The Week in Review: IoT

Products/Services
No matter the size of your button! You can now order up a flight on a private jet with the push of, yes, a button! GrandView Jets, an affiliate of GrandView Aviation, is bringing out a Web-enabled “Press for Jet” button, an Amazon Web Services Internet of Things button enabled by ButtonJoy Software. GrandView Jets says it has a fleet of Embraer Phenom 300 private jets to whisk you away from the bomb cyclone or wherever you need to get away.

Sercomm has developed an LTE IoT button device, based on the Monarch LTE Cat M1/NB1 Platform from Sequans Communications. Meanwhile, Sequans wrapped up an agreement with NTT DOCOMO to develop LTE-M devices and applications on DOCOMO’s network, using the Monarch LTE Platform.

Conferences
CES 2018 is nearly upon us, and there will be a strong IoT presence at the annual showcase next week in Las Vegas, Nevada. The Consumer Technology Association had more than 184,000 attendees at CES 2017, with 4,000 companies exhibiting at various venues. Smart cities, smart homes, augmented and virtual reality, self-driving cars, and artificial intelligence will be among the technology fields to be discussed and exhibited. Qualcomm has scheduled a press conference for Monday afternoon, January 8, to discuss its new products and technologies at CES, and its executives (including the new president of the chip company, Cristiano Amon) will participate in several panels during the show.

Analysis
Bret Greenstein, vice president of IBM’s Watson IoT Consumer Business, identifies four key trends for the IoT in 2018. They are: Artificial intelligence will make the IoT smarter and more productive; more CPU power will be spent at the network’s edge; blockchain adds immutability and integrity to IoT transactions; and there will be substantial growth of IoT in manufacturing and industries.

Cybersecurity
A vulnerability in routers from Huawei Technologies was at the center of activity last month with the Satori IoT botnet. Cybersecurity researchers and Internet service providers collaborated to limit the botnet’s infections. Check Point Software had reported the vulnerability in late November to Huawei, and a month later NewSky Security researchers reported the router code involved had been publicly posted on the Internet. Check Point’s Maya Horowitz recommended that users of the affected Huawei routers should change the default password on the router, a recommendation that was echoed by Huawei.

Market Research
ABI Research has a report out, IoT Security Semiannual Update. Details are available here.

Farewell
Otto, a startup that developed a digital lock for homes and manufactured the device, shut down its operations when an acquisition of the company fell through. Founder and CEO Sam Jadallah wrote a Medium post that laid out, in depth, the events that led to the startup’s December demise.