The ultimate Internet of Things Solutions for Connected Car Systems

The technology of the Internet of Things solutions is continuously on the rise in today’s day-and-age
with constant development and innovations, and one of the major industries that have adopted this
technology to further their growth is none other than the automotive industry. After all, it’s a given
that connected cars require the highest-end technology to stay ahead of the curve, and one of the
best ways to facilitate this change is through the adoption of the latest IoT technology to promote
connected car solutions and improve the overall functionality of the automotive industry. Here are
the primary ways in which connected car systems is transforming the automotive industry:

Embedded Infotainment: It’s general human tendency to obtain the highest degree of comfort possible, and this rings true even during the act of driving. Connected car systems can help promote 3D and augmented navigation, multimedia support at multiple levels, smart apps for device integration, high-speed connectivity, and intuitive user experiences that don’t come in the way during your driving experience. This will help you obtain the highest degree of responsiveness and comfort possible in this scenario.

Telematics: It’s evident that one of the most significant advantages of utilising connected cars in the automotive industry is that it’s going to facilitate an unprecedented level of connectivity at all levels when it comes to these vehicles. This is where telematics comes into play, that enables drivers and passengers to stay connected at all times through the utilisation of this technology. This is done by leveraging a telematics control unit (TCU) to incorporate some form of cellular communication and create an automated system that facilitates this automotive connectivity.

Connected Safety: The concept of driver safety is gaining increasing prominence, what with the increasing frequency of accidents and road mishaps all over the world. To prevent such negative occurrences, the industry needs to utilise connected car systems to keep track of various metrics such as driver fatigue and enable a surround view for the driver so that they can stay aware at all times while driving.

Security: Of course, with the continued integration of technology in modern vehicles, a need will certainly arise for increased security levels to prevent any cyber-attacks or anything else of the sort. With the advent of connected car systems, self-driven cars are becoming less of a possibility and more of a reality, which makes the requirement of improved cyber security levels all the more necessary due to the implications of an online attack that can make the system go completely haywire and cause widespread panic.

It’s pretty apparent that the automotive industry will witness unprecedented levels of innovation
over the years with the widespread adoption of IoT technology, and it’s only a matter of time
before we enter the new era of transportation that will completely transform the way we enjoy
mobility services.

Related topics:

How the IoT is revolutionising business for the homes and building management

How The Internet Of Things Transforming the Connected Retail Industry

How the Internet of Things Transforming the Connected Retail Industry

How different do you think that today’s world is from what it was a few years back? I am sure that you’ll say that a lot. But what changed the world? What was that one thing that created disruptions amongst the world? One word for all these questions is “technology”. It’s the technological advancements that have brought the world to the palm of our hands. Get a CD for some movie that released in the 1980s and observe the change in processes and the world. No more waiting for days to get a message, no more going to arcadias to play your favourite games. World today is what older sci-fi movies used to predict. There are self-driving cars, cooking robots and health monitoring wrist watches out in the world which are already fully functional and easing the tasks for humans.

But, the pace at which world is changing nothing amuses us anymore. Think about it; if someone tells me that there is a robot available in the market that can understand the language of your dog and convert it to human language, I won’t be surprised. For me, the next thing that is making a difference and no one would have imagined is connected retail.

Connected retail is nothing but the advanced version of traditional retail with better functionality and features. Internet of Things is the technology that has brought the changes in the retail industry. Nowadays, retailers have access to information and technology that is enough to increase their sales by sizeable numbers, if they have a quality product.

Yes, apart from the Internet of Things for smart homes and smart building solutions there are solutions for retailers too that can help businesses to take their game to a whole new level. Let’s understand some of the regions where internet of things applications has brought ease to retailers and optimised their business operations.

Optimised supply chain and logistic maintenance: This is one area which is the primary concern of every retailer, and connected solutions have hit the right chords by providing solutions to retailers. IoT applications have optimised the processes for retailers and serve as the cost saver for people in the retail business. With connected solutions retailers can now manage and monitor the stock available in the store, the timeline to reorder the products and the number of products to reorder. All this data is available at a single point and extracted by observing various factors like the number of units purchased in a month, time to receive the product after ordering it and number of units left in the store. These solutions help retailers to maintain the stock and constantly meet the demands of consumers.

Engagement opportunities: With the use of IoT applications, retailers now can engage their consumers with better solutions. There is technology that can monitor and track the in-store movement of the consumers. With such technology in hand, retailers can now get the insight about the section in which an individual spends most of their time, the items that they selected but didn’t buy and many other things. Such data can be used by retailers to provide customised solutions to consumers to keep their business. For example A multi-brand outlet in town at the end of the day got data about a consumer shopping details and found that there was one product that the customer had till the checkout counter but didn’t buy because of the shortage of money. So, the store can provide a discount on the particular product to the consumer so that they can buy it on the discounted product and keep their business. This will not only help the store to get more business but also the happy consumer will share about their experience with others, which means more traction for the store.

Above are the few examples of how IoT applications have brought advancement in the retail business. Apart from this, there are things like self-checkouts, virtual closets that are also present in the market that makes the retail business easy and effective.

There is surely a lot more to come in the IoT and retail industry, and we are excited to see what awaits us in the future. We hope that the article was enough to give an insight into the connected retail solutions. But, if you wish to know more about the topic then you can have a look at HARMAN’s website and understand things in detail. HARMAN is one of the leading company that provides end-to-end IoT solutions to industries.

Product Sustenance Services for Maintain Brand product and Revitalize Products

The world is not same anymore, every day we see things changing at a pace faster than ever. The way we did things yesterday may not be the way we will do it tomorrow. Our apps are getting updated every day, and we find new and better process for our tasks. Similar is the case with the technological products that are used in the various industries. Products or the tools that they use go outdated with every single day and a better version come out on the market.

This continued development process of the tools is important if you want to survive in the industry.

Once a product is launched and is used by people in the market, it is prone to many defects, malfunctions and errors. More than this the product is in the constant competition from other tools that can come up with advanced features and less price which can easily take up the business of these tools. To survive in the industry and to keep the business going, what’s important is product sustenance. Product sustenance is the key to keep your product updated with the advancing technology and increasing competition.

How can a company maintain and revitalize their product?

There are many companies that are working on the same lines and providing the product sustenance services to other product companies. The process includes picking up small modules or the units of the products and then updating then one at a time. By integrating the latest technologies and modern product architecture, companies organise the updating process of units of a bigger product. While doing so, they make sure that the functionality of the product is not affected and the work doesn’t stop.

While product sustenance maintains the products integration and constant development while not hampering the workflow it also helps companies to maintain their brand's name. With continuous upgrades and timely integration of modern technology, it gives the consumers a trust that they are using the latest technology and builds authority for the brand name. Consumers understand the brand is making constant efforts to provide best of services to them which makes them stick to the brand.

If you’re looking to upgrade your product or want to get more insights on how the product sustenance works then we will recommend you to visit the website by Harman as they provide best-in-class product sustenance services.

Cloud Computing Trends that will take off in 2018

With the riding prominence of IoT services in today’s day-and-age, the rapid and unprecedented ascent of technology has completely transformed the daily functioning of multiple industries in and around this digital landscape. One particular aspect of IoT technology that has fuelled this digital transformation that has become a major topic of conversation has to be cloud computing services, that has expanded and completely taken over multiple industries due to the high degree of functionality that is provided by this invaluable piece of technology. The importance of cloud infrastructure and services simply cannot be overstated enough – after all, it’s leading towards the improvement of multiple scloud computing servicesectors and leading to the rise of multiple prominent cloud computing trends that will certainly take off in 2018. Here are some of the major trends that we speak of:

1.       Rising demand for experts well-versed in cloud computing infrastructure: This is perhaps one of the most obvious implications of the rising prevalence of cloud computing services in the modern world. After all, most companies and organisations would actively try and seek out bona fide experts who have an in-depth understanding on how to utilise this technology efficiently and reap the biggest rewards. Only by doing so can the investment that people make in cloud computing technology actually provide you with the expected benefits that will help in augmenting your business in more ways than one.

2.       Higher prevalence of SaaS in industries: Trying to code, test, and release their own software to be used in the business can prove to be a tall order to businesses, whose employees are already maxed out when it comes to the amount of work that they can perform in the first place. The rise of cloud infrastructure and services has made the concept of SaaS prominent due to the greater degree of functionality that is provided by this particular service. SaaS has pretty much all but replaced the usage of traditional and expensive on-premises software usage because it essentially provides organisations with improved solutions without engaging in overly time-consuming deployment operations.

3.       Increased and improved collaboration: Traditionally, collaboration between two teams in a particular industry used to be a time-consuming task, and the lack of something so important generally lead to a lot of debilitating problems due to the complete lack of any transparency of information. Thankfully, with the advent of cloud computing infrastructure, it has become a lot easier for companies to coordinate the actions of teams and ensure that the flow of work is as smooth as humanely possible, without any unnecessary delays hampering the overall process.

Cloud computing services have completely revolutionised the industry landscape in more ways than one, and it’s pretty evident that this technology won’t become outdated anytime soon. The trends mentioned above must be identified by industries that function in and around the technology landscape, and can help extensively when it comes to the overall improvement and development of these industries.

HARMAN IoT Gateway: A Step-Change in Delivering IoT

In the phrase of different sensors including many specifications presenting everyday challenges for IoT deployments, HARMAN has developed an IOT gateway device which streamlines distribute a solution that is cloud-ready, eco-friendly, easily administered, cooperative across all specs, and persists secured by PKI authentication and blends over all sensors right out-of-the-box.

Internet of Things (IoT) presents the efficiency for an influential ROI for companies looking to adopt a connected solution for less cost, improved productivity, or business transmutation. The potential for generating an organization value using IoT in automotive, manufacturing, smart agriculture, smart cities, health, and building management has been accurately documented. However, like all IT deployments, ROI can only be best accomplished through streamlined execution of IoT projects.

 Organizational Matters:

The conception of a range of sensors including different specifications has displayed hurdles for companies assuring interoperability, security, and analytics. IoT schemes can take countless hours – and sometimes outright stall – either because of incomplete or lack of assimilation with sensors.  Protection within IoT deployments also continues to be a major concern for organizations – especially the chance of IoT gateway devices being compromised due to an interruption. Further, some decisions have been taken on smart storage, forwarding, and discarding of data with the help of the quantity, variety, and speed of data generated across hundreds or thousands of sensors within a deployment.

Device Abilities

An IoT solution consists of three essential elements:

(1) Devices and sensors at the ground level

(2) Transport the data generated by those devices and sensors

(3) Analytics conducted on that data at the end for business insights.

At the ground level, the patterns of sensors are related - in a web network over WIFI or low powered radio frequency (RF) - to an iot gateway device which aggregates the data. The HARMAN IoT gateway works as that intelligent aggregator device at the edge which promotes the info run from the sensors.

Organisations who are still dependent on Raspberry Pi as an aggregation device at the edge for their IoT deployments, the Harman IoT gateway solution brings out many new aptitudes. With its strong characteristics, the solution saves a lot of time, effort, and cost in installing IoT initiatives by removing the requirement for ordinary integration, programming, and other administrative tasks. Additionally, it adds to the ability and the versatility of an IoT deployment by making it operative across several sensors.

Interoperability: The Harman IoT gateway device facilitates faster deployment by making interoperability with an array of 400 sensor varieties. Apart from WIFI, this device supports radio frequency along with a broad range of specs. Due to this, some sensor connectivity such as Bluetooth (Low Energy), Wi-Fi, Light link, Smart Energy), Lora (Outdoor Variant – 868 MHz band), ZigBee (home automation Cellular (LTE and 3G) are supported.  The gateway identifies the sensors and, with an associate mobile app, starts accumulates the data from those sensors in a couple of seconds. This offers a plug-and-play which saves a lot of programming and configuring time for the deployment team.

Improved Protection: There has been a continuous news in media about crimes such as Mirai delivered using IoT sensors and means, the authentication issues remain in the centre for multiple organisations, who want to adopt IoT. HARMAN’s partnership with Entrust Data card provides a PKI based security that the uprightness and introduction of the iot gateway devices are preserved.

Ease of Management: Exclusive Management of IoT gateway solutions includes firmware upgrades, provisioning, diagnostics, basic troubleshooting, security patches, and configuration changes, all of which could be addressed remotely to the IoT media. For device management, the solution carries Lightweight M2M (LWM2M) standard for device management. For bandwidth necessitated situations, the gateway already comes built-in with a HARMAN over the air (OTA) technology client to facilitate updates using some cost-efficient softwares. The HARMAN OTA updates are 1/10th the size of the standard file-image updated over LWM2M - promoting the updated version of devices in operations where connectivity might be limited.

Access to Analytics: By logging on to a simple interface, users can install systems for an iot gateway to ascertain ways to handle the data amount from the sensors. To promote analytics of related data, a sensible store and forward scheme can be set up.  To process the data at the edge or at the backend the iot gateway device comes with a data manager, based on SQLite with App program interface (API).

The capacity of the Harman iot gateway to perform edge analytics provides it with the strength to send security alerts gleaned from sensor data straight to the users, based on several rigorous criteria, without waiting for the results from analytics. On the cloud analytics front, the IoT gateway solution comes equipped with assistance for Telit ILS, Microsoft Azure IoT Hub, Sierra Wireless Airvantage, Interdigital OneMPower, IBM – Watson, MQTT, CoAP, AMQP Protocol Adapters.

With the flexibility, interoperability, protection, and analytics, the HARMAN IoT gateway requests the key pain features that customers display time and again when deploying IoT specific solutions. The IoT gateway device fares’ quite well in connected car, industrial IoT, retail, building management, healthcare and rugged outdoor industrial settings. Please leave us a line for us to arrange a demonstration for you either over a webinar or in person.

10 things that will help companies on their digital transformation journey

Digital transformation refers to the profound, accelerated transformation of a particular business in the modern world due to the rapid adoption of improving digital technology services. Due to the level of physical product innovation that has already taken place in the business landscape, it will be hard for firms to find new and unique ideas in such a cutthroat and competitive environment. This is where digital transformation solutions come into play – serving as a method for these modern businesses to innovate in a way that emphasises software changes over hardware ones (or anything physical, for that matter).

In order transform into one of the most effective digital transformation companies, the businesses should keep 10 things in mind that will help them immensely on this journey.

1.   Keep up with current digital trends: Without adequate knowledge about currently ongoing and finished digital trends, it will be virtually impossible for a business to capitalize on these advantageous innovations. By availing the services of digital transformation consulting, a firm can take this first step to ease their entry into becoming a digital transformation company.

2.     Identify relevant digital innovations that’ll help your business: While modern digital innovations are certainly quite fascinating, all digital transformation services are not universal in nature. Depending on the industry in question, a company needs communicate extensively with their digital transformation consulting specialists and identify which ones will positively affect your business, and to what degree.

3.   Adopt an appropriate leadership mandate: Before going forward with the digital transformation process, the why, what and when of it should be explained in concise fashion to the leadership of the company. Without this transparency of information regarding digital transformation services, there’s always the possibility of the higher-ups losing confidence in the process and terminating it halfway.

4.     Keep the staff comfortable and acclimated during digital transformation: During the adoption of digital transformation solutions, there will be a number of changes – including some that the employees might not like. It’s imperative to discuss these changes with the employees beforehand, in order to ensure that the employee turnover rate doesn’t fluctuate too much.

5. Facilitate the rapid transformation of your business: With adequate digital transformation consulting, the company will be able to anticipate the level of change in their business, and prepare accordingly so that they aren’t overwhelmed by the huge inflow of the digital transformation services.

6.   Setup a customer-first approach: Ultimately, the product you are making needs to gain approval from customers in order to be successful. Keeping this in mind, it’s necessary to utilize digital transformation solutions in a matter that will satisfy the needs of the demographic that your product will appeal to.

7.    Follow the Agile manifesto: The customer-first approach falls under this particular method, but the Agile philosophy is so much more than just that. This philosophy is used to provide certain guidelines to the various teams involved in the project and ensure that all members of a team work on the same wavelength. Adopting this manifesto will ultimately lead to a faster, smoother and better working environment in the company.

8.     Adopt the DevOps software development process: Communication between teams and automation of processes is a must for companies to rapidly experiment, identify and implement relevant digital transformation solutions. Using the DevOps system will go a long way in helping companies implement both these processes with relative ease in the business.

9.   Use an effective combination of an Internet of Things platform (IoT) and the Minimum Viable Product (MVP): For most digital transformation companies, it is easier to utilize an IoT platform to store consumer data from the products they’re using. In order to simplify this process, it would be easier to use a MVP and single out the core concepts that customers like.

10. Don’t just use digital transformation services, innovate them as well: Simply identifying and implementing the digital transformation solutions discovered is not enough. By understanding the core concept and functioning of these connected services through extensive digital transformation counselling, a company can decide to instruct the appropriate team to innovate the digital transformation service being used and optimize it to further ease the development of future products. 

6 Best Smart Home Devices and Automated Home Systems In 2017

The concept of Smart Homes is still in its infancy, but the systems and devices that have been launched to improve this technology have proven to be quite impressive. 2017 has especially been a productive year for Smart Home technology, showing us a glimpse into the future of modern housing. Here are six of the best Smart Home devices and automated home systems that one can buy in 2017.

1.       Amazon Echo

Perhaps the most well-known Smart Home gadgets on this list, the Amazon Echo is a Bluetooth Speaker with additional functionalities in the form of Alexa, Amazon’s voice assistant. By configuring this device to your liking, you can use the Echo to employ the system of smart home control most of the gadgets in your house.

2.       Google Home

At a first glance, the Google Home might seem quite similar to Amazon Echo. They share a lot of the same features, but this particular hub also has the added functionality of Google Assistant, which opens it up to a host of different possibilities. The most surprising thing however, is that Google Home is actually cheaper than the Amazon Echo.

3.       FIREFX Network Guardian IoT Cyber-Security Router & Intrusion Prevention System

As Smart Home solutions start gaining mainstream relevance, so will the need for tighter security so that these homes don’t become a target for hackers. The FIREFX Network Guardian is a step in the right direction, providing unmatched cyber-security. The price is steep, but the security provided is completely worth it.

4.       Ecobee4

This device is one of the most user-intuitive thermostats out there, with a responsive touch-screen and a remote sensor that helps in regulating the temperature of your house. This latest version also has Alexa integrated in it, which makes this thermostat a breeze to use.

5.       Nest Cam Outdoor

Boasting an upgrade from its indoor counterpart with a waterproof enclosure and power cord, the Nest Cam can record live 1080p video, has an easy-to-attach magnetic base and can send alerts based on suspicious motion or audio (based on the user’s preferences).

6.       August Smart Lock, Home Kit Enabled

This smart lock mounts over your existing deadbolt and allows your lock to be connected with your smartphone through a smart home app to provide a lot of control over your home security system. Its integration with Home Kit allows for a number of extra possibilities as well.