Eginity

The home of the future

lwilde — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 21:21:07 +0000

“The enthralling, attractive, internet-accessing, low-powered television that companies such as TiVo offer in their vision of the future sounds pretty tempting. In truth, however, it will be a long time coming and only the start of a new digital wave that is gradually building already.

A clue to this lies, for instance, with a host of major house-builders: when installing cables for power and lighting, Barratt, Persimmon and other developers now also put in cables for home audio and video. Purchasers are then offered a multimedia pack, and all that’s required is the drilling of a few holes in the right place. Plug in a suitable hi-fi, fire up the system and individual, seamless music and video in every room is available immediately. Stage two is simply plugging this lot into the internet.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/7366844/The-home-of-the-future.html

How “smart dust” will change our lives

lwilde — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 15:40:37 +0000

“Smart dust. Sounds like a new cleaning agent, or perhaps a “designer” drug from the Eighties. But smart dust, emerging in an era of ever-increasing processor speeds and nanotechnological breakthroughs, promises transformative changes in the way we live.

Smart dust refers to collections of minuscule sensors that can monitor and transmit data such as temperature, humidity, light, location and acceleration. They can detect chemicals or gases in the air. And eventually they will transmit sound and images as well.”

http://www.northjersey.com/news/business/84759412__Smart_dust__aims_to_revolutionize_lives.html

Embedded mobile & M2M device revenues to rise to almost $19 billion globally by 2014

lwilde — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 16:00:17 +0000

“According to Juniper Research, revenues from Mobile Connected M2M and Embedded Devices will rise to $18.9 billion globally by 2014, with consumer and commercial telematics and in vehicle applications accounting for over a third of the total. Other areas which will contribute significantly to M2M revenues include Mobile Connected Buildings, driven by security needs, and Utility Metering, driven by regulatory initiatives in Europe and economic stimulus funds in the US.”

http://www.sourcewire.com/releases/rel_display.php?relid=53729

Smart dust? Not quite, but we’re getting there

lwilde — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 16:33:43 +0000

“In computing, the vision always precedes the reality by a decade or more. The pattern has held true from the personal computer to the Internet, as it takes time, brainpower and investment to conquer the scientific and economic obstacles to nudging a game-changing technology toward the mainstream.

The same pattern, according to scientists in universities and corporate laboratories, is unfolding in the field of sensor-based computing. Years ago, enthusiasts predicted the coming of “smart dust” — tiny digital sensors, strewn around the globe, gathering all sorts of information and communicating with powerful computer networks to monitor, measure and understand the physical world in new ways. But this intriguing vision seemed plucked from the realm of science fiction.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/31/business/31unboxed.html

University of Central Florida Business Incubation Program’s Open House at Orlando site on Colonial Drive set for Feb. 18

lwilde — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 21:19:19 +0000

http://www.zimbio.com/Top+News/articles/xu0tXd3Jqv7/University+Central+Florida+Business+Incubation

ORLANDO – The public is invited to attend an open house of the recently expanded University of Central Florida Business Incubator-Orlando Thursday, Feb. 18 at 3218 E. Colonial Drive.

The festivities, which are scheduled from 4 to 6 p.m., will include welcome speeches by Dr. Thomas O’Neal, UCF Associate Vice President for Research and Commercialization and executive director of the Business Incubation Program, and by Tony Ortiz, Orlando City Commissioner for District 2.

The open house also will feature self-guided tours of the 6,400 square-foot facility, as well as finger foods and beverages.

The incubator – a partnership between the City of Orlando and the University of Central Florida Business Incubation Program – opened on Colonial Drive nearly two years ago in a 2,400 square foot office across from Fashion Square Mall with plans to expand into a neighboring office with nearly 4,000 additional square feet, according to Site Manager Melissa Wasserman.

The expansion offers dramatically more common space for clients to meet with business associates including a training room equipped with the latest AV technology and work stations with wireless internet access.

“We are very proud of the quality of our new clients and the functionality of our newly expanded space,” Wasserman said. “We are eager to welcome the local community to see how the partnership between UCF and Orlando is growing.”

The center’s established residents – OC Grant Consulting Associates, SeaQuarius, Social Security Advocates and Therigy – recently were joined by Brand Advance, Eginity, Excelsior Communications Services Inc., MTK Sports Training, InBusiness Inc., Learn to Learn, MyDocHub, Perceptive Technologies and VideoProof, some of who recently moved in from other UCF incubator locations.

The Orlando incubator is one of six such facilities in the university’s Business Incubation Program. Others are in East Orange County near UCF, and in Seminole and Lake Counties.

The UCF Business Incubation Program serves nearly 80 full-time client companies and provides a wide range of services, including business mentors, educational classes, affordable office space, as well as access to a receptionist, a site manager, and necessary business equipment like multi-line phones, FAX and high-speed Internet.

For more information please call, 321-281-8384.

About the UCF Incubation Program:
Since its founding in 1999, the UCF Business Incubation Program has helped more than 130 emerging companies (including nearly 80 current clients) create over $500 million in annual revenue and more than 1600 new jobs with an average salary of $59,000. With six facilities across the Greater Orlando community, the Incubation Program is a collaboration in economic development between the University of Central Florida, Orange County, the City of Orlando, Seminole County, the City of Winter Springs, The City of Sanford, Lake County, the City of Leesburg, and the Florida High Tech Corridor Council. For more information, please visit www.incubator.ucf.edu.

Research and markets’ latest report focuses on role of ICT in smart houses

lwilde — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 15:39:12 +0000

“According to Research and Markets’ “Smart Houses: Smart Grid Extensions” ICT Markets and Technologies Development report, the U.S. market for information and communications technology, or “ICT,” in Smart Houses is huge, especially with the support of the government. This latest report addresses development of wireline and wireless information and communication technologies to support the smart house infrastructure.”

http://smart-grid.tmcnet.com/topics/smart-grid/articles/73895-research-markets-latest-report-focuses-the-role-ict.htm

An update on China’s Internet of Things

lwilde — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 15:31:39 +0000

“Late in 2009, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao called in a speech for the development in China of the “Internet of Things” — the use of wireless sensor networks to manage a range of processes in industry and government. Wen’s speech was followed by an announcement from China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) making the Internet of Things a priority and establishing a working group on wireless sensor networks.

Regardless of obstacles, the government in China aims to push national industry to make a breakthrough in wireless sensor networking, a key technology in the Internet of Things. And the wireless sensor network will be first deployed in infrastructures, environmental detection, public security, industrial control, and healthcare.”

http://www.internetevolution.com/author.asp?section_id=789&doc_id=187170

Here’s what the future of America’s infrastructure might look like

lwilde — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 14:57:37 +0000

“In last night’s State of the Union address, President Obama talked a lot about the need to upgrade our country’s infrastructure, from power plants to railroads, both to create jobs and to improve efficiency. He wasn’t kidding: We lose an average of seven billion gallons of water a day to leaks in the system. Power interruptions cost the economy about $79 billion annually. And we all remember the Minneapolis bridge collapse, but up to a quarter of all the bridges in the country are in need of attention.

Fortunately, there are some amazing technologies already rolling out, and more just waiting for the funding the President talked about. We reached out to experts in transportation, telecommunications, sewage and water to figure out what kinds of technologies might be part of this next generation of infrastructure and found that the key isn’t patches, it’s an overhaul.

Smart systems that deliver only the power needed or recycle sewage for water and energy. Cantilevered trains could be built over existing roads. Roads could de-ice themselves. Here are 25 of those transformational technologies that might become reality sooner than later.”

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-01/heres-what-future-infrastructure-might-look

The future of the city

lwilde — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 16:02:46 +0000

“…Cities bring together the systems by which our world works: education, transportation, public safety, and health care, among others. We have the capacity to inject new intelligence into those systems. Enormous computational power can be delivered in forms so small and inexpensive that it is being put into phones, cars, and appliances, as well as things we wouldn’t recognize as computers, such as roadways (to monitor traffic) or rivers (to monitor pollution and better allocate water use). The data captured by these digital devices—soon to number in the trillions—will be turned to intelligence, because we now have the processing power and advanced analytics to make sense of it all.”

http://www.newsweek.com/id/231096/page/1

ZigBee Alliance begins development of ZigBee Retail Services

lwilde — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 21:56:36 +0000

“The ZigBee® Alliance, a global ecosystem of companies creating wireless solutions for use in energy management, residential, commercial and consumer electronics applications, today announced it has started development of ZigBee Retail Services™, a new standard focusing on the retail experience from point-of-manufacture to point-of-sale. This effort is expected to utilize the wide range of ZigBee’s existing profile capabilities, fully leverage the advantages of ZigBee’s open global solution set, and add significant new capabilities to improve the retail supply chain. Focus on this key market area is expected to result in substantial new product and service opportunities.”

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/ZigBee-Alliance-Begins-prnews-2095642618.html?x=0&.v=1