November 10, 2016
Elite recently attended the IoT Summit Chicago, a technical and business conference sponsored by the Illinois Technology Association. The event covered two days of presentations on all aspects of the rapidly growing connected work of the Internet of Things.
Elite has a significant interest in the IoT because of the testing and certification services we apply for sensor technology, wireless transmitters, and networking infrastructure. The range of new and existing technologies being deployed for the IoT is projected by experts and analysts to reach 40 to 50 million connected devices by 2020. That’s only four years away!
The summit included presentations covering venture capital and investment, business models, cloud services, system integration, networks, sensors, and transmitter hardware.
The IoT Summit is an important event for metro Chicago but its significance certainly extends to the entire Midwestern economy. Chicago is working hard to grow its name as a technology hub, and recent national rankings list it within the top 10 cities for tech.
Some of the more noteworthy technical presentations recognized that there are plenty of interesting and innovative technical solutions on the way for the IoT. However, there seems to be a consensus that eventually three classes of networks will emerge depending on the application needs:
- Short range – Bluetooth, WiFi, and Mesh, Nearfield
- Long distance, large bandwidth – Cellular, satellite
- Low Power, Low Data, Long Distance – LORA, SigFox, Ingenu
- Cellular CAT-M & NbIoT
Which networks and transmitter technology will emerge as leaders is still being played out, but ultimately the winning solutions will be based on a business case with a strong RoI for each unique IoT application.
Both Comcast and Senet touted build-outs of LORA 900MHz networks in Chicago as well as other US cities. Several presenters mentioned the implementation of cellular CAT-M devices by the end of this year and NbIoT radios by 2017. Time will tell how the IoT will take shape but Elite will be ready in all cases to service manufacturers bringing products to market.
For more information on the IoT Summit Chicago and for information on Elite services for IoT, contact Steve Laya.
