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LoRa adoption wide, and surprisingly mixed with similar technologies

#LoRa promises long range with battery life and low cost. But like any technology, it is not a solution to all challenges. In LoRa’s case, its because it is extraordinarily bandwidth limited, and upstream oriented. This anecdote from the Mobile World Congress suggests many vendors see it as a complementary technology rather than competitive to…

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Are Consultants Expensive?

Pricing expertise can be a tricky business. Businesses are constantly faced with the build versus buy dilemma, only now it involves people. And compared to employee salaries, contractors often seem expensive. But there are many mitigating factors. How do you know if you are paying too much? How about looking at the market rates? They…

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Chicago deploys computers with eyes, ears and noses

The city now has eyes and ears The data will be available on OpenGrid.io.. there is a team of 17 trying to figure out how to use the data. See full story on Chicago deploys computers with eyes, ears and noses | ITworld At almost 7M, I am not impressed by the lack of utility…

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Wireless Healthcare Standards Evolving

The Continua Health Alliance is trying to solidify an application standard for interconnected healthcare devices that are both mobile, like pulse oximeters, and fixed like sensors used for remote patient monitoring. These technologies promise to ease the burden of caring for the elderly whether in their own homes or assisted living centers. In the quest…

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Sensors in the Cloud

Sensor networks with hierarchies and their resultant isolation will eventually give way to the notion that all devices should interoperate with the world, through IP protocols. I’ve advocated this trend for some time, but several news items from Sensors magazine reinforce this: Zigbee and IP and Pedigree Releases Oneview From an architectural perspective, this only…

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RFID Forecast 2009-2019 Interesting Notes

In a recently released report: RFID Forecasts, Players & Opportunities 2009–2019 I found several thing interesting: (Context warning: this is related primarily to passive technologies.) 1. The total spend is only expected to grow 10% in 2009. Hardly a sign we are on the hockey stick of adoption. 2. Three of Five dollars spent is…

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New Zigbee Health and Wellness Profiles

Recently, the Zigbee Alliance released standards for Medical oriented devices to allow standardized interoperability for device functions. Eventually, this should allow worthwhile peer- to peer functionality on the 802.15 network, over and above centralized monitoring applications. I can see this functionality built on Zigbee being very useful in elder care facilities, because of its interaction…

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Is it time for the RFID hockey stick?

In tech adoption, there is a phase where rapid uptake and expansion occur once maturity has begun and the early adopters have proven the concepts. What I’m seeing at this show, is that passive RFID is very close to that phase. However, there are remaining barriers, and they are no longer in the fundamental technology,…

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The other green of RFID

RFID is frequently seen as method of increasing efficiency to save money. But it could be seen as much as an environmentally friendly tool as a monetary one? How? Consider that for every efficiency made, there is less energy used on wasted work, less excessive product in the supply chain, and less product wasted because…

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What’s in an acronym – RFID and RTLS

There seems to be confusion in the industry about where these descriptions differ. RFID is a general description of any system that identifies without line if sight. At a cursory glance, RTLS (Real time location System) seems to add a qualitative presentation and timeliness element to data that is collected by RFID. But ask yourself…

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