Unpack IoT is a blog dedicated to understanding the intricacies of the Internet of Things, smart cities, industrialized IoT, and IoT platforms. This is the go-to source for a holistic view of the impact of IoT in industrialized sectors like transportation and energy and how they work for (or against) stakeholders. Each week Unpack IoT covers a wide range of topics that will help industry newcomers and insiders understand, or "unpack" the vast world that is the Internet of Things.
As Charlie goes through his daily-connected lifestyle journey in our previous posts, in the background, he was always seamlessly traversing between smart city verticals and the IoT infra vertical (a.k.a. foundational building blocks). The building blocks are the core enablers required for smart city initiatives.
Read MoreAs part of Charlie’s connected lifestyle, he has register with his nearby hospital workout gym facility that links his records with his primary physician, pharmacist, and medical insurance company. With Charlie’s participation in preventive care and exercising at the gym, his insurance company extends him discounts on his premium. He downloaded a health and wellness app onto his smartphone and linked it to his smartwatch to collects data when Charlie is at the gym and forward the data collected to his doctor as well.
Read MoreCharlie opted to live in his city because it offers him a connected lifestyle that supports a high quality of life, attractive employment, and promotes fun-packed recreation and wellness facilities. With this backdrop, Charlie conducts all his interactions with the city government online. In addition, he insists on his interactions with the city to be at anytime, from anywhere, and on any devices in a very simple engaging process with high degree of user experience.
Read MoreCharlie’s connected life story continues with him being an advocate of water conservation prompted by the drought and rationing of lawn watering. Specifically, Charlie can access the city open data from the smart water management app on his smartphone for data on water rationing. Further, Charlie’s home is equipped with sensors in his waste containers to signal the waste management company for pick-up; and participated in replacing toilets in his smart home with a more efficient water usage for toilet flushes.
Read MoreWhile Charlie was in the office, he received a notification from the smart home solution that FedEx dropped a package for him and it is at his next-door neighbor per Charlie’s previous standing instructions. Specifically, the FedEx courier’s photo, a photo of the package, and a link for tracking of the delivery were forwarded to Charlie.
Read MoreCharlie resides in North-side of the city and works downtown. He is an advertising executive and drives his car everywhere – office, clients’ locations, city parks, gym, docks for kayaking, etc. Charlie would love to live in a city with high standard of living at an affordable cost and his commute cheaper. In essence, Charlie is looking for the technology around him to work in sync with his very hectic life.
Read MoreWhat is a smart city vertical you may ask? To answer this question, we have to go back to the genesis of smart city, a.k.a. Internet of Things (IoT). Gartner defines IoT as: “The network of physical objects that contain embedded technology to communicate and sense or interact with their internal states or the external environment.” As for Whatls.com, “IoT is a system of interrelated computing devices, mechanical and digital machines, objects, animals or people that are provided with unique identifiers and the ability to transfer data over a network without requiring human-to-human or human-to-computer interaction.”
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