Internationale Partnersuche

Innovation & Technologie Angebot

Low energy Wi-Fi communications for the Internet of things (IoT) in a wide area

Country of Origin: Spain
Reference Number: TOES20170331002
Publication Date: 31 March 2017

Summary

A Spanish university has developed a system to send/receive small data blocks between a base station and a set of Wi-Fi interfaces without any active data link. It provides broadcasting and unicasting communication modes and reduces the power consumption of Wi-Fi interfaces as it does not require an active Wi-Fi connection. The technology can be used in applications for the Internet of Things to interchange data. Companies interested in licensing or technology cooperation agreements are sought.

Description

Internet of things (IoT) is the inter-networking of physical devices, vehicles, buildings or other things embedded with electronics, software, sensors and network connectivity that enable these objects to collect and exchange data.



Usually, these devices cannot be linked to the electricity grid and they need batteries for its power supply. For this reason, power consumption is a critical parameter in the configuration of the communication system.



Nowadays, there are several technologies to solve communication problems between IoT devices and Internet. These technologies are mainly:



a) Low power and wide area solutions as Low-Power Wide-Area Network(LPWAN), SigFox communication protocol or 3G/UMTS mobile telecommunications technology which need expensive network interfaces for devices.



b) Wi-Fi solutions using low cost network interfaces for sensors, but with high power consumption and low range distance (100 meters).



A Spanish university has developed a technology that improves Wi-Fi communications for the IoT, increasing range distance and reducing energy consumption using standard Wi-Fi chipsets. The technology is a software method to send/receive data between a base station and devices using standard Wi-Fi interfaces. The Wi-Fi interfaces do not need any connection to standard Access Points (APs) nor IP addresses.



The system consists of two elements:



• A base station with two interfaces: 



    - One Wi-Fi interface to send/receive data to/from sensors in a wide area.

    - One Internet connection interface (Ethernet/UMTS) to interchange data between sensors and any IP address in Internet.



• Software installed in sensors to use Wi-Fi interfaces to send/receive data to/from a base station without any active data link.



This technology can be used in multiple applications where a large number of devices need to exchange small data packets, being of special interest when devices are not connected to the electricity grid and in IoT solutions where there is the need to use low power and wide area Wi-Fi communications with sensors. For example:



• Device deployments for agriculture applications (smart farms).

• Device deployments for big infrastructures (stadiums, bridges, sea ports, etc.)

• Device deployments in areas with no coverage of mobile data service (GSM/UMTS) like forests, high mountain or sea. 

• Environmental monitoring, urban IoT, smart homes, traffic control, wearable technologies, etc.



The researchers are looking for companies acquiring the technology through licensing agreement for its implementation in their products. The research group is also open to technical cooperation.

Advantages and Innovations

The main innovation of this technology is the reduction of power consumption because the amount of data that it is transmitted is smaller than in other communication systems. Moreover, this technology increases the coverage area for Wi-Fi devices in the IoT applications.



The technology provides a set of advantages to improve limitations of other communication systems between Wi-Fi devices and Internet:



• It reduces the power consumption of Wi-Fi devices when sending/receiving data.

• It increases the coverage area for a Wi-Fi communication from 100 meters to 3 kilometers.

• It reduces the infrastructure costs, substituting multiple Wi-Fi access points for a single base station.

• It supports any communication protocol.

Stage Of Development

Field tested/evaluated

Stage Of Development Comment

The technology is developed and there is a prototype based in Raspberry Pi platforms. The prototype has been evaluated in field tests.

Requested partner

- Type of partner sought: Companies

- Specific area of activity of the partner: telecommunication sector, manufacturers of devices and developers of communication solutions for IoT.

- Task to be performed: Acquisitions of the technology through licensing agreement. Further development or adaptation to specific needs through technical cooperation agreement.