M2M : Machine 2 Machine

Cellular Machine-to-Machine (M2M) communications first started in the era of analog cellular connectivity, and have largely shifted now to 2G GPRS and CDMA connectivity. Certain M2M applications can benefit from the higher data rates than 3G cellular offers, and it is tempting to assume that all M2M communications will be 3G eventually.

But a new study from ABI Research forecasts that 3G modules will achieve only a 30% penetration of the M2M market by 2012, and will become the technology of choice only where bandwidth demands and economics dictate; “future-proofing” will play a smaller role in 3G M2M market development, over the next five years.

One of the problems of widespread M2M deployment is the lack of addressability of the billions of devices that could be connected. Came across this company PR related to providing Remote control of all IP based devices…

Hexago, the leading provider of IPv6 deployment solutions, today introduced the industry’s first solution that empowers fixed or mobile service providers to offer their customers a new category of services by leveraging the benefits of the next generation Internet protocol, IPv6. Hexago’s Home Access Proxy 6 (HAP6) allows the deployment of IPv6-based peer to peer (P2P) services and user generated content (UGC) services over IPv4 networks. By giving every home/user its own URL, HAP6 enables remote control of all IP devices in the home. Examples of HAP6 enabled services include camera, home automation, big big email, remote support, home station, home Web site, file sharing and buddy backup. Hexago is demonstrating HAP6 this week at Booth Number 2538 at INTEROP Las Vegas.

Came accross this well written article on the evolution of wireless communication technology as it applies to data transmission.

The Link

In 1995, a group of engineers at Siemens answered a classic question through a surprisingly simple, yet extremely effective idea: ‘what would happen if we took out the component that establishes the radio connection in a mobile phone and made it available for other applications?’

The pioneer of radio modules that shipped independently of a mobile phone was called the M1: it consists primarily of a circuit board which combines the baseband processor, transmitter (referred to as the HF part), power supply controller and memory. That is all that is needed for an elegant exchange of data across GSM networks.

Bandwidth increase drives innovation
Looking ahead, the next generations of HSDPA will support 7,2 Mbps and 14 Mbps data rates with some networks planning to be ready for this before the end of 2007. HSUPA provides an improvement in the uplink performance and supports a maximum data rate of 5,6 Mbps. This technology will most likely find use in remote monitoring and security applications where video needs to be streamed ‘up’ from a remote site. HSOPA, often referred to as Super 3G is positioned to eventually replace HSDPA and HSUPA and will provide downlink speeds of up to 100 Mbps and uplink speeds of 50 Mbps. As soon as the basic infrastructure is available, there will also be M2M radio modules for these high speed HSPA networks – the height of evolutionary achievement in radio modules.

St. Jude Medical, Inc. (NYSE:STJ) today announced U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval of its newest devices for treating patients with potentially lethal heart arrhythmias and heart failure. The Current(TM) ICD (implantable cardioverter defibrillator) and Promote(TM) CRT-D (cardiac resynchronization therapy defibrillator) are St. Jude Medical’s first devices to be built on the company’s new consolidated hardware and software platform to support implantable cardiac devices.

The next generation “Unity” device platform will enable St. Jude Medical to more quickly update all devices with new features and diagnostics, as they become available, because the basic framework for all of the devices will be the same. In addition, the consolidated platform’s expanded capabilities can support, in the future, more advanced algorithms and features for better patient management. Furthermore, programming during device follow-up will be streamlined, as all software interfaces for new St. Jude Medical pacemakers, ICDs and CRT devices and most nominal settings will be the same.

The Promote CRT-D offers flexibility in pacing choices by allowing physicians to select an additional LV lead pacing pulse configuration. (A lead is a thin, insulated wire, connected to the heart tissue on one end and to the device on the other end. It transmits electrical impulses to the heart, and information from the heart back to the implanted device, so physicians can use it for diagnoses. LV leads are placed in the lower left chamber of the heart.) This flexibility of allowing selection of the LV pacing configuration provides for more options to allow for optimizing pacing without the need to manually reposition the lead.

In addition, the VIP(R) (Ventricular Intrinsic Preference) algorithm (currently available in St. Jude Medical’s Victory(R) and Zephyr(TM) pacemakers) is now available in the Current ICD and provides a delay in device stimulation of the lower chambers of the heart (ventricles) to allow the patient’s own heart rhythm to prevail when possible. The VIP technology is designed to provide device stimulation only when needed, which has been shown to be better for patients’ overall heart health. Both devices also feature new patient management tools, such as enhanced patient exercise monitoring that gives the physician information about patient activity levels. Improved lead monitoring capabilities–including adding daily checks of each shock vector to those performed for pacing vectors –provide added patient safety.

The Spanish government is promoting the need for M2M like systems to help in building out the Patient Monitoring Infrastructure.
The Link
By the year 2026, 21.6 per cent of the world’s population will be older than 65, 32 per cent of which will have some kind of disability.

Official data confirm that the percentage of elderly people will increase dramatically within the next years: by 2050 there will be 180 per cent more people older than 80 than today.

Guided by these figures, the Spanish Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Trade , through its CENIT programme, targeted at fostering cooperation between the private and the public sectors for the development of technological innovations, has granted a 20 million euro subsidy to the research and development project “AmIVital: digital personal environment for health and wellbeing”.

Seventeen Spanish top Information and Communication Technology companies and research groups participate in AmIVital. From the private side, SIEMENS will be the leader of this project in which other companies take part, such as Telef’nica R&D, Telvent Interactiva, Ericsson Spain, Eptron, CPI , Central de Procesos Inform’ticos, Acerca Comunicaciones y Sistemas and Arizone. Public stakeholders will include the association ITACA , Instituto de Aplicaciones de las TIC Avanzadas (TSB Group), CARTIF Foundation, Hospital Universitario Puerta de Hierro Biomedical Research Foundation, Rioja Salud Foundation, Carlos III Health Institute and the universities of Malaga, Polytechnic of Madrid, Saragossa and Granada, through its department of Computer Architecture headed by professor Alberto Prieto Espinosa.