What is vehicle tracking?Vehicle tracking has been around for a long time but as often happens with really useful technologies, vehicle tracking was made possible by bringing together two existing capabilities. The first was the Global Positioning System (GPS), the second was the mass deployment of cellular telephony. Even so, it took four decades for those two technologies to get to a point where vehicle tracking became a commercial reality.A child of the Space RaceGPS was a child of the ‘space race’ between the USA and the USSR. Following the launch of the first artificial satellite, Sputnik in 1957, researchers noticed that the frequency of signals coming from the satellite to a fixed point on the ground increased as it … Read More
Tank Monitoring for Small Businesses
Why do I need Tank Monitoring?From fluids such as chemicals, fuel and water to bulk solids like cement, cereals and aggregates, these are just some of the critical inputs and outputs for many businesses. You may run a farm, a fuel depot for vehicles, an industrial process or a brewery but in each case the raw material or finished product will be stored in some kind of tank or silo and you will want to know how much of it you have. At first glance using IoT technology for tank monitoring may seem straightforward but there are many variations on this application. At the simplest level the IoT device generates an alert to know when a certain level has been … Read More
Smart Doorbell
Why do I need a Smart Doorbell?A smart doorbell or smart button can benefit your business in different ways. As a security device it allows you to know who is at your door or an unattended reception desk. Your operations may involve you being out in the yard and away from the building while you attend to stocktaking or repairs for example. A hotel can use a smart button to summon a taxi without the need to make a phone call or send an SMS. You may be away from your premises but would like to know who is at your door and be able to communicate with them. You may also wish to give access to a trusted supplier … Read More
7 Important battery considerations for your IoT application
The availability of Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) communications technology allows IoT applications to be implemented that were not possible before. These applications have no access to mains or vehicular power sources and must rely on batteries. If your device relies on batteries, then you have to work out what type of battery is best for you. The device has to work autonomously for the length of time required by the application. The problem facing designers of an IoT deployment is how to dimension the battery for the job the device is required to do. Using cellular network technologies such as NB-IoT or LTE-M, or alternatives such as LoRa or Sigfox, you can now envisage deploying IoT devices that will … Read More
Can IoT help the Circular Economy?
This year’s theme for Earth Day is “Restore Our Earth” and we’re reflecting on the requirement for a more sustainable approach to pretty much everything and whether IoT can assist in making that a reality. Since the industrial revolution our model of production and consumption can be summarised as ‘take-make-use-dispose’. Two hundred years later that model has been recognised as the cause of resource depletion, pollution, habitat loss and climate change. This is not sustainable. We have to move towards a different model, one of ‘take – make – repair – repurpose – recycle – remake’, to create a Circular Economy (CE). Many big corporations have developed or are developing CE strategies and practices, and many small and medium size … Read More
