Overcoming the Battery Obstacle: End-to-End IoT Strategies and the Two-Pronged Solution

This final essay in a Everactive’s three-part whitepaper series focuses on the problems that have faced smart factory strategists due to a lack of end-to-end IoT strategies.  Just catching up?  Start with “Why Self-Powered Sensors are the Game-Changer.”

Everactive Insights-as-a-Service Platform

The previous installment of this series outlined 8 Reasons Batteries Restrict Cost-Effective IIoT Deployments. Now we’ll talk about how Everactive has developed a solution for the Industrial IoT revolution: an end-to-end system that pulls together all of the necessary components for a robust and ubiquitous sensing solution—built around wireless IoT sensors that are entirely self-powered.

Everactive self-powered IIoT system infographic

Solving the Two Key Obstacles to Industrial IoT

So that your company can start realizing the full value of pervasive sensing today.

Batteryless, self-powered sensors

number oneDeveloped with patented core semiconductor and wireless networking technology that enables them to operate off low levels of ambiently harvested energy, Everactive’s sensors can generate enough power to enable their ultra-low-power operations indefinitely.  In other words, our sensors operate continuously and will never need a battery.

First of its kind, Everactive’s small wireless sensor devices leverage the company’s custom systems-on-chips to power continuously and exclusively from low levels of harvested energy, removing the need for batteries.

Everactive’s systems harvest energy from a number of environmental sources—including low-level indoor solar (and, of course, outdoor solar), the thermoelectric effect (capturing ambient energy generated wherever there is a temperature gradient), as well as through the vibration of piezoelectric materials (such as certain crystals and ceramics) and even from radio waves traveling through the environment.  More importantly, unlike other “low-power,” but single-purpose electronic components that utilize energy harvesting, Everactive develops complete sensor devices.  This means that each device, or Eversensor, is able to not only collect an array of data using multiple sensors, but also process, analyze, and transmit that data wirelessly—all on the same batteryless power budget.

You can think of Everactive’s self-powered systems as “forever sensors,” because you can deploy them throughout your facilities and then never have to worry about physically inspecting them for maintenance or a battery-level check.

A fully integrated, ultra-low-power ecosystem

the number twoAs we’ve discussed in this paper, the second obstacle holding businesses back from deriving the full value of pervasive sensing is that most of these sensor systems are built at the component level—not the system level—which means they cannot function optimally or cost-effectively for a number of reasons.

First, there’s the power problem.  Some components in a sensor might be designed for low-power needs, while others are not.  This leads to issues such as sensors that transmit less data, or less frequently, in an effort to conserve and prolong battery life.

Edge computing dashboard illustrating insights from IIoT networkA second problem with sensors built on disparate parts, from different sources, communicating with software systems developed by still other manufacturers, is that they simply aren’t designed to work as a cohesive system where all of the component parts work seamlessly together.  This can lead to missed opportunities and insights that can come only from a system that works as an integrated whole instead of a series of cobbled-together parts.

Everactive’s end-to-end IoT systems solve these problems as well.  We’ve created the industry’s first and only integrated, full-stack pervasive-sensing platform where the entire environment—physical sensor, data capture and processing functionality, wireless communication, analytics and reporting software platform—was designed to operate as a true ecosystem.

Learn how Everactive’s batteryless systems can deliver value for your operations.

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About Everactive

Everactive produces data intelligence for the physical world.  Operating without batteries, the company’s always-on wireless sensors deliver continuous cloud-based analytics at a scale not possible with battery-powered devices.  Everactive’s end-to-end IoT solutions are built upon groundbreaking advances in ultra-low-power circuit design and wireless communication that allow it to power its Eversensors exclusively from harvested energy.  The company has developed the required networking and cloud software to deliver an out-of-the-box service focused on providing high-value insights from newly generated and self-sustaining data streams.