The growing world of machine to machine (M2M) technology brings with it lots of exciting news about new product releases, new services, and new moves within the industry itself. Now, with the weekend firmly in our collective grasp, it's a good time to take a step back and consider some of the bigger events that happened this week, and that's just what we'll do with our Week In Review!
First, NETGEAR has a new member of its collective family this week as the sale of Sierra Wireless' AirCard division was finalized. NETGEAR picked up AirCard from Sierra Wireless for $138 million, along with $5.9 million in assumed liabilities. While things like the AirPrime embedded wireless module and the AirLink intelligent gateway will still be available, the key takeaway here is that Sierra Wireless can now focus on M2M and connected devices, allowing for accelerated growth in an increasingly popular field.
Next came a clear example of why food transportation companies were badly in need of telematics services by way of Cooltrax. Cooltrax put out a white paper dubbed "The Role of Reefer and Refrigerated Telematics in Measuring and Monitoring the Cold Chain," showing off several key reasons why companies were so in need of the service. With proper telematics, fleet manages can ensure the optimal box temperatures and ensure food gets to where it needs to be, safely and efficiently.
Then we had a look at using telematics to improve both safety and efficiency in other fields. American Pest was spotted near the tip of that particular spear, backed up by inthinc Technology Solutions, to bring out a line of accelerometers and OBD integration systems to ensure that driver performance in company vehicles is up to par. The combined system issues verbal alerts to drivers engaging in unsafe practices, like not wearing a seatbelt, speeding, braking hard or other methods, and relays a total score for each driver back to a central management portal for later consideration.
NetCracker Technology brought in the next item, staging a Q&A session on how to get an M2M program up and running. Since NetCracker offers M2M cloud services, it has a good understanding of how to get such programs set up and running, which is valuable knowledge as several companies have, previously, been seen having issues with getting M2M in place. NetCracker's recommendations start with knowing what doesn't work, understanding the key values of cloud support for M2M, and being both patient and ready to partner with other companies as being big parts of a successful M2M strategy.
Finally, there was big news from Pole Star, who was undergoing a period of record high growth thanks to commensurate growth in the indoor location technology sector. With more businesses looking to bring in indoor location applications to take advantage of the rapid growth in mobile devices--not to mention better connect with customers through these devices--that's giving Pole Star a lot of opportunity. It certainly helps that Pole Star can offer indoor location technology for both Android and iOS devices, giving it plenty of versatility.
That was the week that was in M2M evolution, and it's plain to see that the market is one that's rapidly on an upward trend. Our global online community is constantly bringing back fresh news in the sector, so be sure to join us back here next week for more on M2M, and of course, every weekend for our Week In Review coverage!
