TeliT (AIM:TCM): RIDING THE M2M WAVE

Oozi Cats, CEO

The Machine-to-Machine (M2M) market is demonstrating a continuous growth in the past few years. According to a survey conducted by Machina Research—provider of strategic market intelligence on M2M and the Internet of Things (IoT), the total number of M2M connections will grow from 5 billion in 2014 to 27 billion in 2024, at a CAGR of 18 percent. And the total M2M revenue opportunity—including devices, connectivity and application—will be touching $1.6 trillion by 2024. A huge part of this market will be contributed by new electronic devices that are getting equipped with M2M capabilities— starting from tens of millions of smart meters deployed by the energy companies to hospitals that track their equipment with real-time information. Alongside this, manufacturing companies to local governments are investing massively in mapping and connecting their assets, to have a better visibility and control over their operations.

Riding the wave of M2M communications with its wireless module technology, services and connectivity offerings is Telit [TCM:LSE], a disrupter in M2M space. With cellular, short range and positioning modules alongside a Platform as a Service (PaaS) for M2M, the company markets its products in over 80 countries and is involved in the asset tracking, healthcare, security, point of sale, wearables, telemetry, and smart metering verticals, among others. “We offer the industry’s broadest portfolio of integrated products, platforms and services to support and enable IoT deployments from things to apps,” says Oozi Cats, CEO of Telit. “Our IoT connectivity plans and IoT platform services help reduce the risks, time to market, complexity and costs associated with deploying and providing IoT services across industries and vertical markets worldwide.”

One of the early adopters of cellular M2M and IoT solutions, Telit launched their first M2M module, called Datablock, way back in 1998. Today, with a series of acquisitions—including Motorola M2M from Motorola—and organic growth, Telit offers their IoT connectivity solutions to thousands of SME M2M customers in the U.S. Their aim is to provide customers–whether developers, enterprises or systems integrators–with a complete portfolio of modules, platforms and services that enable the customers to develop and deliver unique IoT solutions. Telit provides three fundamental building blocks to onboard more business assets to the IoT faster and reliably—IoT Modules, IoT Connectivity and IoT Platforms.

Building Blocks of IoT Infrastructure

Telit IoT Modules makes the process of designing IoT modules from there functional areas, simpler than from different vendors. This reduces development and testing time as well as risk while adding performance benefits when taking the devices to market.

We offer the industry’s broadest portfolio of integrated products, platforms and services to support and enable IoT deployments from things to apps

Cellular IoT Modules positions awareness for all connected devices—short-to-long range license free wireless connection of devices to their peripherals, to each other, and to long-range gateways; and long-range cellular connection of devices to each-other. In an example, Panasonic Nubo partnered with Telit to provide a unique 4G mobile monitoring camera aimed at use cases in the mass consumer market that are not necessarily covered by Wi-Fi connections. The camera allows users to monitor their valuables in remote locations such as holiday homes, caravans, vehicles and hotel rooms. The device’s built-in SD card can be used to store footage for later viewing or Nubo can send push notifications when events occur and enable the user to react remotely via Wi-Fi or 4G. Panasonic selected Telit’s LE910 module to support Nubo’s LTE connectivity. In addition, LTE supports the bandwidth requirements of communicating live images and offers compatibility across different regions.

The Positioning IoT Modules assist clients with location awareness to the devices without having to become an expert on satellites, constellations and RF design. While, the Short Range Wireless IoT Modules lets the IoT to reach large numbers of devices as it runs on unlicensed spectrum and consumes very little power.

The Automotive IoT Modules is one of Telit’s core focus. The company not only develops modules specific for this industry, but ensures that the highest quality standards are observed from R&D to manufacturing and logistics, completely meeting automotive industry requirements. To guarantee total adherence to these quality standards, Telit has a dedicated team spanning R&D, sales and support whose job it is to know and help customers navigate the challenges they face integrating M2M into cars, trucks, buses, and other automotive platforms.

Connecting ‘Things’ to ‘Apps’

The Telit IoT Portal is a unified platform of services that make it easy to connect ‘things’ to ‘apps’ seamlessly—integrating any edge-device, production asset or remote sensor with any app or back-office system. The portal consolidates a suite of advanced connectivity management functions with the company’s deviceWISE Application Enablement Platform. Whether a client is managing thousands of global IoT devices or just starting out, the Telit IoT Portal provides them complete access to a range of enterprise-grade features, tools and resources. It's a single-sourced solution of end-to-end platform services conceived to help firms launch and run their complex multi-point IoT deployment.

Engineered for “unified-streamlined-simplicity”, the IoT Portal provides a command and control hub from where customers can seamlessly connect and integrate everything. The portal also offers remote device management over-the-air, enabling clients to configure provision and update their devices ad-hoc or using custom schedules. The Portal also brings together unmatched security features with encryption, secure networking, session management, permissions and authentication features.

Pioneering Machine-to-Machine (M2M) Communications

While delivering various benefits to users by enriching existing and new devices with connectivity to the internet and back office operations, Telit's do-it-yourself m2mAIR Cloud PaaS simplifies the creation of a firm's own end-to-end applications for m2m and IoT. The platform is powered by deviceWISE—that seamlessly integrates any device, production assets and remote sensors with an organization’s web-based and mobile apps and enterprise systems. deviceWISE reduces risk, time-to-market, complexity and cost of deploying solutions for monitoring and control, industrial automation, asset tracking and field service operations across all industries and market segments around the world.

"Our IoT connectivity plans and IoT platform services help reduce the risks, time to market, complexity and costs"

Telit provides upfront customization, integration services, ongoing technical maintenance and support, letting the forward-thinking operators focus on marketing and operating innovative revenue-generating IoT services under their own brand. Telit also offers IoT/M2M SIM cards and custom data plans with roaming across different regions and networks around the world, alongside comprehensive connectivity management tools for connection provisioning, operation and analysis across wireless networks. Telit’s m2mAIR Mobile network services provide flexibility in configuring connectivity services together with tailored rate plans to deliver exactly the connectivity clients need, without charging them for what they don’t use. A convenient, easy-to-use, web-based management tools provide organizations with in-depth oversight into their account–right down to the individual SIM.

The company takes pride in their research and development investments and their ability to bring those resources to the customers who can access Telit’s lab resources for testing their end products for official certification. The company has established a comprehensive technology development roadmap, encompassing a number of cutting-edge solutions and platforms to support the M2M market. In the long term, Telit aims to provide a complete portfolio of turn-key M2M/ IoT systems that will enable clients to embrace the 'connected' era while boosting productivity.

- Eileen Singh
May 04, 2016