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IoT heavyweights eye new app-layer connectivity standard for smart buildings

A number of major IoT outfits are collaborating under the auspices of the Zigbee Alliance to develop a new application-layer connectivity standard for the smart buildings market. Members of the strategy group leading the work include the likes of Legrand, Nordic Semiconductor, NXP Semiconductors,...

Mercedes-Benz, Samsung intro in-car control of smart home with new S-Class

Mercedes-Benz has integrated its in-car voice assistant system with the home-based Samsung-owned SmartThings platform to enable drivers and passengers to interact with connected devices in their homes. It is the first native in-car system to be linked with smart home functions, claim the pair. The...

Ikea chairs new Europe-focused Zigbee group to focus on smart homes

The Zigbee Alliance has started a new Europe-focused special interest group to promote the short-range technology in the European market. The group is chaired by Swedish flat-pack furniture company Ikea, which integrates Zigbee into its smart lighting products.  The European group will also lead the...

Amazon picks LoRa for smart-home telco platform – plus Nordic, Silicon Labs, Tile

Amazon has selected LoRa for its new Sidewalk wireless networking platform, running in 900 MHz spectrum, according to Semtech. Camarillo-based Semtech hailed its technology’s move into the consumer space. At the same time, Nordic Semiconductor, Silicon Labs, and Tile have variously said they have...

Five verticals for hybrid IoT – where short- and long-range IoT tech meet

Note, this article is taken from a new Enterprise IoT Insights editorial report on the combination of low-power short- and long-range communications technologies in hybrid IoT systems. Go here for the full report, which is free to download. A webinar on the same subject,...

World Economic Forum: $10tn GDP, 395m jobs by 2030 by prioritising nature – and tech

The World Economic Forum has published a study that says “nature-positive” enterprise solutions can create 395 million jobs and $10 trillion in revenue by 2030. A major subtext of the piece is how digital technologies, bringing insight and automation to critical industries, can drive...

New kid on the IoT block – fine-ranging with UWB and what it means for IoT

Note, this article is taken from a new Enterprise IoT Insights editorial report, out tomorrow, on the combination of low-power short- and long-range communications technologies in hybrid IoT systems (see cover image below). Check back here for the full report (from July 9); a...

UK to release 6 GHz and 100 GHz spectrum for Wi-Fi in smart homes, offices, factories

UK regulator Ofcom is proposing to make 500MHz of contiguous spectrum in the lower 6 GHz band available for unlicensed indoor Wi-Fi and low-power outdoor Wi-Fi usage. It has also revealed plans to release an additional 18GHz of Extremely High Frequency (EHF) spectrum, above...

Amazon trumps Google in smart home sales; smart lighting tops growth forecasts

The smart home market in Europe continued to grow in the third quarter of 2019, reaching almost 23.8 million units, an increase of 18.1 per cent compared to the same quarter a year ago. Amazon usurped Google in the period as the top tech...

Amazon, Apple, Google combine to develop new smart-home connectivity protocol

Amazon, Apple, Google, and the Zigbee Alliance have announced a working group, under the name Connected Home over IP, to develop and promote a new, royalty-free connectivity standard to increase compatibility among smart home products. Security will be a fundamental design tenet, the group said....

KT to make massive investments to become an AI company

Korean telecommunications company KT announced plans to invest 300 billion won ($257 million) over the next four years to become an artificial intelligence (AI) company, Korean press reported. The Korean telco also said it aims to hire nearly 1,000 specialists in the AI field with the...

Zigbee certified IoT products and platforms passes 3,000-mark with Amazon

The number of certified Zigbee IoT products and platforms in the market for smart homes and cities has passed 3,000, according to the Zigbee Alliance. The alliance’s certification programme seeks to establish quality standards and levels of interoperability among Zigbee products for product developers,...

Georgia Power unveils first smart neighborhood in Atlanta

Georgia Power, the largest electric subsidiary of Southern Company, and homebuilding company PulteGroup announced the opening of what it claims to be Atlanta’s first Smart Neighborhood.  Leaders from Georgia Power, PulteGroup, the Georgia Public Service Commission, U.S. Department of Energy, City of Atlanta and the project’s technology partners joined together to...

In plain sight – how smart homes risk enterprise IoT, and why nothing is being done (Reader Forum)

With the rise of connected devices in homes and offices spiralling upwards, Paul Hague, chief executive at UK cybersecurity firm BlackDice, says enterprises are letting vulnerable home devices onto their networks and walking blindly into a cybersecurity nightmare. The internet of things (IoT) hasn’t changed...

Deutsche Telekom intros NB-IoT-connected bins for sensitive documents

Deutsche Telekom has teamed up with logistics company Rhenus and the Fraunhofer Institute for Material Flow and Logistics (Fraunhofer IML) to develop an NB-IoT connected smart bins for disposing of sensitive documents. An NB-IoT sensor in the containers issues a signal to Deutsche Telekom’s cloud-based...

Amazon, Comcast, NXP, Schneider develop Zigbee interoperability updates

The Zigbee Alliance is coordinating efforts from the likes of Amazon, Comcast, Landis+Gyr, NXP, Osram and Schneider Electric to make smart home and IoT products easier to develop, deploy, and sell across ecosystems. The new All Hubs Initiative, driven by a Zigbee Alliance workgroup, is...

Panasonic and Toyota pool home and car tech in ‘smart town’ joint venture

Japanese firms Panasonic and Toyota have agreed to form a new smart cities joint-venture that combines the former’s expertise in the home gadgetry market and the latter’s work in the mobility space. The two companies will integrate their respective housing businesses, as part of the...

UK mulls security ratings and immutable passwords for IoT devices

The UK government has set out a plan to secure and protect consumer IoT devices from cyber attacks. It is considering a mandatory labelling scheme to rate the security of IoT devices, and inform consumers how secure their devices and appliances really are. It is...

Arm wins major meter management deal, “pulls in” Pelion customers in retail, logistics

Arm is going after energy providers and device makers after striking a deal with Singapore-based EDMI, manufacturer of IoT modules for utilities, to provide the management platform for smart meter devices, connectivity, and data. EDMI, owned by Osaki Electric Company in Japan, has major smart...

Ericsson maps cellular IoT to 5G, with new categories and solutions

Ericsson has redefined its portfolio and vision for cellular IoT technologies in four categories, including two new segments for Broadband IoT and Industrial Automation IoT. It said the objective of the exercise is to “outline the evolution” of IoT technologies, to encompass higher-powered LTE and...

‘No future Elon Musks in IoT’, ‘no future in IoT without LoRaWAN’ – team LoRa plots next moves

This week, 1,500 business types from every-sized enterprise in the burgeoning IoT space will descend on Amsterdam in The Netherlands to chat LoRaWAN, the low-power wide-area (LPWA) networking technology that saw 60 per cent growth last year. The occasion is The Things Conference (January 31...

Arm, AT&T, Ericsson, HPE et al  join new Linux group to bring order to edge IoT chaos

The Linux Foundation has started a new umbrella organisation, LF Edge, to establish an open, interoperable framework for edge computing that is independent of hardware, silicon, cloud, or operating system. The launch “changes the IoT and edge computing landscape,” it said in a press note....

Amazon joins Zigbee board to push open standards in smart home, smart city

Amazon is to take a seat on the Zigbee Alliance board of directors. The Zigbee Alliance said the decision shows the IoT market is convening around its technology as a short-range technology for smart devices, notably in smart home and smart city applications. The move...

Semtech spurs LoRa community with next-gen silicon, stares down cellular IoT carriers

With brand new silicon, a vibrant support network, and a profile burnished in the early IoT rush, LoRa specialist Semtech is looking to spread its wings and rise above the challenge from cellular IoT carriers. Outside of the IoT space, the US semiconductor outfit has...