Industrial Internet of Things networking company FreeWave has partnered with remote monitoring and surveillance firm McQ, to offer industrial users the ability to transmit video over long distances with low power consumption.
The two firms said that the combination of technologies would provide government and military, oil and gas, wastewater, and agriculture customers with the ability to transmit mission-critical footage cost-effectively over long distances. The solution would also enable integration with the network edge within the unlicensed 900MHz radio frequency.
The companies said that in the past, RF technologies with low power consumption didn’t have the required bandwidth or power necessary to sustain streaming video, but FreeWave can run video over a radio frequency of 900MHz using the ZumLink Z9-PE radio.
This means it doesn’t require Wi-Fi or cellular technology at the camera, and can also be powered by solar, wind, or fuel cells, eliminating the recurring costs of cellular services and the challenge of limited Wi-Fi coverage in many areas.
Video border patrol
The joint technology will be deployed in a US government-funded international border surveillance project, scheduled for this summer.
But the firms added that the solution could work equally well in agricultural or oil machinery surveillance. It could also be used for collecting data on volcanic activity, agriculture, or wastewater, and from unmanned drones, along with identifying problems on roadways that are not connected to existing networks.
Scott Allen, chief marketing officer of FreeWave Technologies, said that the ability to stream video within the IoT has until now been “cost prohibitive and time-consuming, based on the need to install physical wire or deploy Wi-Fi”.
“Our joint solution will give customers the ability to access video streaming technologies reliably for critical missions in deserts, high mountain ranges, and other remote and physically challenging environments,” he said.
McQ CEO Brian McQuiddy added, “For many of these customers, the ability to leverage these capabilities in practically any scenario might be the crucial factor in completing these critical missions and vital research.”
Internet of Business says
In many cases, the IoT will rely on low-cost, low-power technologies to unlock the value of connected devices and big data analytics. Video – along with AI – has long been one of the most challenging applications, because of the energy and processing resources needed to crunch large volumes of data, so this latest partnership is good news for the sector. It’s also further confirmation that the edge environment and radio frequencies will be among the key tech hotspots as the IoT spreads.