digital transformation and IoT will drive investment in ITOM until 2020 The growth of digital business and the Internet of Things (IoT) is expected to drive large investment in IT operations management (ITOM) through 2020, according to Gartner. A primary driver for organisations moving to ITOM open-source software (OSS) is lower cost of ownership.

Gartner believes many enterprises will turn to managed ITOM or ITOM as a service (ITOMaaS) enabled by open-source technologies and provided by a third party.

With OSS, vendors can provide more costeffective and readily available ITOM functions in a scaled manner through the cloud.

Through to 2020, public cloud and managed services are expected to be leveraged more often for ITOM tools, which will drive growth of the subscription business model for both cloud and on-premises ITOM. However, onpremises deployments will still be the most common delivery method. This imposes multiple challenges to incumbent ITOM vendors. First, those vendors that do not offer a cloud delivery model will face continuous cannibalisation from ITOM vendors that can deliver ITOM through both cloud and on-premises.

Atoll Solutions and u blox provide easy access to LPWA technologies in India u blox, a provider in wireless and positioning modules and chips, and Atoll Solutions, an IoT gateway platform, sensor node and wireless module provider, announce the availability of an IoT starter kit based on LTE Cat M1 and Narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) modules from u blox.

With an extensive smart city programme already announced, India’s infrastructure is moving towards low-power wide-area (LPWA) technologies to enable smart street lighting and smart metering. The starter kit provides the perfect development platform for nodes and gateways based on LTE Cat M1 and NB-IoT. Supporting both the NB-IoT (LTE Cat NB1) SARA-N2 and LTE Cat M1/NB1 SARA R4 module series from u blox, the starter kit will enable the rapid development of IoT solutions, ready for deployment in a smart grid. Future development will include complete reference designs incorporating other u blox solutions, including Bluetooth Low Energy and GNSS modules.

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Neil Hamilton, Thingstream

Myriad Group has launched Thingstream, a global M2M connectivity proposition that delivers true ubiquity, security and better connectivity for IoT applications via the world’s first global IoT connectivity platform.

not just a suitable roaming carrier partner who can match the enterprises footprint, but also means a device needs to support TCP/IP in order to communicate. Our connectivity approach is to literally remove the internet aspect whilst still allowing small, secure payloads to be delivered to the cloud environment. Our approach leverages USSD messaging which not only removes complexities around carrier roaming but, importantly reduces the processing and power consumption required by the transmitting device itself.“

The global M2M platform offers a ubiquitous solution for a broad range of IoT applications; ideally suited to devices which move, are in remote locations or need to be super secure before connected to the cloud.

Thingstream’s solution uses Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD), universally available via Thingstream’s global roaming M2M SIM. The company believes that the IoT options for industrial applications are too complex, expensive and fail to offer the required level of connectivity.

Neil Hamilton, the vice president of business development at Myriad explained: “To date, a typical solution for asset tracking typically involves cellular data, this by default requires

“The global ubiquity of USSD technology makes it the ideal small data transport for remote control IoT applications,” added Hamilton. “We want to enable simple, secure connections for industrial IoT applications with Thingstream, addressing both technical and commercial challenges associated with connecting remote, moving and roaming devices to networks.”

USSD offers a low power global area network, accessible anywhere with a GSM connection. The GSMA states that just 20% of the globe’s population are unable to access basic GSM mobile services, with this number continuing to shrink. USSD therefore offers the single widest access service for connected devices.

RFID market to reach US$11.2bn in 2017, says IDTechEx report Based on its new report ‘RFID Forecasts, Players and Opportunities 2017-2027’, IDTechEx Research finds that in 2017, the total RFID market will be worth US$11.2 billion(€9.50 billion), up from $10.52 billion (€8.92 billion) in 2016 and $9.95 billion(€8.44 billion) in 2015. This includes tags, readers and software/services for RFID labels, cards, fobs and other form factors, for passive and active RFID.

In other areas, RFID in the form of tickets used for transit will demand 825 million tags in 2017 and the tagging of animals is substantial as it continues to be a legal requirement in many more territories, with 480 million tags being used for this sector in 2017.

In retail, RFID continues to be rolledout for apparel tagging predominantly – that application alone will demand 8.7 Billion RFID labels in 2017 – which still has plenty of room for growth since this is less than 20% penetration of the total addressable market for apparel in 2017.

In total, IDTechEx expects that 18.2 billion tags will be sold in 2017 versus 15.2 billion in 2016. Most of that growth is from passive UHF (RAIN) RFID labels. However, in 2017 UHF RFID tag sales by value will be 25% of the value of HF tag sales, mainly because HF tags where used for security have a higher price point versus the cheaper, usually disposable labels used for tagging things.

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

INNOVATION NEWS

GSMA highlights US$1.8tn IoT revenue opportunity for mobile network operators The GSMA has announced that mobile network operators are set to benefit from an estimated US$1.8 trillion (€1.50 trillion) Internet of Things (IoT) revenue opportunity by 2026 boosted by the early deployment of commercial Low Power Wide Area Networks (LPWAN) in licensed spectrum, according to new figures in the IoT Forecast Database Research published by analyst house Machina Research.

The new findings highlight the huge growth opportunities for mobile operators delivered through new Mobile IoT applications and services. To date, 12 mobile operators have launched 15 commercial Mobile IoT services, including AT&T, Telstra and Verizon (LTE-M), as well as China Mobile, China Telecom, China Unicom, Deutsche Telekom, KT, LG Uplus, M1, Turkcell and Vodafone (NB-IoT). The research also indicates that the Americas region will account for an estimated US$534 billion (€445.58 billion), or approximately a third of the total revenue.

“There is a real sense of momentum behind mobile IoT networks in licensed spectrum, with multiple commercial launches around the world, as well as the availability of hundreds of different applications and solutions, but there is still much to be done,” said Alex Sinclair, chief technology officer, GSMA. “Many operators are already reaping the benefits of deploying Mobile IoT and we encourage others to act now to capitalise on this clear market

opportunity and further accelerate the development of the Internet of Things.”

The new findings highlight that consumer demand for connected home US$441 billion (€367.98 billion), consumer electronics US$376 billion (€313.74 billion) and connected car technologies US$273 billion (€227.79 billion) represent the biggest revenue opportunities for IoT. However, other areas such as connected energy look set to reach US$128 billion (€106.80 billion) by 2026 as a result of local governments and consumers seeking smarter ways to manage utilities. Similarly, revenues from connected cities are forecast to reach US$78 billion (€65.08 billion) by 2026.

Mobile operators are enhancing their licensed cellular networks with NB-IoT and LTE-M technologies which utilise globally agreed 3GPP standards to scale the IoT. Mobile IoT networks are expected to have 862 million active connections by 2022 or 56% of all LPWA connections.

These new Mobile IoT networks are designed to support mass-market IoT applications across a wide variety of use cases, such as industrial asset tracking, safety monitoring, water and gas metering, smart grids, city parking, vending machines and city lighting, requiring solutions that are low cost, use low data rates, require long battery lives and can operate in remote locations.

Israel’s Cybonet launches comprehensive cyber security solution for SMEs

David Feldman, Cybonet

Cybonet, an international information security solutions provider headquartered in Israel, has announced the release of its newest cyber security solution, Cybowall, a threat detection and response platform engineered for small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs).

Combining both affordability and functionality, Cybowall provides organisations with a single security tool that delivers those capabilities necessary to identify and respond not only to active threats, but also to potential vulnerabilities within the network.

“As smaller businesses struggle to keep up with the emerging threats inundating networks around the world, it is becoming increasingly clear how ill prepared many organisations continue to be,” said David Feldman, the chief

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

executive of Cybonet. “In many ways, smaller businesses today are an even more appealing target to cyber criminals than large enterprise networks. There are more of them and there is often less awareness of the threat, little to no technical staff with a security background, and certainly less budget to invest in security technologies.”

Smaller organisations are often at pains to justify security oriented IT spending, as technology managers struggle to quantify the ROI and clearly communicate the threat landscape to business owners. A recent study conducted by the Ponemon Institute of small and medium-sized enterprises found that with the increase in malware attacks, only 13% of the respondents said they felt prepared to prevent a malware attack, and a staggering 51% of the respondents claimed to have already experienced a ransomware attack – though many of these organisations had not reported it for fear of damaging their reputation.

Taoglas launches small form factor ultra-wideband antennas Taoglas, a provider of IoT and M2M antenna products, launched an industry-first range of small-form-factor ultrawideband (UWB) antennas specifically designed to enable centimetre-level positioning and angle-ofarrival applications, including asset tracking, follow-me drones, healthcare monitoring, smart home services, and other applications that demand high-performance indoor localisation capabilities. The antennas offer high efficiencies across a wide spectrum of frequency bands from 3 GHz to 10 GHz. Indoor wireless positioning has long been hampered by technologies that were not designed for this purpose, such as Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and assisted GPS. UWB is a low-power digital wireless technology that offers significant increases in location precision and range while transmitting large amounts of digital data short distances over a wide spectrum of frequency bands. UWB’s low-power requirements offer increased battery life of sensors and tags, leading to reduction in overall operational costs.

Taoglas’ range of UWB antennas, designed in Taoglas’ Munich, Germany, engineering centre, features both state-of-theart flexible and rigid PCB embedded UWB antennas as well as UWB embedded SMT chip antennas. The flexible FXUWB range of antennas were developed utilising a simple “peel and stick” assembly process, attaching securely to nonmetal surfaces via 3M adhesive, with a highly flexible micro-coaxial cable mounting.

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TALKING HEADS

One size doesn’t fit all – for business case flexibility you need security and connectivity choices As the Internet of Things (IoT) continues to mature, organisations are looking to select enabling technologies, services and solutions to turn their business ideas into reality. Among the many fundamental capabilities required, connectivity and security are among the most visible as Richard Stamvik, managing ecosystem and partnerships at MultiTech, discusses in this interview with IoT Now

Richard Stamvik: There are several challenges for organisations: How large is the area they intend to operate in – is it a building or a country? What quality of service do they need and how much are they prepared to pay for that? What’s the acceptable energy consumption of the IoT solution as this relates to the cost of power from, for example, batteries? And what’s the amount of data to be transmitted and what are the related speed and latency requirements?

Different technologies have different pros and cons. For example, short range Bluetooth technology offers low energy consumption and high data rates. Similarly, you can roll-out low energy, long range low power wide area (LPWA) technologies such as LoRa or narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) but these won’t offer the high data rate of 3G or 4G.

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A key learning here is that one size does not fit all.

IoT Now: Choosing between licensed and unlicensed spectrum is a core challenge. How can organisations judge the relative merits?

RS: The right to use licensed spectrum costs money, payable to the body managing the regional radio spectrum allocation. Here we find the 3GPP cellular ecosystem with operators offering worldwide network coverage and equipment providers with footprint across the globe. Licensed spectrum offers good quality of service, high reliability and low latency, and is suitable for critical or real-time control usecases.

Anyone can use unlicensed spectrum and this offers a quick route to market and cost advantages for infrastructure, devices and services which are all becoming widespread, with both private and public deployments across the world. Here we find LoRa and a several other technologies. ▼

IoT Now: There are many decisions to be made to ensure optimal IoT deployments.

What factors should organisations take into account when making connectivity decisions?

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

There’s a massive diversity in use cases which means many different approaches are required

IoT Now: Among the wide range of unlicensed options, why are organisations choosing LoRa solutions?

RS: There has been a big uptake of LoRa solutions because other unlicensed technology alternatives are either immature, have small ecosystem and deployment footprint or unsuitable business proposition, and licensed technology alternatives such as cellular NB-IoT or LTE category M1 haven’t been widely available. Cellular options such as 3G and 4G were not really designed for low bandwidth and low energy consumption applications whereas LoRa would fit the requirements as well as offer an industry standard and a growing ecosystem of product and service providers.

There’s a massive diversity in use cases which means many different approaches are required.

Consider the business case options; once you have bought your cellular devices you pay a

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

recurring fee to an operator, whereas after your investment in unlicensed technology you have a choice including a recurring fee or a no-fee model. In the unlicensed camp LoRa's maturing ecosystem also offers cost competition resulting in a very nice business proposition for many usecases.

IoT Now: MultiTech is launching further LTE Cat M and NB-IoT products. Please can you tell me about them and why you are supporting both options?

RS: We have a comprehensive cellular product portfolio including IoT modems, routers and gateways, and we support a wide range of cellular wireless connectivity options including HSPA, LTE and NB-IoT. In the US market, LTE Cat M1 has had traction with operators and device vendors for while, while in Europe and Asia NB-IoT is more widely considered, and we thus have to address both.

Over time we’re going to see a mix of both technologies spread around the world. ▼

Licensed and unlicensed spectrum both have their pros and cons and usecase requirements must govern which to select.

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TALKING HEADS

There are many other aspects to consider but first you need to decide what’s important to you

RS: We are bringing NB-IoT and LTE Cat M1 connectivity to both current and future cellular products. For customers this offers an opportunity to quickly hook up their IoT devices to the latest version of the cellular IoT network, and for operators this offers a way to quickly deploy devices on their new networks.

IoT Now: Moving on from connectivity, security is another fundamental challenge to the success of IoT. What security aspects should be priorities for organisations?

RS: Again it comes down to the use case. You need to understand what’s required to protect your assets. It’s like the front door lock to your house. You choose one based on functionality, performance and price protecting against the average burglar. You don’t want to spend more on it than the value of the assets you’re looking to protect.

Beyond the basic economics, consider what you actually need. For example, do you need secure communication from the sensor to the cloud? Do you need end-to-end encryption? Do you want device authentication? Is there a need for the system to be future-proof and, if so, do you need a means to update all the nodes on the network?

There are many other aspects to consider but first you need to decide what’s important to you.

IoT Now: Is the focus on hardware security at the expense of other aspects such as secure VPNs? RS: Hardware security includes ringfencing a storage or a code execution area. Various technology enablers can be used for this, such as secure element, software virtualisation or a Trusted Execution Environment.

You also need a secure link between devices and cloud. Cellular and LoRa connectivity offers encryption, and this in turn requires secure management of encryption keys. You also need management of access rights to devices, and of device and user policies.

Device integrity includes secure boot, watchdog functionality and tamper resistance and prevent unauthorised changes in software and hardware.

The technologies and enablers above enable services such as end-to-end encryption of data in motion and at rest, policy management, authentication of users and devices, provisioning of devices, device update ensuring the latest software is used, device and user management and private networking and VPN. ▼

IoT Now: What is MultiTech doing to help companies develop solutions utilising either of these technologies?

IN ASSOCIATION WITH MULTITECH IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

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Richard Stamvik: Use the technology most fit for purpose for your usecase

IoT Now: What developments and advances are you seeing in authentication and non-repudiation?

RS: We offer a range of related features in our products, and we’re also partnering with companies with experience from various parts of the security landscape, for instance private networking and end-toend services including authentication.

An interesting area is how cost for device identification can be saved by smart use of device entropy, or by embedding a secret using a suitable mechanism. It comes down to security that is good enough for the money you pay.

IoT Now: Is encryption the answer – can it assure sufficient security?

RS: Encryption allows you to ship data from A to B or store it, all while ensuring nobody has interfered with your data and compromised its integrity.

Encryption is just one of the many aspects of security to consider as outlined above.

To sum up; you need to provide privacy by securing the devices, securing the end-toend architecture, and providing management and control of the above.

www.multitech.com

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

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EVENT PREVIEW

Europe’s smart utility community converges on Amsterdam European Utility Week, to be held in Amsterdam, The Netherlands on 3-5 October, 2017, is the premier business, innovation and information platform connecting the smart utility community, allowing attendees to meet experts from utilities, network operators, vendors, consultants, start-ups and system integrators covering the entire smart energy value chain

Adnan Amin, the director general of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) will be The Summit chairperson and will open the official keynote conference session for European Utility Week (EUW) 2017. In the opening keynote, Amin will address the challenges utilities are currently dealing with and how European strategy and goals for 2030 and 2050 will enable the transition towards a low carbon energy supply. The opening keynote during the Summit, on day-one of the event, will examine those key

strategic themes causing shifts in the utility business model.

The opening keynote session will also feature those key enablers from the industry who have been appointed to help orchestrate this change and guide the industry forward including: • Manon Janssen, chair of Topsector Energie and CEO of Ecorys – presenting Energy Innovation In The Netherlands • Ernesto Ciorra, the head of Innovation & Sustainability at Enel Group – presenting 2017: It Isn't Time For Utilities • Brien Sheahan, the CEO of the Illinois Commerce Commission – presenting Energy In The USA, Market Design With Innovative Regulation ▼

European Utility Week is a dynamic and energising three-day business, innovation and information platform in the form of a conferenceled exhibition. More than 400 expert speakers will give you the insight you need to drive the industry forward.

IN ASSOCIATION WITH EUROPEAN UTILITY WEEK

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IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

• Cedrik Neike, a member of the Managing Board of Siemens • Philippe Monloubou, the CEO of Enedis and chairman of Think Smartgrids • Benjamin Sovacool, a professor of Energy Policy at the University of Sussex, UK who is also a professor of Business and Social Sciences at Aarhus University, Denmark • Christian Buchel, deputy CEO, ENEDIS and chairman of EDSO The opening keynote will set the stage for what will come during the strategic Summit across the three-day programme starting on 3-5 October, at the Rai Centre in Amsterdam. The high level opening debate will be a true reflection of the choice of the consumer; how to empower people by understanding their energy choices and the shift of ownership in the value chain.

“The global electricity system stands at a critical juncture in the midst of transition. Whether consumers become empowered to expedite this transition, or resist it, remains an open-ended question. I am excited to take part in the opening keynote of EUW17 to help explore industry perspectives on both transitions and the topic of consumers and prosumers,” says Sovacool.

Buchel says: “By becoming digital operators, European DSOs are taking on the energy transition challenge by actively shaping the smart grids of the future and empowering the consumer.”

Other impressive initiatives happening during the three-day event include the Bridge Initiative (Horizon 2020) projects. Funded by the European Commission the event will house 22 Energy projects helping to contribute to a successful, digitally-supported energy transition.

It does this by fostering the exchange of

information, experience, knowledge and best practices to produce coordinated, balanced and coherent recommendations to policy makers for removing barriers to innovation deployment.

European Utility Week, part of the Global Utility Week series, spans a global network of 150,000 smart energy professionals. European Utility Week will welcome over 12,000 international smart energy stakeholders and 600 exhibitors.

This event brings together energy professionals to learn, network, collaborate and share expertise and information on a global level, which is why programmes for international delegations that wish to learn more about the European utility industry and beyond are set up. Utility delegations from the US, Turkey, Philippines will be sending their c-level utility representatives to the event with more delegations from Malaysia, Brazil, Peru and India to be confirmed shortly.

“The programme is developed to serve every level of the utility value chain in the form of a strategic and policy forming environment during the exclusive Summit and the more practical case studies presented during the Hub Sessions, free to attend for all visitors,” says Patrick Young, the event director for European Utility Week.

The event is a dynamic and energising threeday business, innovation and information platform in the form of a conference-led exhibition

For more information visit: www.european-utilityweek.com

This year will see European Utility Week co-locating with industry events including: EMART Energy, the leading energy trading event, Energy Revolution Europe, exploring the most recent developments in renewables integration and energy storage, Intelligent Buildings Europe, emphasising the importance of buildings in our everyday life and the key role they have in our smart cities future, and the highly revered innovation programme Initiate! working with start-ups, young talents and industry professionals.

EMART Energy is the top networking platform for European energy traders and in 2017 will co-locate with European Utility Week, allowing its attendees to get in touch with a broader scope of solutions and experiences in the energy sector. This year’s EMART Energy conference programme is themed ‘Energy Trading in an Era of Decentralisation’ and will focus on topics such as: making use of decentralisation, external technology drivers, digitalisation: what opportunities arise, renewables entering the market and electrification and will feature analyses on energy price drivers and the latest innovations in trading.

Intelligent Buildings Europe focuses on the importance of buildings in our everyday life, and facilitates the business and networking opportunity between utilities, energy service companies (ESCOs), energy service providers, financiers, governments, cities and municipalities, all with the common goal of meeting climate change and policy commitments by improving energy efficiency.

Energy Revolution Europe focuses on the most recent developments in renewables integration and energy storage in order to fully integrate systems and benefit from a smarter grid.

Initiate! focuses on working with the utility industry in their effort to embrace the need for adopting new technologies, acquiring new talents and forming new partnerships to create positive change. It is the perfect platform to provide start-ups and young talent the opportunity to share their ideas and innovations with the more established professionals in the industry in an effort to collectively empower the industry.

For more information about the co-located events visit: http://www.european-utility-week.com/co-located-events

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

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CASE STUDY

Benton County Electric solves metering infrastructure connectivity in remote areas using BGAN M2M system When a US electricity provider needed to roll-out automated metering infrastructure it selected a broadband global area network (BGAN) satellite service from Inmarsat and Network Innovations

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Benton County is in Northwest Tennessee, bordering the western branch of the Tennessee River and often referred to as the gateway to Middle Tennessee. Aside from the city of Camden, the only other largely populated areas are the agrarian communities of Big Sandy and Holladay.

The county’s electricity requirements are met by Benton County Electric System (BCES), whose 38 employees work to deliver power to more than 10,000 customers. BCES’s philosophy is to offer fair and equitable rates for all. To accomplish this, BCES began an initiative five years ago to install automated metering infrastructure that would collect meter data every 15 minutes. Having nearreal time access to this data would allow BCES to better respond to customer needs, expedite engineering analysis, and provide holistic data of the electric system for a cost-based rate design.

The company would be able to remotely connect and disconnect services, monitor power outages across the county, and offer new services such as prepay. Moreover, reducing its reliance on manual meter checks with automated meters promised to save countless travel hours for BCES’s staff.

The company faced several challenges in rolling out its automated metering infrastructure due to the patchy and unreliable cellular coverage typical of rural and remote locations. Scott Owens (BCES) explains: “We initially adopted a hybrid connectivity model for our meters, connecting our collectors on our fibre-optic network in certain areas, and private cellular networks in others.

However, there were gaps in the network where neither of the two services were available or feasible, meaning that some isolated meters still had to be read manually, draining time and resources. We needed a connectivity solution that would enable us to fully utilise the integrated automated metering infrastructure.”

The solution BCES set about finding the right partners who could provide a reliable alternative to their existing connectivity methods. BCES chose Network Innovations, a key partner of Inmarsat and a leading provider of BGAN M2M satellite communication services. ▼

The company faced several challenges in rolling out its automated metering infrastructure due to the patchy and unreliable cellular coverage typical of rural and remote locations

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

Powered by Inmarsat's global 3G L-band satellite network and optimised for lower bandwidth and throughput than the standard BGAN offering, with a minimum billing increment of 1 kilobyte, BGAN M2M provides a reliable, IPbased real-time connectivity service that seamlessly integrates into any network. It supplies a reliable, alwaysavailable service and connects monitoring and control applications in remote, unmanned locations, giving full visibility and management of dispersed assets across an entire operational area.

“We listened to and fully understood Benton County Electric’s unique challenges and goals,” explains Eric Verheylewegen, the executive vice president for global land sales at Network Innovations. “Our extensive experience working with BGAN M2M and designing solutions for the utility industry, ensured the project was a success.”

The results With a fully-reliable network in place, BCES has been able to complete the rollout of its automated metering infrastructure. This has enabled the successful implementation of a fair and equitable rate design for every customer. The network has also ensured the success of prepay services, which reads/disconnects/connects meters daily, giving BCES’s customers more choices and information than ever before.

“The Inmarsat BGAN M2M service has given us the connectivity, security and cost effectiveness that we needed to complete this project,” says Scott Owens, the director of Communications and Technical Services at Benton County Electric System. “Inmarsat stood out for its reliability and ease of set up. The installation was so straightforward that if you can point a compass, you can install the small size BGAN terminal.”

“Connectivity is the key to everything we do. We don’t need a super-fast service; we need a stable and reliable service,” he adds. “The customer service we received when implementing the BGAN terminals from Network Innovations was outstanding and appreciated in a small company such as ours. The service provided the foundation we need for our automated metering project, which has saved us time and money, and enabled us to improve the experience of our customers.”

Inmarsat’s BGAN M2M solution continues to serve reliably and efficiently, providing BCES with the peace of mind that meter data is always being collected. BCES plans to add to their number of BGAN terminals in Benton County, which promises to bring further benefits to the company and the county’s residents, as it continues to develop its integrated intelligent grid.

Key benefits of BGAN M2M • • • • • •

Performance: standard IP at a rate of up to 448kbps with a low latency from 800 milliseconds.

Reliability: operates over the Inmarsat L-band global satellite and ground network, with 99.9% availability.

Easy to integrate: simple for field teams to set up, integrate and maintain without technical expertise or training.

Cost effective: low-cost terminal, low data rate plans with no reconnection fees.

Enhanced support: free firmware upgrade over-the-air.

Easy to manage solution: remote terminal management, debugging and configuration options.

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

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FEATURE

IoT as a service will provide businesses with the tools necessary to implement IoT Nick Sacke, the head of IoT and Products at Comms365, believes IoT is on the cusp of mass deployment, as organisations use Lower Powered Wide Area Networking (LPWAN) and new IoT-as-aService (IoTaaS) deployment models to achieve fast, minimal risk, low cost innovation The Internet of Things (IoT) is arguably set to be the biggest driver of productivity and growth in the next decade, with Accenture estimating IoT could add $14.2 trillion (€11.87 trillion) to the global economy by 2030. But despite the hype and excitement, right now we seem to be a very long way from realising that vision, especially in the UK. From network costs that are simply too expensive to sensors created by innovative, but small, startups, IoT at scale has simply not been achieved. The question many organisations are beginning to ask is: can IoT really deliver out of the lab, in the real world?

IoT constraints While the concept of IoT offers appeal to businesses of every size, there are several issues that have deterred many organisations, especially SMEs, from entering the market. The escalating costs of mobile networks, both 3G and 4G, have made IoT projects at scale unaffordable and while the market has responded with the introduction of low cost, low power wide area networking (LPWANs), as yet there is no one solution standard. Indeed, in the UK, there is no single network that provides nationwide coverage.

In addition to the networking issues, the sheer complexity of creating a reliable and sustainable IoT infrastructure has affected the development of viable business models. Not only must companies find a way to manage sensors, networks, data storage, data analytics and an essential link to operational systems that leverage IoT data to drive improvements, but they are very concerned about the long-term viability of the model and underpinning technologies.

For any business tempted to invest, there are some very real concerns. Where is the future proofing? Where is the consistent, proven and reliable network infrastructure? How can the complexity of IoT projects be managed effectively without investing in huge additional technical resources? The good news is that IoT is hitting a new level of maturity in both technology and delivery model that will both reduce risk and cost and provide that essential future proofing.

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IoT maturity While the cost model of mobile technologies has made IoT at scale untenable to date, there has been a rapid evolution of LPWAN technology recently that is paving the way for applications that use tens of thousands, even millions of devices. While there are licensed cellular variants such as Narrowband IoT (NB-IoT), currently being used in pilot projects in Eastern Europe and southern Spain, it is the unlicensed LPWANs that are being rolled out fastest, with national LPWANs already in place in the Netherlands, France, Spain, South America, South Asia and several more.

One of the most notable global LPWAN technology developments is LoRaWAN, created

by Semtech, marketed and sustained by more than 500 world-class organisations in the LoRa Alliance standard, which is being rolled out across multiple countries. And while today there is no single, cross UK network, the ability to blend networks in different regional areas, including the adoption of international roaming via LPWANs – now provides organisations with a seamless, low cost, scalable IoT network model.

This growing maturity of network technology is being mirrored by the advancement in design and manufacturing of devices – with new sensors and devices available with batteries that can last up to five years, minimising on-going cost and maintenance requirements. Essentially, it is now possible to deliver IoT projects through blended network solutions at a far lower cost – opening the door for projects that scale to millions of devices.

Proof of concept This maturity is being confirmed by the growing number of high profile IoT projects that are beginning to build confidence in both the IoT concept and specific technologies, including sensors that are being manufactured and deployed at scale. For example, the smart city project in Milton Keynes is using parking sensors in the road that can tell when a vehicle is parked. In addition to enabling new parking enforcement systems, the project is collecting sensor data to analyse trends in parking activity to support ongoing road management planning. ▼

One of the most notable global LPWAN technology developments is LoRaWAN, created

by Semtech, marketed and sustained by more than 500 worldclass organisations in the LoRa Alliance standard

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

Nick Sacke, Comms365

Similarly, the Cambridge smart city project is already starting to measure air quality within this highly congested environment. With pollution a recognised threat to public health, local councils are being asked to act – and smart city projects across the country are looking to use air quality sensors to both provide insight into trends but also deliver real time alerts to support public health advice.

While impressive, these projects are still far less sophisticated in scope and deployment density than many of the developments globally. In Eastern Europe and the Far East, IoT at scale is becoming a reality with large scale deployments of lighting, metering, air quality, parking, and waste management sensors leveraging the new LPWAN network infrastructures.

End-to-end IoT In tandem with technology advancing is a maturing market model, with a growing number of providers stepping up to manage the network fragmentation and delivering IoT solutions as a service, a future proof model. This end-to-end IoT model encompasses every aspect of the solution

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

from sourcing and deploying sensors, to creating the blended network, managing data storage and undertaking analytics. In addition, with integration skills and the use of application programme interfaces (APIs), IoT platforms and their vital data can be made accessible to operational systems.

Furthermore, these projects are no longer ad hoc – market maturity is enabling the shift towards operationalising proven IoT applications. The IoTas-a-Service model will make key applications, such as building management systems, smart parking, pest control and waste bin management available for instant use without heavy customisation, removing all barriers to entry, especially within the SME market.

The smart city project in Milton Keynes is using parking sensors in the road that can tell when a vehicle is parked

We are now on the cusp of something momentous in IoT. The technology components, including the low-cost networks, are now in place; the end-to-end service model with its new aaS potential is reducing the risk and cost to entry, whilst future proofing investment. IoT is no longer just a tantalising concept – with the operationalisation of key applications, especially within facilities management, it is about to explode into day-to-day business operations.

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EVENT PREVIEW

IoT Solutions World Congress showcases testbeds for industrial IoT The IoT Solutions World Congress, to be held in Barcelona, Spain on 3-5 October 2017, is set to welcome more than 220 exhibitors, in excess of 250 conference speakers and over 10,000 visitors. Here, IoT Now presents an interview with keynote speaker, Richard Soley, the executive director of Industrial Internet Consortium, and profiles some of the testbed activity at the event

Richard Soley: It's not really about cheaper sensors, but a convergence of forces over the last few years, which also includes cheaper actuators, but more importantly low-cost computing and storage and much better big data analysis. We're seeing overwhelming interest in applying IoT technology to industries such as healthcare, financial services, mining, manufacturing and production, agriculture, transportation – you name it. They're moving at different speeds, but even in our testbed systems here at the Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) we're already seeing return on investment.

IoT Now: What role do events such as the Internet of Things Solutions World Congress have in the IIoT landscape?

RS: Gatherings like the Internet of Things Solutions World Congress (IoTSWC) bring together the best

and the brightest to share experiences. Papers and videos are one thing, but there's nothing like faceto-face conversations to understand both good ideas and missteps in IIoT implementation. And IoTSWC is the only event to prominently feature testbeds, real running systems, at the centre of it all.

IoT Now: In your opinion, will edge analytics cause greater disruption than big data analytics for businesses?

RS: Data analytics are data analytics – whether at the edge or in the cloud. The disruption comes from the pattern of finally applying real-time predictive analytics to all the data we've been ignoring – or not even collecting – to date.

IoT Now: There has been much talking about predictive analytics as one of the main goals of IIoT but some say that the next step should take us towards prescriptive analytics. What do we need to get there?

RS: Predictive analytics is exactly what leads to prescriptive analytics. If you watch carefully, you collect the data that allows you to avoid downtime or streamline processes ahead of time by seeing what has happened in the past. We just have to take seriously the collection and real-time analysis of data and keep an eye on patterns. ▼

IoT Now: A few years ago, the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) was a concept unknown to most but in the last couple of years it has become key in the future of many businesses. Cheaper sensors are already being produced and deployed and innovations in hardware, analytics and machine learning will combine to create big opportunities for companies big and small.

Where are we now in the roadmap of this next industrial revolution?

IN ASSOCIATION WITH IOT SOLUTIONS WORLD CONGRESS S16

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

IoT Now: Are there any testbeds of these technologies already in progress?

RS: Yes indeed. In fact, as the IIC testbeds collect more working data, they naturally turn from predictive to prescriptive analytics, both in the vertical-market-specific testbeds such as Microgrid, Track & Trace and others, and the horizontally-focused ones such as asset efficiency, condition monitoring and more.

IoT Now: What are the latest testbeds the IIC has been working on?

that have supporting technologies such as computing, security, storage, sensing and actuating, or that have research capabilities, such as universities and so forth. IIC provides the ecosystem and the process to put together testbeds that enable learning quickly how to use this technology in the real world.

IoT Now: One of the key issues regarding IIoT is security. Will such technologies as blockchain and quantum computing play a key role for the different applications of IIoT? RS: We're starting to see other technologies come to the rescue in various areas of industrial internet application. Distributed trust mechanisms, such as blockchain and IOTA, will support the kind of trusted network necessary to build multi-company, multi-country, secure solutions; and high-speed computing, especially parallel computing, is always welcome in overcoming difficult, real-time problems.

IoT Now: What is currently the role of the IIC within the IIoT ecosystem?

IoT Now: As a Doctor in Computer Science what are your expectations for quantum computing?

RS: Any company can build its own ecosystem of partners; but at the IIC we have a critical mass of companies that use Industrial IoT, including energy and manufacturing organisations. We also have many companies that depend on Industrial IoT,

RS: Quantum computing represents a sea change in computational architecture – much like dataflow computing when I was studying it for my doctorate 30 years ago. I don't think we're close to solving the energy needs of quantum computing,

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

â–ź

RS: The IIC is always adding new testbed projects, we have about 27 now in fact. The exciting part is we're starting to see cross-vertical results from our healthcare, energy, agriculture and other testbeds.

A fascinating trend has been the grown of our horizontally-focused testbeds, as condition monitoring, for example, is the same in many application domains.

Quantum computing represents a sea change in computational architecture – much like dataflow computing when I was studying it for my doctorate 30 years ago

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EVENT PREVIEW

but when that finally happens we'll see major changes across the computing landscape, especially in secure communications.

IoT Now: What impact will the adoption of 5G have in the industrial scenario?

RS: An amazingly large number of people believe that 5G is Industrial IoT. It's not, it's just an enabling technology – an important one, but one of many. In many IIoT implementations, wireless solutions don't even appear. In many industrial scenarios, you have systems that don't move and must operate in an environment with high RF interference, so wireless solutions just don't figure into it. That said, there are important applications of IIoT, I suspect especially in transportation, that are going to depend on the high throughput and low latency of 5G moving forward.

Richard Soley

An amazingly large number of people believe that 5G is Industrial IoT. It's not, it's just an enabling technology

www.iotsworldcongress.com

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IoT Solutions World Congress selects 11 testbeds to be showcased at its 2017 event A submersible transformer inspection robot designed for oil and gas platforms, a fully connected and sensorized work environment that dramatically improves worker safety, a predictive analytics platform that can wipe out downtime in factories and a solution that allows the remote management of boats capable of informing in real time about ship status, water leaks or un expected presence in the ship. These are four of the 11 projects announced to take part in the 2017 Internet of Things (IoT) Solutions World Congress Testbed Area. For more information please visit: www.iotworldcongress/testbeds/2017selected-testbeds/ . Held at Fira de Barcelona from 3 to 5 October, the event will showcase 10 testbeds providing practical examples of how the industrial internet will change the way we produce and manage resources and businesses, transforming the global economy.

Testbeds are experimental platforms designed to implement innovative solutions and test them in real-life operating conditions. These tests explore new technologies or combinations of existing ones with the aim of creating ground-breaking products or techniques with the potential to generate new international standards. The practical applications on show at the IoT Solutions World Congress will be coordinated and supervised by the Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC).

ABB’s Submersible Transformer Inspection Robot encompasses virtual reality (VR) driven remotely operated inspection robots able to operate in highly hazardous transformer environments. Today, inspection of the internal transformer environment for damage or routine maintenance in oil and gas platforms is only made possible by draining the oil from the transformer tank. This comes with significant health risks to the maintenance technician due to the exposure to highly toxic environments, as well as punitive downtime and inspection costs, and environmental hazards when draining to oil. This new solution reduces significantly these risks.

Worker safety is also at the core of IBM’s Connected Workforce Safety and Operations project. The solution features an edge layer including a variety of sensors integrated into wearables – such as helmets, watches, eyewear, and vests–, instrumented heavy equipment, gateways and access

points; a platform layer that consists of device management and data analytics capabilities; and an enterprise tier that provides business applications and dashboards for an operations command centre and emergency response teams.

The testbed improves worker safety, workforce productivity, and helps reduce corporate risk by integrating smart wearables with smart infrastructure, while utilising cognitive learning abilities.

Unexpected downtime is one of the key issues that factories worldwide face and a joint project by PTC, Hewlett-Packard Enterprise, National Instruments, OSIsoft and Flowserve makes use of predictive analytics to reduce it.

Exemplified through a Flowserve Pump Demo, this testbed will showcase how sensors providing data such as temperature, pressure, flow and vibration is processed at the edge allowing real-time detection of any anomaly changes in the performance of the pump. The demo also shows how Augmented Reality can then help troubleshooting and repairing directly on-site.

The last of the first batch of testbeds to be showcased at IoTSWC 2017 is the Connected over Seas project by Vodafone, Hiruteknova, TST and Rodman. It offers customers a complete sensor-based solution for their boats.

Thanks to an application and the sensors installed in their boat, customers will be able to know the state of their boat at any time and from anywhere and will get information about battery status, water leaks and danger of sinking, temperature or even unexpected presence on board and will provide full control of the ship.

A globally significant event The third edition of the IoTSWC will be the biggest ever. Exhibiting firms include ABB, Accenture, Analog Devices, Dassault Systèmes, Deloitte, Deutsche Telekom, EMC, Everis, General Electric, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, IBM, Intel, Interdigital, Kaspersky, Microsoft, National Instruments, PTC, SAP, Schneider, Sigfox, Telefónica, Vodafone and others.

IoTSWC will be part of the Barcelona Industry Week, one of the world’s biggest trade fair platforms for industry both from a commercial and knowledge perspective, will take place from October 1-6 and will comprise several events: Expoquimia, Eurosurfas, Equiplast, IoTSWC, In(3D)ustry From Needs to Solutions, the World Congress of Chemical Engineering, the World Chemical Summit, and the Smart Chemistry, Smart Future event.

IoT Now Innovation Supplement - October 2017

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