The internet of things (IOT) is now at a crossroads. While it has featured in mainstream tech discourse long enough not to be seen as a brand new trend, it is not yet a technology that has entered our everyday lives on a meaningful basis.
But Bluetooth believes it is changing all that. Just as countless hardware manufacturers have adopted its older technologies, Bluetooth Smart looks ready to have the same impact and could start making IOT a reality.
To find out more, we sat down with Bluetooth CMO Suke Jawanda, who told us where the technology is at.
TechRadar Pro: Many technologies are claiming to be the tech enabling the Internet of Things. What is Bluetooth's take?
Suke Jawanda: We can credibly say that Bluetooth Smart technology is what has made the internet of things a reality. It's no coincidence that the flood of wearables we're seeing come to market today started flowing after Bluetooth Smart was integrated into iOS and iPhone 4s in late 2011.
Since then, it's become the de facto standard for fitness devices, smart watches and medical devices from companies as diverse as Nike, Polar, Adidas, Pebble, Samsung, Qualcomm, Sony, iHealth, and Nonin.
And with all major mobile operating systems now offering native Bluetooth Smart APIs, this will only accelerate as manufacturers can create products and associated apps that will run on the smartphones, tablets and PCs that people already own.
Going beyond wearables, there are a number of wireless solutions that will help to enable the IoT, but because Bluetooth Smart is standards based, inexpensive and already shipping in billions of devices every year, it's going to be a major part of making the IoT a practical reality.
Manufacturers know Bluetooth Smart can help them bring new products to huge markets quickly. We're already seeing this as Bluetooth Smart is being widely adopted in beacons for retailing and payment systems, and growing fast in smart home applications as well.
TRP: So what major additions does Bluetooth 4.1 bring to the table?
SJ: There are three major improvements at the heart of the Bluetooth 4.1 specification that tie to:
- Improved usability
- Greater flexibility for developers
- Laying the groundwork for the Internet of Everything
Usability:
The first is that Bluetooth 4.1 extends the Bluetooth brand promise to provide consumers with a simple experience that "just works." For example, Bluetooth 4.1 eliminates potential interference between Bluetooth and LTE signals so both can perform at their best.
Bluetooth 4.1 also provides OEMs with more control over how they create and maintain Bluetooth connections by making the reconnection time interval flexible and variable.
This improves the consumer experience by allowing devices to reconnect automatically when they are in proximity of one another. The user doesn't need to think about it. The product just works as expected.
Flexibility:
Bluetooth 4.1 extends the Bluetooth Smart development environment by providing product and application developers with even more flexibility to create products that can take on multiple roles.
With this new capability, a single device acts as both a Bluetooth Smart peripheral and a Bluetooth Smart Ready hub at the same time.
For example, a smart watch acts as a hub gathering information from a Bluetooth Smart heart rate monitor while simultaneously acting as a peripheral to a smartphone — displaying new message notifications from the phone.
IoT Enablement:
Finally, by adding a standard means to create a dedicated data channel for IPv6 communications in a future update to the specification, the groundwork has been laid for assigning IP addresses to Bluetooth devices.
With the rapid market adoption of Bluetooth Smart and the future addition of IP connectivity, all signs point to Bluetooth as a fundamental wireless link in the Internet of Things.
TRP: What applications can Bluetooth Smart enable that typical users might not know of, especially in the business sphere?
SJ: Retail marketers are seeing a huge benefit of Bluetooth in the form of beacons - small wireless sensors placed inside any physical space that transmit data to a smartphone using Bluetooth Smart.
In the retail environment, beacons allow retailers to interact with customers in new and targeted ways. In addition to creating wireless payment systems, they can trigger offers as a consumer passes a certain product display or simply enters the retail location.
Those offers can be customised by prior interactions with the customer to provide them an experience tailored to their interests. Think of a coffee shop that can send you an offer for your favourite beverage as you approach, then let's you order and even pay for the item all from your smartphone.
Beacon technology offers huge potential for developers looking to create apps that take advantage of these proximity sensors.
We're already starting to see developers use this technology for everything from navigation to personal shopping apps. In fact, all the major beacons offerings—everything from iBeacon to PayPal beacon—are all based on Bluetooth Smart technology.
Because it's flexible, inexpensive, and already in the smartphones consumers have in their pockets, Bluetooth Smart is at the foundation of this new retail experience. No other technology has been adopted so quickly.
TRP: How secure is this newest iteration of Bluetooth?
SJ: Bluetooth Smart uses government-grade 128-bit AES encryption – meaning the data sent in sensitive transactions like payment transfers or medical information is highly secure.
For those who aren't aware of encryption standards, I've seen calculations that claim that it would take a supercomputer a billion years to crack a 128-bit AES key, so it's pretty secure!
Bluetooth Smart also uses 'Adaptive Frequency Hopping'. Rather than sending data over just one channel of the 2.4 GHz band, Bluetooth is designed to "hop" between dozens of channels in a pseudo-random fashion.
Not only can Bluetooth hop at a rate of 1600 times per second, it can also "adapt", dropping channels that are in use by other devices.
This not only means that data gets from point A to point B even in environments where other wireless technologies are in use like hospitals, but it also has the additional security benefit of making it very difficult to predict which channel the data will be transmitted.
TRP: What do you think will be the three biggest trends in Bluetooth for the rest of 2014 and beyond?
SJ: Wireless audio is an obvious trend for Bluetooth adoption. With the widespread adoption of smartphones, over the last two years we've seen an explosion of wireless speakers as people stream music that's on the phone.
As a matter of fact Bluetooth speakers have grown at compounded annual growth rate of 453% since 2010. The automotive industry is a natural extension of this trend with the car increasingly becoming important as a communications hub.
Beyond audio streaming in the car, in 2015 I expect to see more applications being developed that can take advantage of the low energy applications of Bluetooth Smart.
Tyre pressure monitoring, remote keyless entry, proximity sensors to store driver preferences, and vehicle maintenance/analytics are all really interesting applications for which Bluetooth Smart is ideal.
Secondly, the wearables and sensors market is really going to showcase the flexibility of Bluetooth Smart. While sports and fitness devices currently represent the bulk of the wearable technology market, I saw many examples of smart watches, jewellery and glasses at CES 2014 that all utilised Bluetooth Smart.
While it may not be true currently, it's only a matter of time before wearables go mass market. More niche sensors will also emerge such as gardening sensors and proximity sensors to find items, connecting almost anything you care about, and Bluetooth Smart will be the central enabler.
We call this the 'internet of my things', and it just wouldn't be possible without Bluetooth Smart. Because our technology is so power efficient, cost effective and built into the smartphones and tablets that consumers already own, it's the natural wireless connection technology.
Last, but definitely not least, the rapid emergence of Bluetooth enabled beacons is going to be a huge trend for the rest of 2014. It's one way that Bluetooth Smart is going beyond enabling the internet of my things and making the 'internet of everything' a reality.
Bluetooth Smart is making scenarios just dreamed about a reality – like driving down a crowded city street and having an available parking spot ping your phone, or your grocery store knowing when you last purchased milk and sending a reminder that you are running low when you're in the dairy aisle.
The foundation of Bluetooth Smart for retail scenarios is going to set the stage for an explosion of beacon technology in 2014 and the coming years.
James Potter