Smart Technology

How will IoT Make Building Smart and Greener
admin
June 20, 2022
IoT, Technology

How will IoT Make Building Smart and Greener?

Smart building technology is becoming a new fashion, fuelled by a global need for better sustainability, reduced waste, and optimal use of resources.

Smart buildings are accessorized with technological advancements of the latest technology, i.e., the Internet of Things, to manage resources, assets, and services effectively, boosting building operations, energy consumption and resource management, and overall resident experience.

Today, buildings are responsible for around 38 percent of global CO2 emissions and 40 percent of U.S. energy consumption; therefore, remodeling buildings’ energy consumption and sustainability are vital to meeting global climate goals.

To adapt this remodeling has already been made clear by U.S. President Biden’s administration, who informed the Buildings Performance Standards Coalition in January. It will be a first-of-its-kind partnership between 33 states and local governments working hard to deliver cleaner, healthier, and more energy-efficient buildings.

The process of optimizing energy consumption in the building sector is a gigantic undertaking; it can begin at the smallest level, i.e., from the tiny chips that power the IoT.

Smart buildings integrate IoT technology into many areas- from digitizing people’s flow and space usage to reconstructing water supply networks. One of the biggest prospects for smart buildings is revolutionizing energy consumption, beginning with smart energy distribution systems and smart HVAC equipment.

Smart Energy Distribution Systems:

Traditional energy distribution systems are positioned in a unidirectional fashion in which energy is expected to flow from generators into loads. 

Usually, power plants generate energy and collect it in the urban centers of these systems.

The introduction and utilization of renewable energy sources like solar and wind have changed the picture of the energy distribution as the energy distribution system has to permit omnidirectional energy flow. A building that consumed energy could now integrate rooftop solar panels to produce and return excess energy into the grid.

Smart energy allocation systems authorize this omnidirectional energy flow and facilitate the integration of renewable distributed energies to collect energy back into the power grid. This whole system reduces energy consumption by enhancing the system’s efficiency and even uncloses a distributed energy generation model. Buildings are becoming energy producers and giving up their earlier character that is consuming energy, ultimately shifting towards green energy.

Advanced sensors and wireless IoT technologies are laying the foundation for smart energy grid transformation, where smart buildings play a pivotal role in fostering a greener, more connected power grid to shape a more sustainable future.

Smart HVAC Systems:

Smart HVAC systems are exciting evolution in smart buildings, which provides energy efficiency, air quality, and resident comfort. With the hit of the COVID-19 pandemic, vendors are looking at a shortened HVAC upgrade cycle. Dealers and distributors are integrating their HVAC systems with new and smart technologies. Today, when everything is shaping into a smart version, building residents are now expecting granular control of HVAC settings in each room and area of their building. In this situation, IoT is a savior as it adds a new level to the comfort experience inside the buildings.

Motorized vents and dampers integrated with wireless connectivity to phones and tablets allow residents to set the temperature and the CO2, humidity, and air quality. Building managers can also benefit from IoT connectivity to know the room occupancy, reduce energy usage, and optimize energy use throughout the premises.

Monitoring Building Health:

Monitoring building health is another important aspect of smart building growth areas. More environmental sensors are being added to buildings beyond traditional temperature and humidity. These sensors control smart dampers for better airflow and outdoor air exchange, manage connected equipment for predictive maintenance to avoid equipment failure, flow meters for real-time leak detection, gas sensors to detect air particles, and many other things.

We are already familiar with connected fire and smoke detection sensors, but with the addition of the latest technology, we can witness more wireless connectivity with long-range wireless and Bluetooth to develop an installer interface.

All three major applications, i.e., energy management, fire safety, and building health monitoring add more connectivity and digital capability.

The Importance of Reliability and Cybersecurity:

Well, aside from the great benefits offered by smart building, there are some challenges faced by smart building to be dealt with with skilled engineering.

The first challenge is technological: wireless networks of such complex systems should be reliable and stable. Though wireless mesh network technology is highly adept, vendors and manufacturers are required to ensure the reliability of their products to estimate the true potential of wireless networks in building environments.

Integrating wireless networks makes buildings vulnerable to cyber attacks. Silicon vendors and product manufacturers have stepped up their cybersecurity game to combat such threats. Uncompromised efforts and constant focus on security while developing and distributing smart solutions will be highly helpful in transforming the building sector.

A Smarter, Greener Future:

The best part about smart buildings is that they are not limited to just brand new structures; these buildings can be retrofitted with smart technology as well. Implementing wireless connectivity in existing systems allows for smooth adoption and speeds up the adoption of wireless communications in buildings.

The initiation of both public and private sectors to improve energy use in the building sector signifies that the coming years will be the era of smart building adoption. Today, when it has become important to reduce CO2 emissions in all sectors and maximize energy efficiency and consumption, the employment of the latest technology and the use of IoT in buildings can charter the way to sustainability and improve the quality of life for individuals and group level.

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How can IoT Sensors Improve Productivity in Manufacturing
admin
April 18, 2022
IoT

How can IoT Sensors Improve Productivity in Manufacturing?

Internet of Things has been reaching out to almost every sector, and as a result, it is expected that the global IIoT market will reach $103.38 billion by 2026. Today IoT devices are more affordable, and many manufacturers invest in smart factory technology. One of the significant parts of smart factory technology is IoT sensors. It is essential to gather the necessary information and send data to the cloud for analysis in manufacturing. Businesses analyze data collected from the sensors to produce the most fitting solution to enhance productivity, avoid unplanned downtime, and cut manufacturing expenses.

IoT Sensors

In the Industrial Internet of Things, sensors are able to detect different types of external information and change it into data or signals that humans and machines can comprehend. Data is stored in a database which is managed either on the cloud or within the building for processing and analysis. 

IoT sensors employ different types of technology like optics, infrared and thermal to catch the required information. Sensors can also collect one or many kinds of data. Sensors include measuring distance, levels, pressure, environment changes, or anomalies in production line batches.

Types of IoT Sensors

Vision Sensors:

Images are caught by a camera and processed using software to know parts’ presence, orientation, and accuracy. Adoption of vision sensors ensures product quality and consistency throughout batches. It is used chiefly on automotive, food and beverage, and general manufacturing production lines.

Proximity Sensors:

This sensor is used to calculate the distance between two objects. It is used primarily in manufacturing, where machines must know distances between products or measurements for assembly robots.

Pressure Sensors:

This sensor is used to measure the pressure of fluids or gases in an industrial environment. It is vital to maintain the correct pressure for the product quality or safety of the crew.

Temperature Sensors:

The temperature of the component indicates if they are failing or overheating. This can allow the maintenance crew to replace the fault before it results in expensive mechanical failure. Temperature sensors also monitor the ambient temperature to assure the quality of the product or food safety. Instant alert of a cooler going over-regulated temperature helps in saving the unplanned cost of food waste.

Humidity Sensors:

Balanced moisture can be an essential factor contributing to the final product quality. Monitoring the moisture guarantees that quality standards are always fulfilled. 

Humidity also degrades equipment, so this sensor can inform the team if the humidity level gets disturbed. It is crucial to maintain the required moisture to enhance sensitive equipment’s life. 

Level Sensors:

Level sensors alert the team if the fluid or solids level goes down. In this way, it ensures that hoppers are filled before they run out, and production time is not lost.

Acceleration and Vibration Sensors:

It is crucial to monitor the movement of equipment to know the accuracy or need for machinery maintenance—excessive vibration in the machine indicates loose bolts or worn-out bearings or motors that are about to fail.

Sound Sensors:

The pitch of some machinery also indicates whether it is operating correctly or not. By observing the machine’s pitch, the maintenance crew can be informed if the machine is running too high or low and needs repair or replacement.

With the evolvement of IIoT technology, major industrial sensor manufacturers are designing “smart” sensors. These sensors are easy to implement than analogue ones (as it requires PLCs to process and interpret data protocol). A smart sensor is able to process data within the sensor and transmit it directly back to the managing platform. This causes data transmission to be more versatile and saves bandwidth by just sending helpful information.

IoT Sensor Connectivity

IIoT deployment may involve a few or thousands of sensors monitoring and controlling a single machine or an entire production line. Sensors need to be connected to send back the data to the network and cloud software. This connection can be wireless or wired, and each of them comes with some form of pros and cons. 

Many manufacturing plants opt to hardwire their IoT devices using industrial Ethernet cables. Hardwiring can guarantee a reliable connection, but the distance between sensors, I/O blocks and PLCs can limit its function. There is also the risk of damage to the cable, which comes with the cost of replacing it. 

Nowadays, wireless IoT sensors are in trend as wireless are more powerful and reliable. It can cover a much larger area and distance. It is more scalable as many sensors can be deployed through this. 

For instance, a single private LTE network can wirelessly connect many devices on a factory floor and provide seamless functioning.

How Are Manufacturers Improving Productivity?

Here are some examples that prove that IoT sensors play an essential role in helping manufacturers save costs and improve productivity.

Enhanced Product Quality:

In machines already connected to the cloud platforms, it is easy to store data such as temperature and pressure to track in production batches digitally. Machine vision via high-resolution cameras is another way of tracking products through a production line. Vision sensors with software can monitor product quality. Hence, this technology can reduce poor-quality products from reaching consumers who can imperil the company.

Minimize Unplanned Downtime with Predictive Maintenance:

The accessibility to real-time data and cloud-based analytics allows engineers and maintenance crew to spot inefficiencies in machinery. It is more valuable than scheduled maintenance, in which programs can analyze data collected from sensors to predict if an unplanned breakdown will occur or not. This ultimately helps technicians replace components before they fail, dodging any accident or expensive repair.

Warehouse Management and Asset Tracking:

In a smart warehouse, the IoT sensors can help track the flow of assets throughout the factory. Autonomous robots can pick or move or pack orders without human interference. Automating these tasks can allow employees to focus on other priority tasks.

Improve Procurement and Forecasting:

Sensors can also be helpful for procurement managers. Sensors installed on the production line can watch the assembly of products, help control raw materials usage, and reduce waste. It also alerts the crew when the supply goes down. Thus monitoring these essential items using sensors can reduce waste and enhance forecasting.

Product Development:

We all know that product development is one of the most critical and costly processes in manufacturing. Manufacturers can reduce the sum and make a better decision before concluding on total production.
One of the best ways is to gather data through sensors on the production floor and advanced manufacturing analytics to reduce the time consumed in the R&D process.

In fact, sensors on products can be implemented to collect data in real-life scenarios. Collecting data in real-time allows engineers to make rapid changes to get a more efficient product.

Summary

It is apparent that sensors plan a crucial role in daily operations throughout factories. Data collected using sensors can help develop a more efficient production line, machine operation, and safety.

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admin
September 6, 2021
IoT

How is IoT Renovating Hotel and Hospitality Industry into Smart Ones?

IoT is already making so many industries and sectors smart and successful. No doubt, organizations are also embracing this new technology. Hospitality is another industry that devours the benefits of IoT by integrating it with internal management, and the output is more than expected.

We all know that housekeeping and maintenance have been the most critical components of smart hotel management. It is essential to keep a place running smoothly while maintaining quality, as it can affect the guests’ experience. When everything is done accurately, guests may not even notice that maintenance or housekeeping is being performed. In fact, issues are resolved before any guest sees it, or if someone notices it, requests are addresses immediately and seamlessly.

When things are not done as expected, it might go downhill much promptly- guests might complain, ask for recourse or write a negative review which ultimately causes business drop and no repeat business as well.

Thus, it is clear that the housekeeping and maintenance model matching guests’ needs and hotel management is challenging. Compromising quality and thoroughness by spending too little on housekeeping and maintenance may lead to guest dissatisfaction. Or spending too much on maintenance and housekeeping may result in appreciation, but you may feel that you’re spending more than the requirements.

So now, the most significant challenge is to know how to strike the proper perspective smart hotel?

Present Systems for Core Hospitality Functions and its disabilities:

Well, before switching to Smart Hotel, it is necessary to understand the state of current operations. To understand this, you need to ask few questions about housekeeping services like “How many rooms are cleaned every day or weekly? How much time is consumed in cleaning, and how many staff are engaged in it? How many rooms are allotted to a single staff and how assignments are made?

You even need to question on maintenance front, too, like “how often maintenance requests are made? What are the things which need frequent repair? How much is spent on maintenance?” It would be best to determine how often preventative maintenance is performed and how much it stops more significant issues from emerging down the line?
These small but essential questions are challenging to answer as these issues can be resolved only by employing the right system or process.

Many organizations discovered that their systems are:

Manual and Variable:

Apart from housekeeping and maintenance being hands-on and physical work, recordkeeping has also been manual. Every input must be made manually from room allotment to service requests, thus dragging the possibility of errors and sometimes ambiguity.

Disintegrated:

Even if the software is part of hotel management, there are separate systems for each function that troubles to find out who’s doing what or what happened at what time. The process for housekeeping can be different from the maintenance procedure. Sometimes, a system for maintenance requests is varied depending on the type of service or vendor.

Responsive:

We all know that most maintenance systems are dependent on submitting service orders to acknowledge or resolve things that are already broken. This results in a system that reacts to the emerging problems rather than one that actively works to fix them before it happens.

These different and manual systems have been part of the industry for a long time despite having limitations. Now, there are many firms and companies that offer software to digitize and collect housekeeping and maintenance operations. Yet, these solutions are still dependent on some level of human interference. Whether recording time spent completing a particular task or determining if something needs servicing indicates the degree of unpredictability and difference in the data as long as you do not have a smart hotel.

Monitor Smart Hotel Functions in Real-Time and Get Actionable Insights

The Internet of Things empowers hospitality industry professionals to view the current status of essential services like maintenance and housekeeping in entirely new dimensions, analyze past data in a centralized form and utilize data to extract actionable insights to improve the business.

Let us know the benefits of employing IoT based housekeeping and maintenance solutions.

Set Alerts for Dynamic Maintenance

Leak sensors on water lines and bathroom fixtures, vibration sensors on HVAC appliances and airflow sensors in ducts can be helpful. These sensors provide alert when things are damaged or broken, and it can even identify problems before it turns into a big issue. These sensors can be installed on an individual room basis or in common utility areas to get alerts. One can set a limit for moisture, airflow or vibration to get alerts to perform preventive maintenance or promptly address the arising situation accordingly. With sufficient available data, some IoT solutions use machine learning or artificial intelligence to execute complex models for predictive maintenance.

Better Staffing and Resource Planning

Attaching proximity sensors and indoor positioning beacons to either housekeeping staff uniforms or carts can provide data on rooms cleaned at any given time. As staff move from one room to another, these sensors capture the data of time spent by the staff in cleaning a room without manual reporting. By getting zone and room level data, hotel management can know the current state of rooms- cleaned or have to be cleaned. Occupancy sensors installed in rooms can inform staff with a real-time indication of which room to skip to avoid the requirement for repeated manual follow-ups. Collecting and analyzing past housekeeping data can help pinpoint operational bottlenecks to notify total staff headcount and cut housekeeping costs.

Enhanced Guest Experience

Interactive tablets are added in rooms for the comfort of guests to place room service orders like request extra towels or mark their room as ‘Do Not Disturb.’ When these sensors are integrated with housekeeping and maintenance data in a centralized system, front desk employees get access to the real-time dashboard of every room’s status, enabling them to respond to requests and send the required personnel. This ultimately results in an improved service experience where services are prompt and seamless to visitors.

Analytics and Administration Monitoring

Data collected from housekeeping, maintenance and guest service requests can be utilized to bring about reports and metrics like average cleaning time consumed per room, maintenance requests made per week, or average request fulfilment time. Sensors attached to HVAC appliances can be utilized to monitor energy usage and optimize it in response.

Thus organizations are aware of metrics that can be deployed for suitable operational changes.

Different Sensors, Networks, and Software to Meet Your Needs

Sensors used in an IoT solution will depend on the particular demands of the Smart Hospitality use case. For example, to track housekeeping activities through indoor positioning, current hardware technology consists of WiFi tracking tags, BLE beacons, or RFID tags. For maintenance purpose, leak sensors, there is ultrasonic-based and mechanical impeller leak sensors. Vibration sensor technologies comprise piezoelectric and MEMS-based accelerometers.

In Smart Hotel network connectivity, sensors can cooperate with the cloud through a variety of wired and wireless protocols, like

  • WiFi or Ethernet
  • LoRa and other LPWAN protocols
  • Cellular (NB-IoT, LTE-M)

In the end, you’ll need an IoT software platform to ingest, convert, and envision the data. This may also comprise the skill to connect or remove sensors to various appliances and assets, set alerts and create customized reports.

Thus we can conclude that IoT supports hospitality organizations to stay ahead of the curve in the guest experience and streamline operations.

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Adoption of Smart Cities for a Brighter Future
admin
March 25, 2021
Digital Transformation, IoT

Adoption of Smart Cities for a Brighter Future

Are you living in a smart home? Just look around, and you’ll observe it’s a heck of a lot smarter than it was ten or even five years ago. Today our homes are occupied with smart devices, like smart speakers, smart thermostats, and smart lightbulbs. But the trend did not remain to the smart home, but the trend for intelligent spaces extends far beyond our homes. Now, everything is becoming a part of this trend, including smart cities. Smart cities are dependent on the latest technologies like 5G, IoT and fibre infrastructure. The latest innovations and changes in 5G, IoT and fibre infrastructure technologies are developing and strengthening the networks of the future.

Smart cities are utilizing these networks for smooth functioning. However, to ensure smart cities’ sustainability for the future, the connectivity infrastructure must be supported by highly efficient energy networks.

Let’s know everything in detail- what are smart cities, how technology is changing the outlook of cities, and what are the key investment opportunities?

Why do we need to remodel cities into smart ones?

A smart city uses advanced technologies to magnify efficiencies and enhance its residents’ quality of services and life. It usually embraces smart power distribution, transportation system, street lights and rubbish collection etc. The main concept behind the idea is to use data and technology smartly to make everyday life easier and better for people residing and working in the city while potentially utilizing the present resources.

Smart cities are built to enhance energy efficiency and help their regions reach their respective net-zero carbon emissions targets. It is expected that smart cities can generate around $20 trillion in economic benefits by 2026.

UN has predicted that 68 per cent of the world’s population would be living in urban areas by the end of 2050, which intimates that there would be more pressure on cities. There would be environmental, economic and societal challenges. The only solution to upcoming problems is by making cities smart.

By introducing smart cities, we can make cities a better and safe place to live. It can improve the fundamental quality of life indicators like daily commute, health issues and reduce crime incidents by around 10 to 30 per cent.

How is technology making cities smart?

By controlling traffic problems:

Traffic is a curse for everyone living in cities but thanks to technology as it has provided some promising solutions. For example, one can adjust the route in real-time according to demand, and smart traffic lights can be used to manage the congestion.

Potentially utilizing city resources:

There are sensors attached to the waste containers to report the container’s real-time status, which means that refuse collectors do not have to waste time travelling and collecting half-full refuse containers. This also implies that collectors can keep a check on how many bins are about to overflow and when they need to replace them. This facility is far better than measuring abstract factors like how many collection trucks are at work.

Enhancing energy efficiency:

Smart cities use technology to monitor real-time energy use and energy consumption closely. For example,

In Schenectady, New York, most street lights are upgraded to LED technology, allowing the lights to be adjusted based on real-time data. In Amsterdam, homes have smart energy meters designed to reduce energy consumption. This enables citizens to use energy sources consciously.

Making cities safer:

Today, the adoption of the latest technology has improved the safety and security system of the residents. Smart Cities utilize technology inventions like wifi, IoT and CCTV cameras to strengthen safety and improve incident response times. For example,

In many smart cities, real-time video data from the street is analyzed to better track and designate resources on the ground and enhance public safety.

Strengthening greater collaboration with citizens:

One of the best things about Smart cities is that it invites residents to participate in local issues. There are some apps that empower residents and allow them to report local problems. They can even share resources among themselves by using community networking platforms.

For example, Smart Cities have a low-cost environmental kit that is used to collect local ecological data. Residents place it in locations like balconies and windowsills to collect the local environment’s data like air, noise, and pollution. The collected data is then streamed to an online platform, efficiently creating a crowdsourced map of data worldwide.

What are the four infrastructure investment opportunities?

Empowering technologies:

The speedy growth of advanced technologies like 5G, Artificial Intelligence, cloud and edge computing supports smart cities’ evolution. We are currently in the starting stage of an edge computing revolution. It is absolutely essential to support the rapid growth in the number of connected devices and the massive increase in data gathered.

It is expected that approximately $20 billion of opportunities across hardware, software and services would be generated by the end of 2023.

It is clear that investment in reliable technology and high-speed connectivity is the central concept in building Smart City. The sudden shift to work from home culture in 2020 due to pandemic demands for stable and secure high-speed connectivity. With the increase in the number of connected infrastructures, cities must be aware of weaknesses and probable emerging problems.

Buildings and construction:

Climate change is one of the primary concern in today’s world. So decarbonizing the sector is the only possible and cost-effective ways to decrease the emerging climate change problem.

It is noted that most commercial buildings are responsible for 20% of energy use in the United States, in which 30% of energy is usually wasted. However, the addition of smart solutions can transform buildings into smart ones and make them energy-efficient and completely automated.

As per the Paris agreement, all buildings require to be net-zero carbon by 2050, and this goal increases the demand for smart buildings.

Updated energy sourcing, management and deployment:

Today, cities are consuming around two-thirds of the world’s energy; thus, there is immense pressure to shift to lower-carbon energy systems. No, doubt investment in smart technology will accelerate the shift while yielding economic growth and competition. Investment in next-generation energy transmission, smart grids and distribution networks can help monitor energy flows and adapt to fluctuations in supply and demand, respectively. Smart cities will also include smart meters to introduce price differentiation, microgrids for a local energy source, gamification apps to lower consumer usage etc.

Smart water and waste management solution:

With climate changes, water management and waste management are another concern to be resolved as soon as possible. Today, access to potable water, treatment of wastewater and waste management are essential issues that cities are facing. Besides this, flooding, drought and water losses are also growing threats due to climate changes and urbanization. Urban planners have to keep track of the ageing drainage systems.

Therefore the introduction of smart solutions has become necessary to overcome water-related issues. The addition of a smart water management system will include leakage, pollution detection and predictive maintenance planning.

For waste management, there are sensors attached to the bins that update the refusal bin’s status. Refusal collectors keep track of the data and collect the waste containers accordingly. This minimizes the travelling time and cuts off the fuel charges. A smart waste management system also stresses reducing waste at the source through advanced use of packaging, strategic collection methods and divided waste-to-energy solutions.

Conclusion:

Smart cities are the best solution to tackle environmental, social and safety issues. It includes everything which is required for the betterment of lifestyle. From smart homes to street lights, smart meter to smart traffic lights, everything contributes to saving natural resources and potentially utilizing available resources. Prompt Softech is dedicatedly working on converting the traditional technology and working process into smart ones. The Softech company provides IoT enabled solutions that can bring changes to your organization by making processes and operations more effective and efficient, ultimately leading to optimal outcome, better experience and the slightest error. You can initiate the ‘smart city’ revolution by adding smart solutions to your organization and cut off unnecessary expenditure.

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admin
November 30, 2020
IoT

8 Ways The Internet of Things (IoT) Can Help Grow Your Business

We live in a golden era where every device we use is connected to the internet in one way or another. The network of these connected devices is what we can call the Internet of Things.

IoT impacts the way we live our lives and make various aspects of our life smarter and more efficient. With smart technology being cheaper, we are now seeing more devices built with wireless connectivity embedded. Modern-day IT companies can use IoT technology to make their business operations more streamlined and improve efficiency in ways that were not possible earlier. Here are a few ways how IoT can grow your business today:

1) Improved business insights and customer behavior

Connected equipment in manufacturing, aviation, agriculture, healthcare, supply chain, and many other industries create more data streams and analytics potential. This means that companies are now gaining much greater insights about their day-to-day business operations and learning more about how their customers use their products or services.

In many of the cases, this has been enabled by cloud platforms provided by Microsoft Azure, IBM, AWS, and Google. But there is also a shift towards edge computing in some industries to reduce latency introduced by relying on third-party data centers.

2) Improved inventory management

The use of IoT will dramatically improve small businesses’ ability to monitor and manage their inventory process. Smart devices and IoT are now making it possible to automatically track and collect items and make overall inventory management and logistics more efficient. This whole comprehensive method is more productive than the cumbersome and expensive task where warehouse workers manually do the scanning and tracking of inventory piece one at a time

3) Personalized information and actions

IoT also brings together personal data so that they can deliver a more personalized experience to their customers.

In this way, E-Commerce retailers can leverage the analytics collected based on the customer’s behavior to offer more personalized information and actions. A good example fo this is where there is a car connected, and the driver receives offers that are tailored specifically to him or her. Alternatively, a family with a smart refrigerator can also receive the same tailored experience based on their personal preferences.

4) Efficiency and productivity gains

By connecting a business’s key processes, leaders can easily identify ways to boost efficiency and increase productivity. Thanks to these gains, companies expect that the revenues may get a boost by up to $154 million due to industrial IoT development, according to a recent report by Inmarsat.

Employees at Ford in Spain use a special suit equipped with Ford’s body tracking technology in partnership with Instituto Biomecanica de Valencia. The experiment involves 70 employees in 24 working departments.

The technology works similarly to motion taking systems that record how athletes sprint on turn or actors move and speak. Ford has been using the same technology to design a less physically stressful workstation to boost its manufacturing processes.

By accurately tracking the workers’ movement, it enables data-driven changes to its vehicle production processes, making them safer and more efficient.

5) Asset tracking and waste reduction

Closely linked to efficiency and productivity are the drives to reduce waste for which IoT tracking is integral. The growing use of IoT, with smart devices and sensors, can reduce unnecessary expenses that occur due to operational inefficiencies in the dress collection process. The urban waste collection process is also quite complex and time-consuming as well as resource-consuming

Therefore, using route optimization where municipalities or waste management companies work together and use smart dumpsters can transmit real-time data to waste collectors. The data then can be processed by the IoT company, which can select the best routes for waste collectors with areas that need a cleanup on priority. This results in an efficient pickup process that is more productive so that it can save fuel and workforce costs.

6) Remote working

Remote working is undoubtedly a trend that is becoming more and more popular as the days go by. For almost a decade, the possibility of working from home is more feasible for workers everywhere, and all the credit goes to development in the IoT.

IoT brings efficiency and accessibility on a level that was never seen before, and this has allowed remote working to be a popular option in today’s modern society. With IoT performing many different aspects of standard work practices, it is no surprise that remote working opportunities are flourishing.

7) Improved business security

IoT technology can be used to boost the security of your commercial office building in multiple ways. For example, wireless CCTV systems can be installed everywhere on your business premises and provide you with 24/7 live feed direct to your mobile devices. Many research data suggests that security cameras can be a handy tool against criminals. Security cameras can also come in handy to monetize star performance, and also it lowers the risk of employee theft.

Wireless alarm systems are also another affordable way to improve your business security and protect your equipment. An added benefit of installing IoT based security devices is that they may reduce the cost of your business liability insurance. Today, all the companies should take advantage of IoT devices that can monitor their buildings, boost their workplace security, and can negotiate lower insurance premiums.

8) New business models

While most of the use cases for IoT lies mainly inefficient productivity and process monitoring, and many companies recognized the scope for it to provide them with information about their customers in how they use their products.

We already have been saying internet-connected cars, coffee machines, trains, and all manner of other smart things that can feed used data back to the manufacturers and operators to build services around those products.

While few of these things were initially designed to be connected but added in IoT, there is a new value to them. These can also help improve the future design wire, the heaps of data gathered from real-world usage.

Companies that successfully can integrate IoT with their products have used benefits ahead in the future. It also allows the organization to shift the focus from conventional business models to new revenue streams. The data acquired from the IoT products hold much value. However, more significantly, customers can be given the option to purchase subscription-based services that offer customers a more personalized and tailored experience.

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admin
November 12, 2020
Artificial Intelligence, IoT

How is Artificial Intelligence Contributing to the IoT Revolution?

Today businesses around the world are extracting the potential outcome by deploying IoT in their business operations. They use it to create new and optimized business possibilities. The firm growth of IoT in various industries is spectacular, whereas AI and its influence on a professional and personal level are considered undervalued. However, combining IoT with rapidly improving AI technologies can design ‘smart machines’ that stimulate intelligent behaviours to make a precise decision without any human interference. Thus, AI-IoT together minimizes chances of error and ensures efficiency along with productivity.

How does AI help in the IoT revolution?

Artificial Intelligence performs smart tasks such as language translation, decision making, voice recognition, etc. and IoT involves a series of interconnected gadgets to transport information over a network. IoT gadgets depend on web connectivity to deliver a fair amount of relevant information about users such as user behaviour, users’ preferences, personal details, etc. It is absolutely wrong to overlook them as they contribute to improving the operations and user experience. However, many organizations have no idea about saving and processing of massive amounts of data which ultimately hinders the growth and potency of IoT.

In this critical situation, AI work as saviour as it helps to store the bulk of data processed by the IoT devices. It analyses and produces a sense of it. Thus, we can conclude that AI is a chief driver which promises to contribute to the exceptional growth of IoT.

Enabling evolving profits for businesses

Earlier, the AI framework was taking care of limited categories of the task. They were not scalable and required human interference. However, advancement in technology has created a successful transformation of AI by involving it into IoT concept. The collaboration of AI with IoT has introduced smart machines which require the least human intervention. The integration of two evolving technology will bring a dramatic change in different industries. Four significant changes that will emerge in businesses after integration of AI & IoT are:

Improved revenue:

Integration of IoT with AI will be profitable for many industries and sectors in terms of generating significant revenues and returns. IoT data providers, IoT gadget, manufactures and companies offering application services based on smart sensors will also enjoy the profits gained by the togetherness of these two highly effective technologies.

Better Safety Standards:

Un-interrupted and regular monitoring allows a business to take prompt decisions to restrict any failure. Up-to-date monitoring improves overall protection and security standards while enhancing productivity. The strict monitoring over different operations even reduces the possibility of harm to lives and assets.

Decreased Expenses:

Assessing the appliances by smart detectors, the sensor installed domestic devices and smart electricity meters cut the extra operational costs in businesses or household works.

Improved user experience:

Smart sensors offer a plethora of opportunities to improve the user experience. These detectors catch the user’s preferences and provide them with options accordingly. For example, smart ac sets the temperature as per the user’s need.

Positive influence on different industries

1) Manufacturing Industry:

Manufacturing sectors like aircraft, automobiles, mining, household appliances, etc. sync smart sensors with their machinery to get future analyses and improve efficiency along with productivity. Industries are endeavouring to develop a wholly autonomous and advanced industrial unit. The installed sensors will assist enterprises in detecting the areas with looming threats, informing about the future maintenance requirement to ensure least machinery falls.

2) Smart Homes:

IoT has introduced advancement in homes too. Today, smart home concepts have taken up speed. Smart homes concept means a house where all the gadgets are connected through a shared network. Integrating IoT with AI will enable devices to interpret the owner’s instruction and make smart decisions, respectively.

A smart home consists of technologies that aim to make lives comfortable by allowing the owner to regulate the device remotely, regardless of where she/he is currently present. It even ensures better safety and security. For example, an owner can pre-plan the time at which he/she wants coffee, or when TV should turn on to watch their favourite show.

3) Body sensors:

Smart detectors have made the lives of patients and doctors easy. These smart devices sense different activities to maintain good health. Today, pharmaceutical companies are investing in medical sensors that can assist patients in keeping a track on their health. In the covid-19 situation, most of the hospitals are offering virtual consultations to their regular patients. Smart sensors are tracking the health of patients and sending health alerts to the doctors if any changes appear. This technology has allowed everyone to follow social distancing to minimize the chances of Covid spread.

For example, sensors evaluate blood pressure, blood sugar levels, etc. and send a notification if any changes occur.

4) Airlines:

Sensors have also become part of the aircraft to monitor the looming risks and errors and to assure safety before any mishap occurs. These smart sensors predict probable errors and calculate the degree of severity to decrease aircraft downtime and ensure safety. Airline companies also use sensors to detect the maintenance issues that typically cause flight delay and cancellations.

5) Oil Rigs:

Oil industries have to spend a fair amount on obtaining oil drilling machinery. Oil companies can use smart sensors to get a timely notification for servicing and reduce the operational cost. Sensors attached to the machines provide the information about the condition of devices and send the alert for maintenance or servicing before any damage happens to a machine.

Wrapping Up:

IoT and AI are technologies which seem to complete each other through one or another way. This deadly combination will change the outlook of many businesses and industries. It will even improve our personal and professional lives in a very positive way. Thus, undoubtedly this ultimate combination is highly beneficial as it will open up new opportunities for growth and innovations—the addition of AI in IoT concept can ease the business processes, improve productivity and provides enhanced user-experience.

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admin
May 27, 2020
IoT

How will IoT Transform Transportation in the Coming Years?

How far have you imagined the development of technologies? Have you ever thought of automatic driving car in your childhood?

Few sci-fi movies might have created some imaginations, but who had thought IoT and AI would make it possible.

The holistic development of technology has changed the outlook of every sector. Healthcare, houses, towns are among things which are becoming smart along with the human race. The transportation sector is also benefiting from these changes to brush itself as more modernized and smart.

The transportation sector is evolving every day and thanks to IoT service providing companies which are inducing smartness to this industry.

The transportation sector has been offering safer, faster, cleaner and comfortable drives, and now IoT has taken the responsibility to make it smart.

As per the survey, global smart technology would touch $262 billion by 2025, and this would not be just financial success for manufacturers but would add a realistic approach to the expectations of users.

Don’t believe it? Read the blog to know how IoT would transform the transportation sector in years.

Assisted Driving:

The most prominent feature which IoT promises in transportation is safety. Smart transportation would have cars that would communicate with one another to improve supported driving features and ensure more safety.

Through IoT integrated communication, a driver would get the real-time data of other things present on the road to avoid any collision. The driver could use the data and take necessary steps like brake or turn and enjoy the smooth driving.

Though assisted driving features are no new as many vehicles have it but the inclusion of IoT into it would make it more useful and reliable. This integration also gives a base to driveless cars. Connecting IoT would allow vehicles to communicate with other vehicles and would help in better navigation. To be honest, safe and reliable self-driving cars would not have been possible without IoT.

You can too add IoT in your manufacturing business by contacting reliable and experienced IoT development company.

Read More: Will 2020 Be The Transition Phase of Internet Of Things?

Effective Navigation:

Improved navigation is helpful for humans, and IoT is the one which provides the most efficient navigation. Today, most of the people are dependent on GPS navigation which sometimes is slow to adapt the traffic changes, leading to frustration.

IoT navigation is a saviour in this situation. It is more helpful for the driver as it provides real-time information about traffic, blockages etc. Dynamic navigation can help in avoiding any type of hazard by providing real-time feedback to the driver.

Fluid navigation is best suited to services like environmental waste transport as accidents can cause spillage. To avoid accidents, drivers need proper real-time information on high traffic areas or spot accident-prone areas.

Maintenance clock:

Oil change sometimes comes up with a hefty repair bill. Any idea behind this unexpected bill?

Late servicing and inability to know when to go for vehicle maintenance is the primary reason behind this. There are many drivers who have no idea about when to get a vehicle checkup service. In this situation, IoT act as your assistant. It provides predictive maintenance of a vehicle and alerts drivers by highlighting urgent repair needs.

IoT devices installed in cars or vehicles analyze the performance of different parts and determines when servicing is required. It notifies the driver when something is about to damage.

The real-time information provided by IoT allows the driver to take the necessary steps and go for repair before any significant breakage occur. Not just this, it even provides a chance to manufacturers for more improvement. They can analyze the data from IoT devices and detect the common issues in their vehicles. Thus, they can use the information and make more reliable and safe cars.

Better Ridesharing:

Ridesharing is a new and useful trend which has been adopted and has brought disruptive changes in the transportation sector. IoT has made this trend more reliable and comfortable for the company as well as passengers.

Functional ridesharing depends on IoT, and it won’t work correctly unless a passenger could not see the location on the related app. Ridesharing even includes items like bicycles and scooters, so companies need to have their built-in device as well.

Read More: How can IoT be Used to Fight Against COVID-19?

A well established IoT network grants better vehicle surveillance by passengers and providers. It even helps by providing the fuel level information and determining the performance of a vehicle. With the provided data, companies could check that passengers are getting the car at peak performance levels.

Improved fleet management:

IoT has made everything more organized, particularly for fleet owners. IoT integration in transportation is helpful for a company that operates a fleet as they need to get the location of the vehicles, and how they are running. Through Iot enabled transportation, managers can get the real-time location of their trucks.

Not just tracking part, iot devices provide other services like weather analytics to help drivers for a safe journey, fuel economy tracking for fleet managers to calculate regular expenses like gas and maintenance. These features add more money and fast deliveries and reduced maintenance cost.

Introducing IoT in Transportation:

Well, IoT has already added a lot more than expectations. If you see the surrounding then would found that IoT has already become part of our daily life. IoT service providers are exploring the best versions to make the surrounding more smart and accurate.

Statista states that the connected car market expanded by 45% between 2018-2019 and would observe a hike in the global shipment of 76 million units by 2023.

Hence, it is no wrong to conclude that car companies are familiar with IoT and its wondrous offering, and they are capitalizing it as well. In coming year IoT would submerge the transportation sector fully, exploring safer, smart and reliable vehicles. Connected cars would become part of normal life, and roads would be more safe and convenient for everyone.

If you still not thinking about modernizing your products or adding IoT to your business, then it might emerge as a significant loss in coming future because the coming year would be based on IoT. If you want some help or assistance, then consult a reliable IoT development company.

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admin
February 4, 2020
IoT

Know How IoT can Double Your Hospitality Business?

IoT this very much ‘in-use’ word can be simply moulded as a concept to connect all digital devices embedded with software, sensors, network connectivity and necessary electronics. It permits them to collect and exchange data, making them responsive and “smart”. The Internet of Things has now fitted itself in all industries, viz logistics, healthcare, sports, agriculture manufacturing, travel and tourism etc. But its intervention in the hospitality industry has many things to talk about. The boom in technology has developed the requirement of IoT services in almost all services. You can also make your business smart by getting IoT Development Services.

In hospitality, it can be defined as a network of digital devices and machines interrelated through the internet for better guest experience in minimal costing.

Here, am listing a few examples of hospitality where IoT has been engraving its worth.

  • Marriott have a live Internet of Things room. They are providing a facility of the most realistic virtual life. The room is capable of doing various automated activities.
  • Le-Meridian Goa, Calangute has also used IoT to reduce energy consumption and offer an exceptional guest experience.

Why adopt IoT in Hospitality?

Customisation is something which attracts people and providing the same facility would undoubtedly place your hotel and services on the top.

Customisation makes people feel important and being in hospitality, its the most crucial point to be focused.

We can predict that hospitality can carve the optimal benefit from IoT to enhance customer experiences.

Highly valued IoT solutions for hotels:

  • Helpful for HR, front desk management and housekeeping.
  • Positive reviews of the visitors and one to one customer engagement ultimately lead to more revenue generation.
  • Less unpredicted ad-hoc maintenance calls. Scheduled maintenance helps in proper management and contribute to saving cost and money.
  • Guest data management becomes easy. The proper analysis of habits, likes, dislikes, preferences and spending patterns allows providing a better-enhanced experience.

So in the end, both the sides i.e. guest and hospitality take the leverage of IoT services which can be only developed by proficient iot application development company.

How IoT entertains guests?

Guest experience is a measuring factor in the hotel industry, and this fact cannot be ignored. The whole hospitality industry runs on the reviews of the guests.

So the inclusion of IoT can provide exclusive services to increase the comfort level of the guests.

  • Check-in and Check out queues would be no more headache.
  • In-house navigation would help in finding the way to restaurants and other amenities.
  • Customised offers/food would pamper the guest.
  • Fixing room temperature, music, lighting as per the choice of the guest to provide exceptional comfort.
  • Ideal water temperature and remembering the food choices of the guest.

Thes are just some apparent advantages of including IoT in the business.

Read More: Is IIoT is the Fourth Industrial Revolution?

How IoT helps the hotel industry?

For hotel industry, including IoT is like “having the best of all possible worlds.” Let’s check the possible positive ways through which IoT can help:

1) Automatic Room Services:

The automatic room services ultimately fulfil the motive of guests visiting your hotel. They expect comfort and personalised stay, which is only possible through IoT.

For instances, you can adopt a centralised network of automated systems to deliver customised solutions.

Guests can fill out all there preferences like food, temperature, lighting etc. and then everything will be served as per their choices.

A virtual assistant can give a wake-up call to the guest, or smart sensor can make coffee once the guest gets up.

Sensors can detect the absence of the guests and switch off all the services automatically.

In fact, sensors can start shower at a particular time with a set temperature on voice command or through the app.

2) Hotel Maintenance in a smart way:

The hospitality industry has to spend many bucks on maintenance. If it could be detected and sorted out by sensors gradually then it would contribute in reduction of loses.

The IoT sensors can do this and make the maintenance culture smart and secure. It can detect the damaged appliances and fix it automatically, or it can notify you about the same.

Sensors can be installed to detect issues like leaking taps or fused lights to reduce human resources and water wastages.

3) In-room Features:

Through IoT, you can offer keyless doors, set temperatures ( as per the guest’s preference), music, lighting etc.

Amazon’s smart products like Alexa, a voice-based interaction assistant, can be used to control and adjust the in-room features.

4) Smart solutions for building and logistics:

IoT can provide a whole new look to the building and logistics by making it smart and efficient.

Stock management, facility management and inventory can be regularly monitored and better managed in IoT enabled ambience.

This confers better guest experience and maintains the whole management smoothly.

Read More: Cloud-MANET and IoT Collaboration- A New Era of Technology?

5) Energy management:

Proper energy management can reduce all the useless expenditure caused by the hotel industry. This is possible through IOT and it could aid in reducing energy cost to 20 per cent.

When we talk about IoT and energy-saving, then don’t limit it till heating, air conditioning or ventilating. There are devices like a smart thermostat, occupancy sensors, and machine learning algorithms which analyse the energy usage pattern, weather and peak season demand to manage the energy requirement demand.

6) Cross property integration:

How about centrally calibrating the data of guest for all the hotel chains? Well, IoT would enable you for the same for future purposes and uses. It would learn the choices and preferences of the guest and would set it if guest visits the hotel situated at any place. The visitors would experience the customisation at different chains of same hotel (ultimately making them loyal).

On the other hand, this would bring transparency across properties as data would be uploaded in the CRM.

I won’t say that the above-mentioned roles are definite because IoT can be potentially utilised only if your aim to explore it. IoT is all about its explorations and integrations.

Some IoT devices for the hospitality industry:

  • Amazon Alexa: Alexa is a virtual assistant who is ready to serve the guests anytime. It empowers them by providing voice-control to different smart devices. The guest experiences the most customised and personal stay in the hotel.
  • Mount Kelvin: Mount Kelvin, a device developed to provide extraordinary experiences to guests for their in-room preferences and comforts through controls. From light to curtain, heating to air condition- it provides all the control to the guest making them king of the room.
  • Flic: Flic is another way to enhance the guest experience. It has a wireless Bluetooth button with customizable options that notify the guests for coffee, towels, linen (basic services they demand) just with a press of button.
  • Nest Thermostats: It is a smart thermostat which helps in saving money and energy while providing full temperature comfort. It is connected to the hotel’s booking system. It saves the cost by knowing the occupancy of the room. When guest enter it adjusts the temperature as per the guest’s preference.

These IoT solutions will certainly submerge the hospitality industry by making itself “requirement”.

IoT is a one-time investment and has been predicted as a long-time benefit provider for all the industries.

If you too want to embrace the IoT benefits then must contact reliable iot development company.

IoT development services providers can turn your thoughts into an actual reality. In the coming seasons, IoT would be no more a ‘surprise’ as it would be integrated with most of the devices.

Perhaps you need to come in the loop of IoT trends and make your administration and working better in all the possible ways.

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