Byte Lab made a brief presentation of IoT Implementation Challenges and the future of IoT Connectivity, a theme that was presented to the audience in Vienna at “M2M/IoT CE Forum 2017” and in Sarajevo at “IoT Summit 2017”.
Implementation Challenges:
- Wireless Communication
- Security
- Battery life
- Time to market
Our two examples…
BIKE INTEGRATION MODULE
Product description:
- Cyclist performance tracking
- Central hub to which fitness sensors connect: HR, oximeter, power, cadence…
- Together with GPS tracking, sensor data is sent to the cloud
- Training performance metrics and data visualization
Communication:
Several wireless technologies integrated into a small module (GSM, GPS, BLE, ANT, NFC)
- Antenna design challenge due to the small size
- Isolation between different antennas
- Bluetooth/ANT concurrent operation challenging
Security:
- Each device has to be authenticated
- Secure link between cloud and device
- Only encrypted messages are exchanged
- Sensitive information stored in a secured way
- Successful attack at one device does not expose other devices
Battery Life:
GPS tracking consumes most of the energy
- Trade-off between tracking precision and battery life
- Concurrent GPS / GALILEO operation bears additional power penalty
- Tracking information pushed to cloud in bursts
Time to Market:
- Different wireless integrations slow down regulatory compliance testing
- Certified off-the-shelf modules vs internal development (modules increase unit cost)
- Verification makes up most of the engineering time
OPTIC METER READER
Product description:
- Automatic readout of analog rotary counter meters
- Camera picture processed with OCR
- Gives digital life to analog meters
- Easy installation by anyone
Communication:
- Communication needs to work through five concrete floors
- High sensitivity LoRa technology selected
- Trade-off between sensitivity / bit-rate and power consumption
- Device position not known, need for antenna which works in all directions
- Duty-cycle restriction based on regulatory standards
Security:
- Encrypted LoRa RF communication
- Wi-Fi security
- TLS secure session with the could
- Unique ID and truly random passwords
- Proof to ”Man-in-the-Middle” attacks
Battery Life:
- RF transfer consumes significant amount of energy
- Dynamic TX power output based on RSSI
- Dynamic LoRa parameters based on RSSI
- Critical to achieve minimum sleep consumption
- Turn off power to circuits not used
THE FUTURE OF IOT CONNECTIVITY – LOW ENERGY WIRELESS NETWORKS
LoRa – Long range radio
- ISM Band
- LoRa WAN – Low Power Wide Area Network
Sigfox
- ISM Mand
- Properitary low energy wireless network
Narrow-Band IoT
- Licensed spectrum (Quality of Service)
- Large area coverage, low cost, long battery life
