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| Omron expands its industrial IoT goals to the U.S. |
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| By Kevin Tofel |
Omron, a maker of sensors and industrial equipment based in Kyoto, has built a selection of IoT sensors and gateways designed to make deploying connected sensors much easier for business. The company, which is probably more familiar to those of us in the consumer world for its medical gear, showed off its new gateways at an IoT show in Austin, Tex. last month.
Cary Horan, a business development manager with Omron, told me the plan is to launch a sensing device called the IoT Module along with an IoT gateway next year in the U.S. The company will white-label the technology for companies that want to build their own software on top of the hardware for their own specific industry verticals. With the Omron gear, a company that makes tractors could, for example, add IoT functionality simply by adding the gateway to its machines and reselling the sensors. |
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| — Omron's IoT gateway display at a trade show in Austin. Image courtesy of Omron. |
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The Omron IoT gateway will have LTE Cat M1 or NB-IoT cellular connectivity or LoRaWAN, Wi-Fi, or BLE connectivity over unlicensed spectrum, and will come pre-certified by government agencies responsible for overseeing radio communications in the countries where it is sold. Buyers of the device can pick and choose between connectivity and power options based on their needs.
The first Omron sensor designed to work with the gateway measures the quality of oils and fluids, and will be designed for refining operations. The company also plans to release a weather sensor next year that measures rain, wind speed and direction, barometric pressure, temperature, and humidity. Environmental sensors that measure air quality, volatile organic compounds, and noise are also in the works.
Horan anticipates that the market for Omron's sensors and gateway will be in energy operations, smart cities, and agriculture. Omron is well known in both the sensing and industrial worlds, as that's where the the majority of the company's revenue comes from. Sales of Omron's industrial robotic arms and sensors make up 57% of its annual revenue.
Expanding further into this customer base isn't a hard sell for Omron. The company also sells electronics infrastructure to cities, which is another market it hopes to reach with its new IoT gear. Omron has invested in IoT internally as part of an overall focus on attaining carbon neutrality by 2030 and plans to take its learnings and gear to others that are also trying to reduce their carbon footprints.
I have two concerns about Omron's approach. First, we saw early on in the launch of IoT companies a focus on providing sensors and gateways to companies that were easy to deploy, but tough to get information from. Omron says customers can pull information from the gateway using an API or MQTT, around which the customer can then build an interface. Omron also provides a low-code programming environment for users that want to build a quick application or dashboard from the data for their end customers.
My second concern stems from a challenge of many IoT platforms that have launched to date, namely that they were too generalized to help solve the specific use case(s) of the end customer. The ease of programming the dashboard for specific use cases will help here, as will the release of more sensors that will work with the gateway. Omron has many options in sensing technology, and only needs to build the packaging around the sensing technology to make it work with its gateway.
So I guess the industry should prepare for another IoT platform option. |
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| Mui Labs will use Matter for expansion to the U.S. |
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Gosh, that's lovely. These were the actual words I spoke when a friend texted me a picture of the Mui board, a smart home controller and display made by Japan's Mui Labs. The wooden rectangle has touch-sensitive areas and LED lights that provide a means of displaying relevant information. It belongs in a home that embraces Scandinavian minimalism or the cluttered and homey cottage-core design aesthetic.
Mui Labs embraces a concept called calm design, which aims to snag a user's attention smoothly and then fade back into the background. It reminds me of my original goals for the smart home, a place that provided ambient information about weather, time, and whatever else I might want to know. And in a year or so, thanks to Matter, I might have the chance to experience Mui's design sensibilities in my own actual smart home. |
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| — The Mui board provides an example of calm design for technology. Image courtesy of Mui. |
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Mui's Munehiko Sato told me that the Matter smart home interoperability protocol finally hitting the market means that the company can take its design methodology and back-end software and apply it to more devices. For Mui, which was spun out of Japan's NISSHA Corp. in 2019, this means that it no longer has to build custom integrations for each device partner it wants to support. It will still need to support deeper integration for certain tasks that aren't currently supported by Matter, but jobs like unlocking a door or turning on a light are now possible.
Mui will release a Matter-compliant controller board next year, and is also looking to provide device makers with its software and cloud services to create calm technology experiences. Sato said the company might issue a small crowdfunding campaign to release the new board directly to consumers in the United States, but the primary focus is on signing partnership deals with technology providers that want the backend software and design talent to help them design device interfaces.
There are a variety of companies that provide various layers of smart home IP for third-party device makers. For example, Kraftful designs apps for smart home device companies while Tuya will do everything from the physical electronics all the way through to the app and cloud services. Ayla, meanwhile, provides cloud services and hardware reference designs for its clients. Mui would fall into a similar category, but its emphasis is on the calm design thinking. It also wants to work with device makers and home integrators.
This calm design aesthetic is a theme we'll see more of in the coming year as the industry seeks to change the impression of smart home technology from gadget-oriented to warm and helpful. It comes on the heels of a shift from the sleek black or glossy white boxes of the early 2010s to rounded, fabric-covered devices that try to blend into homes a bit better. At CES next year, Samsung's Jong-Hee Han, vice chairman, CEO, and head of Samsung’s DX (Device eXperience) division, will host a press conference dedicated to the theme of "bringing calm to our connected world."
Mui's contribution to calm design is a bit whimsical. For example, Sato showed off a timer app on the board that relied on the user drawing a line with their finger on the touch-sensitive panel to indicate how long the timer should run. The longer the line, the longer the timer runs. As the timer counts down, the line is gradually erased. For longer timers, a user can select a number of candles that correspond to 5-minute increments and watch them digitally burn down as the time passes.
The idea is to reduce the cognitive load associated with electronics use in the home, lessening the need for notifications and constant interactions with a device. For optimal success, I'd like to see Mui bring data in from existing sensors in the home to handle tasks such as turning on lights for the user when they enter a room. I'd be thrilled if companies would license that sort of experience from Mui, as it would reduce the programming I'd have to do to make technology work inside my home.
And I wouldn't mind if alarm providers licensed the hardware Mui offers to help me eliminate the ugly alarm panels located by my front door. I can see the CEDIA professional installer market picking up on the MUI products and software, but I'd love to see it in homes whose residents aren't able to spend an arm and leg on customized smart home tech. |
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| Episode 401: Two big smart home deals explained |
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The end of the year is a busy time for M&A as companies rush to get deals done before the start of a new tax year, and this week the smart home sector saw Assa Abloy sell its Yale and August smart lock and some other brands to Fortune Brands for $800 million. We explain why the deal happened and why we can blame Matter and the DoJ for the sale. Then we discuss NRG Energy’s $2.8 billion planned acquisition of Vivint, and why it is a big signal for the future of energy management as part of the smart home. Fundings also happen ahead of the New Year, and Phlux Technologies, which makes infrared sensors, and Reach, a company building wireless over-the-air power transmitters, both scored venture capital this week. In smart home news, we discuss a new mixer from GE that’s super smart and super pricey, and Samsung’s plans for CES this year. In security news, there’s a new botnet out there to worry about. And for developers, there’s a new $200 kit from Swarm that provides satellite connectivity.
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| — The GE Profile mixer is smart, but expensive. Image courtesy of Crate and Barrel. |
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Our guest this week is Cathy Pearl, a conversation designer at Google and the author of the O’Reilly book "Designing Voice User Interfaces". We discuss the history of voice interactions and what changed to make Amazon’s Alexa such an innovation. We also discuss how voice can help make technology less complicated, what type of conversations people want from a voice interface, and how voice also drives accessibility. Then we discuss the ethics of creating voice companions for lonely people and a time that Pearl was stuck at an airport talking to a chatbot for 20 minutes. We end after I ask if voice is going anywhere in the wake of the upheavals in Amazon’s Alexa business. Her answer will not surprise you. Enjoy the show.
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This week on the IoT Podcast Hotline, we answer a listener question about Matter and local control.
The IoT Podcast Hotline is brought to you by Silicon Labs. Silicon Labs is a leader in secure, intelligent wireless technology for a more connected world. Learn more about their integrated hardware, software and development tools at silabs.com. |
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| News of the Week |
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This week's news was compiled and written by Kevin C. Tofel
UnaBiz needs more money after Sigfox purchase: After acquiring beleaguered Sigfox last year, Singapore-based UnaBiz raised $25 million in Series B funding. This week, that funding round was doubled to $50 million as the company plans to weather any economic storms in 2023. Long a player in the Low-Power Wide-Area Network space for IoT, Sigfox went into receivership — essentially a restructuring bankruptcy — and UnaBiz bought the company. Purchasing a proprietary network technology brings challenges, though, and it seems like UnaBiz could use more capital to manage the integration of Sigfox’s services. UnaBiz says it has “closed down Sigfox’s loss-making entities” and plans to invest the funds in the verticals of utilities, security, facilities management, and supply chain and logistics. (TechCrunch)
Ericsson disconnects itself from the IoT: Although Ericsson’s IoT division brought in $76.9 million in 2021 revenues, the company is pulling the plug. Why sell? Ericsson’s IoT business has been a “key driver” of losses in its enterprise division. But one company’s losses is, potentially, another company’s gain. IoT provider Aeris is purchasing Ericsson’s IoT holdings, which include the company’s IoT Accelerator connectivity management platform and Connected Vehicle Cloud platform. I can’t say I’m surprised. Amazon and Google are both diminishing their IoT investments to a degree. Ericsson following the pack out of certain low-margin efforts just makes sense. Let’s check in on Aeris this time next year and see if it can extract higher margins from the assets and technology. (Enterprise IoT Insights)
Bosch’s connected camera app store is no more: Speaking of shutting down IoT efforts, Bosch is closing its app store for AI-connected cameras. This probably has less to do with profit margins and more to do with building responsible AI-based applications. Originally, Bosch debuted this store as Security and Safety Things, later rebranding it to Azena. But changing names didn’t help anything when Azena was reportedly performing only basic, high-level audits of the AI-based apps in its store. At the time, Azena felt the burden of vetting belonged to device customers, which defeats a key reason to have an app store in the first place. I get that responsible AI isn’t easy, but even a little more effort would have appeared better. Azena also allowed app sideloading to supported cameras, which basically brings an app free-for-all type of situation. (TechCrunch)
Palo Alto Networks strengthens medical device security: At least this week isn’t all doom and gloom on the connected device front. Palo Alto Networks introduced Medical IoT Security, a zero-trust solution for medical devices. The company uses machine learning (ML) to create device rules with automated security responses and verify network segmentation, among other features. The latter is important when it comes to blocking threats from an infected device (not an infected patient) causing havoc across a medical facility’s network. Using ML, Medical IoT Security can detect when a medical device is generating more data than expected, even terminating the network connection to that respirator or x-ray machine. (Palo Alto Networks)
LTE for Raspberry Pi is a thing: Raspberry Pi continues to be the little board that could — except when it comes to a Pi-based IoT project that needs cellular connectivity. As luck would have it, that’s changing courtesy of a funded Kickstarter project bringing 2G, 3G, and 4G LTE modules for the Raspberry Pi. Personally, I’d think any connected project would be better served with a Wi-Fi or LoRaWAN module on a Pi. But there are situations where a cellular connection for the Raspberry Pi might make sense. A 4G LTE Pi HAT will cost you $86, or you can save $7 and go for the LTE dongle instead. (Kickstarter)
Looking for the best fitness tracker? We review fitness trackers and smart watches in this newsletter but we can’t review them all; there are simply too many and we only have four wrists between us. So this overview of some of the best fitness trackers is worth sharing. The Whoop band, which Stacey did review, is atop the list. However, know that it’s really meant for high-performance athletes and you don’t buy the device; you pay a monthly subscription fee. There are others on the list that I wasn’t familiar with, so if you’re in the market for a wearable fitness tracker, you might want to read this article. (Well + Good)
There’s a new time-series IoT database: I read some surprising news from the Apache Software Foundation this week. Apparently, InfluxDB and other time-series database companies need more competition because that’s exactly what Apache has launched. The Apache IoTDB is an open source solution for large-scale IoT data collection, storage, and analysis either at the edge or in the cloud. (Phoronix)
Yes, the robots are taking jobs away: I love me some robots, but I might be loving them a little less after reading this report. In China, an estimated 77% of workers could be replaced by robotic automation. Of course, most of those jobs are on production lines that are well-suited for robots. Even so, the impact of increased automation could reduce total employment by 7.5% in China. For a services-based economy like the U.S., the risk of robot-caused unemployment should be reduced to a point. Then again, I’ve been chatting with the latest OpenAI bot lately and could easily see such technology displace knowledge and service workers here. (IoT Tech News)
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