IoT news of the week for Jan. 7, 2022

Amazon’s Sidewalk network is getting larger: We caught wind of a new Sidewalk outdoor radio back in December and figured it was meant to be used by Amazon to broaden its LoRaWAN footprint. Turns out, we were correct. Amazon will use professional installers to add the new Sidewalk Bridge Pro by Ring around the U.S. It plans to trial the new product at Arizona State University. The idea here is that either Echo and Ring consumer devices alone aren’t enough to provide network coverage or consumers aren’t opting in to support the network. So Amazon is taking it to the streets, so to speak. (Amazon) — Kevin C. Tofel

This is what an IoT-enabled future could look like: I read this story about how a hospital is dealing with the latest surge of COVID cases not expecting to see an IoT angle. However, I was struck by how perfectly it encapsulates the ways in which IoT and data science done well can help us deal with a much more unreliable world. This particular hospital has a predictive analytics team that takes in all kinds of data (some from sensors) and uses it to predict when COVID cases will rise and how that will affect hospitalization rates. This is pretty par for the course in what people call AIoT (a combination of AI and IoT). Once the data team predicts a tsunami of patients, other teams at the hospital change the amount of PPE it orders, prep wards, and re-arrange staffing. And when the surge of patients is past, hospital staff tries to schedule the inevitable repairs needed after the strain on the system. This is using tech to its full advantage. We can just deploy this stuff and hope it improves our ROI, but we also have to use it to improve our ability to deliver services. This hospital isn’t optimizing for profits at the moment; it’s optimizing for service delivery. This is how we need to use the IoT. (Slate) — Stacey Higginbotham

Intel has a new “IoT” chip: Intel has released a new, powerful processor that it says is for the IoT edge and if you consider the edge a performance-hungry gateway device, then I suppose Intel is right. The new Intel chip is a beast running on its Alder Lake platform and capable of handling machine learning jobs and graphics processing. I’m putting this in the newsletter because I worry that people will see Intel discussing an IoT chip for the edge and think the company is again trying to win over the market for low-power, constrained devices. It is not. (HPC Wire) — Stacey Higginbotham

I sure hope this recycling tech can scale: A company called Lasso Loop Recycling is showing off a home recycling center that can handle plastics, metal, or glass instead of consumers having to send those items to the curb for municipal pickup. A user drops their item into the bin to be recycled and the Lasso device detects what the item is, cleans it, breaks it down a bit, and stores the compressed material for later pickup. Lasso estimates that homes will require pickup 3-8 times a year. If a user drops an item into the device that it can’t handle, the Lasso makes that clear and gives the item back. This is a CES launch, so it could be vaporware. But the team is showing off a prototype at the show, and is offering pre-orders for a commercial device that will be generally available in 2024. If you want to sign up for the early pre-sale, the contraption will cost $3,500 and arrive in 2023. The rest of us can expect to wait longer and pay $5,000. (Lasso Loop) — Stacey Higginbotham

Veea combines a service with its smart home hub: Veea, a company that has crammed a bunch of radios, storage, and computing into a box to provide both network connectivity and a platform for distributed computing for the edge, has launched a smart home-as-a-service offering at CES. Veea makes a smart home networking device for service providers that they can use to provide Wi-Fi, Zigbee, cellular connectivity, and more inside the home. Using docker containers, the service provider can run hub software from popular smart home device vendors on that box, eliminating the clutter of a variety of hubs (I have about eight of them in my home). At CES, Veea said it will now provide that STAX box and a service to manage all of the information and devices that might connect to the hub. Service providers (that’s a telecom or cable company) can then offer their customers the ability to connect a variety of smart home devices, even those that run HomeKit or Amazon Alexa. For those familiar with DIY offerings, it’s similar to having your broadband provider offer the capabilities of HomeBridge or Home Assistant without the customer having to DIY their own system. That sounds compelling. (Veea) — Stacey Higginbotham

Airthings expands its air quality monitor lineup: After debuting its $299 Airthings View Plus product last year, the company is following with two new smart devices. This week at CES, the AirThings View Pollution and View Radon devices were introduced. They cost $199 each and provide data on different air quality aspects. The former is specific to measuring particulate matter (both PM 1.0 and PM 2.5) while the latter checks for radon. (Airthings) — Kevin C. Tofel

Humans are better than AI at predicting the weather: We talk about AI on a regular basis, so I found this article interesting. Although more data fed from satellites into computers has resulted in better algorithmic weather forecasts, humans are still the top dogs. Meteorologists certainly use the more precise information but they also rely on their own experience and intuition. And that’s especially true for very specific small locations and near-term conditions that can be overlooked by the eyes of an AI. (Wired) — Kevin C. Tofel

Garmin dips a toe in the smartwatch market: Long known for its fitness wearables with some “light” smart features, Garmin this week introduced a real smartwatch. The Venue Plus 2 starts at $449.99 and has an integrated microphone and speaker. It still has that Garmin focus on fitness but now works with whatever voice assistant is on your phone. You can perform any voice commands supported by the phone’s assistant and take calls over Bluetooth. Surprisingly, the watch runs Garmin’s own software, just like all of its other wearables. I thought perhaps it would bring the great fitness features to Wear OS, but instead, it’s adding more smarts to its own platform. (The Verge) — Kevin C. Tofel