VOLVO CARS
A secured and luxury Drive
The Volvo Car group was established as a separate entity in 1999 and since then has been renowned for its high-quality standards, safety and luxury. Today the main aim of the company is to accomplish absolute human safety with a strategy of technology and services designed around the driver and passengers. Now, keeping in mind the goals to achieve and the ease that they wish to provide to their drivers; Volvo leaves no loop in technology trends that can be taken up. And there enters IoT!
Like all other competitors of the automotive industry, Volvo is working to secure high-quality connected- vehicle services. It wants to leverage data from its cars to make driving safer and improve customer experience. Lex Kerssemakers, Senior Vice President Product Strategy and Vehicle Line Management at Volvo Cars says, “We clearly see that cars in the near future will integrate the same level of digital services that consumers today are used to having in their homes or at work. This is a strategically important part of Volvo‘s investments for the future where we intend to take a leading position.”
Keeping the Mission in mind, Volvo decided to bring connected car services to the market. Volvo will be able to provide its car owners and drivers with its latest developments in connected car digital services such as automation, telematics, and navigation. Drivers and passengers will be able to access applications for information and navigation on a screen in the car. Simultaneously Volvo Cars will be able to transmit this information to the other players in the ecosystem of the automotive industry.
Volvo Cars are on its way to achieving the aim of having zero serious injuries and deaths in new Volvo cars by 2020. Volvo considers bespoke services for its customers, and IoT is assisting it to create the next generation safety features like Road Friction Indication. For example, the vehicle can detect if a road is slippery via its wheel sensors. It will send an alert to the driver and then send the alert to the cloud. And then further to every vehicle entering that area and to transportation authorities.
The technology used in a human-centric way has always been important to Volvo Cars and the prime concern to roll out new services for its customers. Its collective ambition is to develop industry-leading solutions in line with a networked society, where driving is not a need but a secured luxury!
KINSA
Making Healthcare ‘Smart’
IoT is the master key to the simplification and advancement of each and every industry and has the potential to reach every human being on the Planet once in a lifetime. Initiating from the manufacturing industries and reaching to tech-driven hospitals and medical facilities in such a short span of time, it is already on its way to make a mark in the development of Healthcare IT. It will continue to grow since the technology will continue to get more advanced with each passing day. One great example of this collateral of Healthcare and IT is KINSA.
KINSA’s mission is to detect illness in real-time, helping individuals, communities and the disease centers to respond before it spreads. Kinsa has developed a communication network that is at the service of people the moment they are ill. Its greatest innovation of all times is the ‘Smart’ thermometer Kinsa brings thermometer that is connected to the Kinsa Health App to track temperature, symptoms and other issues regarding the illness of people individually and as an aggregate so that people can make informed decisions in real time. The granular illness signal provides highly accurate estimates and forecasts, enabling better state-level public health surveillance. Further, this data about public level illness, its symptoms, the number of days it lasts and its frequency is transmitted to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention as per age groups and regions.
The Kinsa app not only tracks the important symptoms, but it also follows up with important and specific information. Next, the app uses this data to update a live health map that tracks the progression of illness throughout the country. This provides a county-by-county perspective on community health. Kinsa uses Artificial Intelligence to track illness based on severity, duration, and contagiousness. It assists the ill to get the right medical guidance in real time that will help them get better.
Contagious illness such as flu is highly unpredictable in every region and needs a way out. Kinsa, with the help of connectedness and artificial intelligence, has taken the healthcare industry and its aid to great heights. And gradually there are several other Healthcare IT sectors that are starting to show readiness in IoT and taking a step ahead in means of technology and medical care together.
HITACHI
Think Beyond Things
Hitachi is delivering value-based outcomes with IoT solutions by bringing devices, people, infrastructure, and the entire cycle of processes together as a Unique Unit. The Japanese company stands out from other industrial companies in terms of its integration and experience across IT. It follows one simple strategy of ‘Think Beyond Things’, and is rigorously working in the direction of bringing social innovation in the physical and digital world.
Hitachi is an independent company, rather than partnering with other firms it keeps bringing in new innovations according to the demand and trends of the world. It offers an IoT platform by the name of ‘LUMADA’, it is a combination of data management and advanced analytics that enables customers to easily develop and deploy IoT solutions. Lamuda collects real-time data from highly heterogeneous shop floor environments and thus reduces the unplanned downtime through artificial intelligence, traceability, and real-time fault detection. Next, it detects quality issues and the machine’s health issues early in the process. The Maintenance Team is informed well in advance about a machine’s abnormal behavior, thus avoiding breakdowns.
Hitachi makes a factory responsive by streamlining operations. It has also developed an IoT-enhanced production model that has slashed production lead times by half within its Omika Works division, that creates infrastructure for steel manufacturing, electricity, and other industries. Data-driven analytics let users analyze and visualize data that in turn boosts the effectiveness and efficiency of the factory.
The success story of Hitachi not only includes building and implementation of the sensors but the entire infrastructure; the turbines, trains, robotics and the entire Urban environment in which sensors are applicable and devices are connected to collect and transmit data. Hitachi adds value to businesses and enables smart cities to meet their sustainability goals with its capabilities and expertise in IoT solutions. It exhibits the power of intelligent innovation!
*IIoT (industrial internet of things) has opened plenty of opportunities in optimization, automation, asset management, intelligent manufacturing, industry control and what not.
The estimates today state that the Internet of Things will include 26 Billion units installed by 2020, and will generate a revenue of over $300 Billion. IoT is the next level of automation of every object in our life and Industries have already started their run to the Industrial Revolution. We see an absolutely different Era coming up, which is Smart and connected and ready to bring in industrialization like never before! *