Dicker Data has added two new companies to its vendor roster to expand its internet of things (IoT) portfolio.

The two user and device tracking providers, Digital Matter and kontakt.io, produce GPS outdoor tracking and Bluetooth indoor tracking applications and devices.

The Perth-headquartered Digital Matter was founded in Johannesburg South Africa in 2000 by Ken Everett. It produces GPS and IoT devices for the agriculture, asset tracking, fleet management, supply chain management, oil and gas industries.

The solutions are focused on long-range, outdoor tracking applications using 2G, 4G LTE-M, NB-IoT, LoRaWAN and Sigfox connectivity.

Dicker Data said its partners could now co-sell Digital Matter solutions with cellular network access from the distributor via its existing Telstra and NNNCo LoRaWAN distribution agreements.

Stuart German, Digital Matter’s business development director said Dicker Data’s technical expertise aligned with the vendor’s “commitment to innovation”.

“Asset tracking is one of the highest growth application segments for the Internet of Things, making this an exciting time to introduce our range of future-proofed LTE-M / NB-IoT hardware and white-label software as a recurring revenue business model.”

Poland-based Kontakt.io was founded in 2013 and makes short-range indoor tracking devices using Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) connectivity. The vendor has integrations with Dicker vendors Cisco Meraki and Mist.

“The combination of Dicker Data’s IoT solution focus and Kontakt.io’s global leadership in IoT innovation creates the conditions for a perfect storm, one that can change the landscape of the Australian connected enterprise market,” Kontakt.io exec Rom Eizeberg said.

“Together, we support the mission of simplifying IoT, removing obstacles to adoption and creating a path to value for a wide market spectrum of partners and end-users.”

Dicker Data’s COO Vlad Mitnovetski said the two companies’ offerings “complement our IoT portfolio, boosting Dicker Data’s ability to deliver end-to-end IoT solutions”.

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The European GNSS Agency (GSA) has published a White Paper on “Power-efficient positioning for the Internet of Things,” providing an overview of GNSS technologies that are relevant for low-power IoT applications, including those that require hybridization with other connectivity solutions.

Billions of Internet-connected devices are capable of sensing, communicating, interacting, computing and actuating. By 2022 it is estimated that around 18 billion out of 29 billion connected devices will be related to the IoT. Many applications require or benefit from knowing the location of an individual device. In this context, the White Paper looks at how GNSS-based positioning for the IoT can be made more power-efficient, to meet the needs of this growing market.

GNSS is a viable solution for tracking objects in the IoT world. However, the power consumed by positioning is an important concern. Two basic approaches have emerged to optimize consumption: transmission of pseudoranges for remote position determination, and snapshot techniques. In the former, the power consumption related to determining position is saved by transmitting the measurements to an external facility with no power restrictions. In the latter, the GNSS receiver is only activated for short periods to determine the position.

Combining both approaches will decrease the power consumption even further but, ultimately, the optimal solution will depend on the application in question. “Numerous factors play a role including target accuracy, selected LPWAN, desired battery life, ease of integration, and hardware and implementation cost,” according to the report.

The White Paper also advises applications that require a position accuracy of one meter or less to use a multi-constellation, multi-frequency receiver. “However, as most low-power IoT applications prioritize extending battery life, a multi-constellation single-frequency receiver is sufficient when positioning accuracy of multiple meters is acceptable,” it notes.

The report also states that, when deciding on an energy-efficient GNSS technique, the choice of the terrestrial network limits the possible options, as most solutions rely on external data to determine the position via GNSS.

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During the 2019 Geotab Mobility Connect even in Estoril, compelling evidence from two major fleets has revealed how telematics hold the key to unlocking significant fleet efficiency and dramatically improving customer service.

The fleets operate in very different industries – fresh food delivery and waste collection – but there are strong parallels in the way they have monitored vehicle movements and performance to transform their businesses.

In the Benelux and France, HelloFresh is deploying connected vehicle technology to track multiple aspects of its fleet and enhance the punctuality of its deliveries of recipes and fresh ingredients. Two years ago HelloFresh decided to insource its fleet and logistics in order to gain greater control of its supply chain; in the Benelux region alone its 600 vans cover 450,000km per week.

Thomas Stroo, HelloFresh Head of Logistics for France and Benelux (pictured above), said: “Our connected fleet supports everything we do. It increases the service and quality assurance to our customers.”

While on board sensors monitor the temperature in the refrigerated unit, GPS location allows the company to track where a driver stops and for how long. The system is so accurate that it triggers an alert if a driver parks more than 100m from the scheduled delivery address to avoid the risk of delivering to the wrong place. The real time tracking and traffic monitoring also helps the company hit its delivery time KPIs, and communicate to customers when delays creep into the service.

“96% of our deliveries are on time,” said Stroo. “Track and trace functions give more flexibility to our customers who can follow their food boxes from the producer to the vehicle to the driver, and can request a re-delivery if they are not at home.”

The same telematics tracking technology is also facilitating HelloFresh’s introduction of electric vehicles, with Stroo now running 51 zero emission vans.

“We have been able to create specific EV routes that take into account the vehicles’ range, the number of stops, and even avoid motorways,” said Stroo. “We can also ensure the vans are fully charged before leaving our hubs, and we can monitor battery levels during deliveries.”

Stroo was speaking at the Geotab Mobility Connect conference, which ran alongside the Fleet Europe Congress in Estoril, Portugal, and his strategic approach was echoed by Unai Obieta, CTO Europe at Ferrovial Servicios (pictured above).

One of Ferrovial’s companies, INAGRA, is using sensors and trackers to revolutionise the efficiency of its refuse and recycling collection service in Spain. The company has not only fitted its 200-plus vehicles with telematics devices, but also equipped its bins with sensors.

“We then use big data analysis to optimise our routes,” said Obieta.

And because the company only collects from containers that it detects are more than 70% full, it has been able to eliminate almost one entire route from its 3.5 routes.

Google’s data drive

Converting theses two companies into data driven businesses chimed with Rahul Parmar, Enterprise Technology, Google Cloud.

He said data is driving the world’s fastest growing businesses, and told delegates at the event that the logistics and automotive industries have the most to gain from big data, via machine learning and artificial intelligence.

“Companies who invest in data are winning exponentially,” he said. “Data is everything – companies are going to win or lose depending on how they use it.”

Data is the new oxygen

Dirk Schlimm, Executive Vice President, Geotab, described data as the ‘new oxygen’ and said companies should treat their data with the same attention as they pay to their finances.

“It’s the most valuable resource of a business,” he said. And in the fleet arena, “Data is essential for productivity, safety, compliance, and innovation.” 

Schlimm unveiled Geotab’s new Vehicle Data Access Index, which will give fleets a valuable insight into the data friendliness of different vehicle manufacturers.

The first version of the index tracks four basic criteria (VIN, odometer, fuel and seatbelt use) across 1 million vehicles from 18 OEMs, and reveals striking differences between manufacturers.

“We’re now looking for feedback from OEMs and to add fleet relevant parameters, such as road worthiness,” said Schlimm.

His goal is for the Vehicle Data Access Index to become an independent index with multiple stakeholders.

Access to data

Access to vehicle data remains a controversial area, however, with Leaseurope lobbying hard for leasing and rental companies to have open access to the data generated by the vehicles they own.

“This data is essential to deliver car sharing, pay as you drive insurance, vehicle security and repair and maintenance services,” said Elisa Falliti, policy adviser, automotive affairs at Leaseurope (pictured above).

But while OEMs have direct access to in-vehicle generated data, independent service providers are having to contend with the ‘Extended Vehicle Concept’ for their data delivery. This suffers from latency delays in data transmission, so it’s not real time, and nor does it allow for direct safe and secure communication with drivers, said Falliti. 

“We want true open platforms and direct access to in-vehicle data,” she said.

This data has real value in a wide range of scenarios, explained Bob Bradley, AVP Data Solutions, Geotab. For example, on board technology which records and transmits in real time the temperature and when the windscreen wipers are used can effectively become mobile weather sensors.

Of even greater potential value is the opportunity to benchmark fleet vehicles against each other, allowing fleet managers to analyse which makes and models of vehicle carrying out similar tasks (in their own company and outside) perform most efficiently, and to measure the efficiency of drivers against their peers, using similar vehicles for similar tasks.

“We have lots of data, but just having data is not enough,” said Bradley. “We need to be data driven, and out goal is to work with customers and partners to leverage this data.”

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Scientists have developed an automated tool for mapping the movement of particles inside cells that may accelerate research in many fields, a new study in eLife reports.

The movements of tiny molecules, proteins and cellular components throughout the body play an important role in health and disease. For example, they contribute to brain development and the progression of some diseases. The new tool, built with cutting-edge machine learning technology, will make tracking these movements faster, easier and less prone to bias.

Currently, scientists may use images called kymographs, which represent the movement of particles in time and space, for their analyses of particle movements. These kymographs are extracted from time-lapse videos of particle movements recorded using microscopes. The analysis needs to be done manually, which is both slow and vulnerable to unconscious biases of the researcher.

“We used the power of machine learning to solve this long-standing problem by automating the tracing of kymographs,” says lead author Maximilian Jakobs, a Ph.D. student in the Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience at the University of Cambridge, UK.

The team developed the software, dubbed ‘KymoButler’, to automate the process. The software uses deep learning technology, which tries to mimic the networks in the brain to allow software to learn and become more proficient at a task over time and multiple attempts. They then tested KymoButler using both artificial and real data from scientists studying the movement of an array of different particles.

“We demonstrate that KymoButler performs as well as expert manual data analysis on kymographs with complex particle trajectories from a variety of biological systems,” Jakobs explains. The software could also complete analyses in under one minute that would take an expert 1.5 hours.

KymoButler is available for other researchers to download and use at kymobutler.deepmirror.ai. Senior author Kristian Franze, Reader in Neuronal Mechanics at the University of Cambridge, expects the software will continue to improve as it analyses more types of data. Researchers using the tool will be given the option of anonymously uploading their kymographs to help the team continue developing the software.

“We hope our tool will prove useful for others involved in analysing small particle movements, whichever field they may work in,” says Franze, whose lab is devoted to understanding how physical interactions between cells and their environment shape the development and regeneration of the brain.

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