News highlights:

• New Arm Cortex-M52 is the smallest, most area- and cost-efficient processor enabled with Arm Helium technology, delivering enhanced AI capabilities for lower cost IoT devices
• Provides the flexibility to scale across a range of performance points and configurations, delivering DSP capabilities without a separate unit to save on area and cost
• Simplified development flows bring AI within reach on a single toolchain and single proven architecture

Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Large Language Models (LLMs) are grabbing headlines, but many don’t realize how much AI is already deployed in embedded devices and impacting applications across our homes, cities and in industry – this is referred to as the Artificial Intelligence of Things (AIoT), and it’s being built on Arm. AI is critical to understanding data and enabling more seamless interactions between the physical and digital world. As this technology advances, on-device intelligence is being deployed in smaller, more cost-sensitive and often battery powered devices at the lowest cost points, with greater privacy and reliability due to less reliance on the cloud.

As AI-enabled IoT shipments continue to increase, our partners need access to more ML (Machine Learning) capabilities and simpler development flows, giving them the agility to innovate and scale quickly. To address these requirements, today we are announcing the Arm Cortex-M52, designed for AIoT applications that require a boost in digital signal processing (DSP) and ML performance without the cost overhead of dedicated DSP and ML accelerators. Cortex-M52 will unlock the potential for delivering ML on embedded computing solutions at lower price points than is possible today.

Bringing AI capabilities to a broader range of IoT devices

The Cortex-M52 includes Arm Helium technology, providing a significant performance uplift in DSP and ML applications for small, low power embedded devices, making it possible to deploy more compute intensive ML inference algorithms in endpoints without a dedicated NPU. Helium technology has already been implemented successfully in products at the far edge of the network, but the Cortex-M52 now enables Arm partners to take this capability into lower cost more power constrained devices.

By extending Helium technology into a new class of Cortex-M, Arm is delivering a step change in matrix and DSP compute on microcontrollers for smaller embedded devices. The Cortex-M52 provides a simplified migration path from the Cortex-M33 and Cortex-M4, addressing a wide range of AIoT applications to enable richer UI, voice and vision experiences, such as automotive and industrial control, predictive maintenance, and wearable sensor fusion. Cortex-M52 delivers the flexibility needed to scale across a range of performance points and configurations, providing DSP capabilities without a separate processing unit, saving on silicon area and cost.

Providing optimal performance and cost choice with robust safety and security

Cortex-M52 extends the Armv8.1-M Cortex-M line-up (which includes the Cortex-M55 and Cortex-M85) to a new efficiency point, a critical milestone in bringing ML capabilities to microcontrollers. It provides the lowest area and power implementation of any Helium-enabled Cortex-M, offering choice to silicon partners looking to trade-off performance and cost. Developers can benefit from an uplift in bothML and DSP performance, with up to 5.6x performance uplift for ML and up to 2.7x performance uplift for digital signal processing compared to previous Cortex-M generations.

Security remains critical in devices, especially when shipping at large scale, and Cortex-M52 implements the latest security extensions for Armv8.1-M, including PACBTI and Arm TrustZone technology, which offers enhanced software threat mitigation. In addition, Cortex-M52 will accelerate the route to PSA Certified Level 2 silicon, enabling the next generation of PSA Certified devices. The latest Armv8.1-M cores (including Cortex-M55 and Cortex-M85) also offer enhanced functional safety features that are crucial in many automotive and industrial control applications. The Cortex-M52 delivers these extended safety packages and features to help partners reach FuSa certification faster and more easily, compared to previous generation Cortex-Ms being deployed in these applications.

Simplifying AI development for the smallest endpoint devices

Traditional embedded developers grapple with the mathematical, data analysis, toolchain expertise and programming skills required for AI. Developer enablement is critical if we are to see an increase in AIoT shipments, and with the Cortex-M52 we’re delivering the critical features and capabilities required in a modern development flow today.

Historically, to achieve the ML and DSP performance Cortex-M52 delivers would have required the combination of a CPU, a DSP and an NPU, meaning that once the hardware is built, developers would need to write, debug and tune code for chips with three separate tool chains, three compilers, three debuggers, and so on. Now, we are bringing AI within reach on a single toolchain and single proven architecture with the industry-standard, user-friendly Arm Cortex-M portfolio. This ensures a unified development flow for traditional, DSP and ML workloads – while specific integration and optimizations for leading machine learning frameworks will ensure that developers have a seamless experience and get the best performance from any Cortex-M.

Cortex-M52 is fully software compatible with Cortex-M55 and Cortex-M85, enabling developers to benefit from and leverage the growing software and tools ecosystem around Helium, as well as free software libraries and an extensive knowledge base from our partner ecosystem. To help streamline and accelerate the IoT and embedded development process, Cortex-M52 will also be available on Arm Virtual Hardware, our cloud-based offering that enables software development in advance of silicon.

Deploying AI across the full spectrum of AIoT use cases, built on Arm

The AIoT runs on Arm and together with our partners, we identified a need to bring DSP and ML compute performance to low power embedded applications at a better cost and accessibility point for the market. The Cortex-M52 CPU delivers higher levels of AI inference performance on the smallest devices, enabling the industry to scale IoT device deployments even further.

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News Highlights:

• New Arm Total Solutions expand high-performance microcontroller and application use-cases with the latest Corstone subsystems for Cortex-M and Cortex-A
• Arm Cortex-M85 processor offers increased performance, improved machine learning capabilities and enhanced security
• Arm Virtual Hardware delivers a broader range of virtual development opportunities for Arm processors, third party hardware and real-world devices

Arm is delivering on its Total Solutions for IoT roadmap, with two new solutions for Arm® Cortex®-M and Cortex-A processors, streamlining and accelerating the IoT and embedded development process.

As part of the expanded roadmap, Arm is launching the Arm Cortex-M85 processor, the highest-performing and most secure Cortex-M to date, and expanding Arm Virtual Hardware to more platforms, including 3rd party devices, to make the development process more accessible.

“Developers drive the future of the IoT, but they face an ever-increasing demand for higher performance, increased security and less complex development flows,” said Mohamed Awad, vice president of IoT and Embedded at Arm.

“The IoT runs on Arm, and we have a responsibility to create greater opportunities for IoT innovation and scale by continually raising the bar on performance, simplified development, and software reuse for our ecosystem.”

Accelerating innovation with Arm Total Solutions for IoT

When Arm Total Solutions for IoT launched six months ago it signified a radical shift in the design approach for the IoT and embedded markets, combining hardware IP, platform software, machine learning (ML) models, tools and much more to simplify development and accelerate product design. At the heart of Total Solutions is Arm Corstone, a pre-integrated, pre-verified IP subsystem that frees silicon designers to focus their time and efforts on differentiation.

Launching today, the Arm Total Solution for Cloud Native Edge Devices is the first designed for Cortex-A and based on Corstone-1000. It makes the power and potential of platform operating systems like Linux easily available to IoT developers, for the first time. It allows application-class workloads to be developed for devices such as smart wearables, gateways, and high-end smart cameras. Since the Corstone-1000 is Arm SystemReady-IR compliant and features a hardware secure enclave that supports PSA Certified for a higher level of security, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) can immediately enjoy the benefits of Project Cassini.

Arm’s new Total Solution for Voice Recognition is based on the Corstone-310 subsystem. It is pre-integrated with the new Cortex-M85 and the Arm Ethos-U55 to create Arm’s highest ever performance MCU-based design. The solution is targeted at use-cases ranging from smart speakers and thermostats to drones and factory robots. Developers can also take the Corstone-310 and create a whole range of additional high-performance products by combining it with different reference software.

Arm Cortex-M85: Setting a new standard for secure, high-performance microcontrollers

The Arm Cortex-M85 is the highest performance Cortex-M processor to date and is a natural architectural upgrade path to Armv8-M for applications requiring significantly higher performance. It offers:

• A 30% scalar performance uplift compared to the Cortex-M7
• Arm Helium technology to support endpoint ML and DSP workloads
• Enhanced security with Arm TrustZone® technology. It also includes Pointer Authentication and Branch Target Identification (PACBTI), a new architectural feature with enhanced software attack threat mitigation to help achieve PSA Certified Level 2, a security baseline for IoT deployments

Arm Virtual Hardware now addresses existing devices, hardware and projects

Arm Virtual Hardware is a transformative offering, designed to enable software development in advance of silicon. It allows the Arm ecosystem to easily adopt cloud-based development and CI/CD, without the need for large custom hardware farms. Hundreds of developers have used Arm Virtual Hardware to date and based on developer feedback, Arm is announcing several new virtual devices to broaden Arm Virtual Hardware’s appeal. New additions will include Arm Virtual Hardware for the new Corstone designs as well as 7 Cortex-M processors ranging from Cortex-M0 to Cortex-M33. Arm is further expanding the library with third party hardware from partners including NXP, ST Microelectronics and Raspberry Pi.

By extending Arm Virtual Hardware to ecosystem devices and the vast majority of the Cortex-M product line, independent software vendors and cloud service providers can now take advantage of the billions of Arm-based IoT and embedded devices which are already deployed.

Creating the foundation for standardized IoT development

In order to scale, the Cortex-M software ecosystem needs to coalesce around a consistent set of standards that enable the portability and re-use of software across a range of devices. Project Centauri was launched to deliver exactly that, so developers can focus on what really matters – innovation and differentiation. It includes Open-CMSIS-Pack, which is already supported by 9,500 microcontrollers and 450 boards, enabling software vendors to easily scale their offerings across all of these devices.

Today, Arm continues to invest in Project Centauri by delivering the first release of the Open IoT SDK Framework. This contains the new Open-CMSIS-CDI software standard, a community driven project hosted in Linaro that defines a Common Device Interface (CDI) for the Cortex-M ecosystem. Eight key industry players are already involved including silicon partners, cloud service providers, ODMs and OEMs.

Empowering developers to serve a diverse and growing market

The IoT and embedded market is incredibly diverse and serves everything from sensors to robotics, smart speakers, appliances, storage controllers and computer vision. In a market this broad, streamlining development is critical, and today’s announcements reinforce why Arm is uniquely positioned to lead the IoT ecosystem forward, ignite growth and value creation across the IoT economy.

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News Highlights:

• Arm Total Solutions for IoT delivers a full stack solution to significantly accelerate IoT product development and improve product ROI
• Arm Virtual Hardware removes the need to develop on physical silicon, enabling software and hardware co-design and accelerating product design by up to two years
• A new Arm ecosystem initiative called Project Centauri will drive the standards and frameworks needed to grow serviceable markets and scale IoT software innovation

Arm today unveiled Arm® Total Solutions for IoT, a unique approach to Internet of Things (IoT) design that will lay the foundation for a new IoT economy.

Arm Total Solutions for IoT will simplify and modernize software development, resulting in accelerated time to market for developers, OEMs and service providers at all stages of the IoT value chain and a reduction in product design cycles by up to two years.

“Through a radical change in how systems are designed, Arm is uniquely positioned to fuel a new IoT economy that rivals the shape, speed and size of the smartphone industry’s app economy,” said Mohamed Awad, vice president of IoT and Embedded at Arm.

“Arm Total Solutions for IoT changes the way we’re delivering key technology to the entire ecosystem and demonstrates our significant and ongoing investment in the software that will empower developers to innovate for global impact.”

New Virtual Hardware Targets will reduce product design cycles by up to two years

Built on the proven foundations of Arm Corstone, a validated and integrated subsystem that has accelerated time to market for more than 150 designs from Arm silicon partners, Arm Total Solutions for IoT introduces Arm Virtual Hardware Targets for software developers, OEMs and service providers. This new cloud-based offering delivers a virtual model of the Corstone subsystem to enable software development without the need for physical silicon. Arm Virtual Hardware brings modern agile software development methodologies like continuous integration / continuous deployment (CI/CD), DevOps and MLOps to IoT and embedded platforms, without having to invest in complex hardware farms.

With accurate models of Arm-based SoCs providing mechanisms for simulating memory, peripherals and more, development and testing of software is now possible before silicon availability. This ultimately reduces a typical product design cycle from an average of five years to as little as three years. It allows Arm silicon partners to gain customer feedback for chips before tape out, while enabling the entire IoT value chain to easily develop and test code on the latest IP well ahead of silicon availability.

Arm Virtual Hardware is available on AWS Marketplace and Arm partners are already using it to innovate faster and accelerate their time to market.

Designing with use-cases in mind to simplify development

Arm Total Solutions for IoT provides a complete solution designed for specific use-cases, leaving developers to focus on what really matters – innovation and differentiation across diverse applications and devices. It has everything needed to simplify the design process and streamline product development, including hardware IP, software, machine learning (ML) models, advanced tools such as the new Virtual Hardware Targets, application specific reference code and support from the world’s largest IoT ecosystem.

The first configuration of an Arm Total Solution for IoT is available now and addresses general-purpose compute and ML workload use-cases, including an ML-based keyword recognition example. Available today are Virtual Hardware Targets for multiple configurations of the Arm Corstone-300 subsystem from Arm SoC partners, incorporating the Arm Cortex®-M55 processor and Arm Ethos-U55 microNPU. You can read more detail here.

Arm is fully committed to this comprehensive solutions approach, with a robust roadmap of future solutions which will cover applications such as voice recognition and object recognition.

Standardization is critical for scale

To allow industry players to leverage the software and services they invest in across the widest possible range of platforms, Arm is also introducing Project Centauri. Project Centauri aims to achieve for the extensive Arm Cortex-M software ecosystem what Project Cassini does for the Cortex-A ecosystem, by delivering a set of device and platform standards, as well as reference implementations for device boot, security and cloud integration.

The Project Centauri APIs include support for PSA Certified and Open-CMSIS-CDI, a standard cloud-to-device specification that minimizes the effort required to enable different cloud solutions and real-time operating systems. This will reduce engineering costs, accelerate time to market, enable IoT deployments at scale and improve security across the Cortex-M ecosystem.

Leading the ecosystem into a new era for IoT

To date, Arm partners have shipped more than 70bn Arm Cortex-M based devices and show no sign of slowing, as chips for IoT are expected to have an average Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of nearly 15 percent through 2026, according to Mordor Intelligence. To address this growth opportunity, Arm is focused on ensuring its ecosystem is at the forefront of accelerating IoT innovation by making Arm IP increasingly accessible to innovative companies of all sizes through Arm Total Solutions for IoT and programs like Arm Flexible Access.

This represents the beginning of a new era for IoT – one of true software and hardware system-level co-design. Arm is uniquely positioned to unite software and hardware developers to create purpose-built compute and unleash the economic benefit of the IoT. From the smartphone to the data center – and now IoT – designing with systems in mind is the key to accelerating innovation and getting the best out of the specialized processing capabilities that the Arm ecosystem is delivering, wherever computing happens.

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Pelion, the IoT connected device service provider, launched as an independent company and unveiled its new brand and enhanced offering today.

As a wholly-owned subsidiary of Arm, Pelion delivers the technology and experience required to harness the potential of the IoT through its scalable, easy-to-deploy services, enabling customers to securely connect and manage devices over their lifetime.

Hima Mukkamala, CEO, Pelion, says:

“With key trends like 5G and edge AI enabling distributed intelligence, Pelion is entering its next phase of growth as a more agile, focused organization primed to help our customers to realize the transformative potential of the IoT.”

“This is an exciting milestone for the business, bringing together a team with a deep heritage of device, security and network expertise. We will work with our established customer base and mature partner network as we continue on our mission to simplify the full device journey and provide a robust, secure foundation for IoT innovation.”

The IoT presents a significant opportunity: Gartner indicates that between 2019 and 2024, the enterprise IoT Platforms Market will grow by 31%*, and Connectivity Management Platforms will demonstrate a CAGR of 21.6%**. However, organizations need help navigating the complexity of deploying devices at scale, from designing devices to connecting, securing and monitoring those deployments throughout the device life cycle.

Pelion is uniquely positioned to help enterprises realize scaled device connectivity with an agnostic approach that enables IoT for any device regardless of OS, network and application. This is combined with close industry partnerships that span the full IoT value chain from silicon vendors and device makers to system integrators, independent software vendors (ISVs), mobile network operators and platform vendors.

Pelion’s Connected Device Platform brings together the connectivity and management capabilities needed for scalable deployments, delivering unified operations management for the full device journey. It is designed to facilitate scalable, secure deployments quickly and without complication, supporting both managed and unmanaged connectivity, and deployable across diverse system and device architectures.

Pelion provides:

• Connected Device Platform that fast-tracks connectivity requirements at project conception, reduces total cost of ownership and scales to meet future requirements.
• Enhanced processing at the edge with application management for third-party and legacy applications.
• Versatile connectivity options to suit a range of use cases; from 5G to 2G, including CAT-M and NB-IoT networks, as well as non-cellular connectivity standards, including Wi-SUN.
• Services and expertise that already enable over 500 organizations.
• Flexibility to address small, consumer price point form factors with low power connectivity needs, through to industrial-grade equipment that demands increased security and data bandwidth.

The business will continue to evolve in line with customer needs for at-scale and secure IoT deployments, building on its success with partners and customers spanning diverse applications from utilities to industrial and logistics, including Hexing, Savortex, Nixu Cybersecurity and Tangerine.

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• Unites NVIDIA’s leadership in artificial intelligence with Arm’s vast computing ecosystem to drive innovation for all customers
• NVIDIA will expand Arm’s R&D presence in Cambridge, UK, by establishing a world-class AI research and education center, and building an Arm/NVIDIA-powered AI supercomputer for groundbreaking research
• NVIDIA will continue Arm’s open-licensing model and customer neutrality and expand Arm’s IP licensing portfolio with NVIDIA technology
• Immediately accretive to NVIDIA’s non-GAAP gross margin and EPS
• Consideration of $40 billion to be met through a combination of NVIDIA shares and cash

NVIDIA and SoftBank Group Corp. (SBG) today announced a definitive agreement under which NVIDIA will acquire Arm Limited from SBG and the SoftBank Vision Fund (together, “SoftBank”) in a transaction valued at $40 billion.

The transaction is expected to be immediately accretive to NVIDIA’s non-GAAP gross margin and non-GAAP earnings per share.

The combination brings together NVIDIA’s leading AI computing platform with Arm’s vast ecosystem to create the premier computing company for the age of artificial intelligence, accelerating innovation while expanding into large, high-growth markets. SoftBank will remain committed to Arm’s long-term success through its ownership stake in NVIDIA, expected to be under 10 percent.

“AI is the most powerful technology force of our time and has launched a new wave of computing,” said Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA.

“In the years ahead, trillions of computers running AI will create a new internet-of-things that is thousands of times larger than today’s internet-of-people. Our combination will create a company fabulously positioned for the age of AI.”

“Simon Segars and his team at Arm have built an extraordinary company that is contributing to nearly every technology market in the world. Uniting NVIDIA’s AI computing capabilities with the vast ecosystem of Arm’s CPU, we can advance computing from the cloud, smartphones, PCs, self-driving cars and robotics, to edge IoT, and expand AI computing to every corner of the globe.”

“This combination has tremendous benefits for both companies, our customers, and the industry. For Arm’s ecosystem, the combination will turbocharge Arm’s R&D capacity and expand its IP portfolio with NVIDIA’s world-leading GPU and AI technology.”

“Arm will remain headquartered in Cambridge. We will expand on this great site and build a world-class AI research facility, supporting developments in healthcare, life sciences, robotics, self-driving cars and other fields. And, to attract researchers and scientists from the U.K. and around the world to conduct groundbreaking work, NVIDIA will build a state-of-the-art AI supercomputer, powered by Arm CPUs. Arm Cambridge will be a world-class technology center.”

“NVIDIA is the perfect partner for Arm,” said Masayoshi Son, chairman and CEO of SBG.

“Since acquiring Arm, we have honored our commitments and invested heavily in people, technology and R&D, thereby expanding the business into new areas with high growth potential. Joining forces with a world leader in technology innovation creates new and exciting opportunities for Arm. This is a compelling combination that projects Arm, Cambridge and the U.K. to the forefront of some of the most exciting technological innovations of our time and is why SoftBank is excited to invest in Arm’s long-term success as a major shareholder in NVIDIA. We look forward to supporting the continued success of the combined business.”

“Arm and NVIDIA share a vision and passion that ubiquitous, energy-efficient computing will help address the world’s most pressing issues from climate change to healthcare, from agriculture to education,” said Simon Segars, CEO of Arm.

“Delivering on this vision requires new approaches to hardware and software and a long-term commitment to research and development. By bringing together the technical strengths of our two companies we can accelerate our progress and create new solutions that will enable a global ecosystem of innovators. My management team and I are excited to be joining NVIDIA so we can write this next chapter together.”

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Today, Arm announced proposed strategic organizational changes to strengthen its focus on growth and profitability.

The company is proposing to transfer its two IoT Services Group (ISG) businesses, IoT Platform and Treasure Data, to new entities that would be owned and operated by SoftBank Group Corp. and its affiliates.

Upon completion of the proposed transfer, Arm will deepen its focus on its core semiconductor IP business and expects to continue collaborating with the new ISG businesses.

“Arm believes there are great opportunities in the symbiotic growth of data and compute,” said Simon Segars, chief executive officer, Arm.

“SoftBank’s experience in managing fast-growing, early-stage businesses would enable ISG to maximize its value in capturing the data opportunity. Arm would be in a stronger position to innovate in our core IP roadmap and provide our partners with greater support to capture the expanding opportunities for compute solutions across a range of markets.”

Arm continues to be committed to enabling a world of billions of intelligent connected devices wherever computing happens. To-date, Arm partners have shipped more than 165 billion Arm-based chips, and an average of more than 22 billion per year over the past three years as demand for computing accelerates with the proliferation of IoT, 5G and AI.

The transfer of the ISG businesses is subject to further board review, customary closing conditions, consultation with local staff representatives (where applicable) and, if approved, is expected to be finalized by the end of September 2020.

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Pod Group today announced a strategic partnership with Arm which will enable it to significantly enhance its eUICC solution.

The agreement will allow Pod Group, a connectivity player in the IoT market since 1999, to incorporate intelligent SIM applets from its Pod Profile into the eUICC solution provided by the Arm® Kigen service, enabling the SIM to perform advanced functions which can be controlled remotely Over The Air (OTA).

The applets developed by Pod Group’s dedicated R&D team add unique functionality to the eUICC and are designed to resolve specific issues faced by many OEMs and IoT applications developers when devices are in the field and difficult to troubleshoot.

The Pod Profile is a SIMalliance compliant interoperable profile package which can be included on any eUICC compatible chip and updated OTA to control all aspects of the solution including service management and quality, roaming functionality, security and fraud prevention. This enables the eUICC to act as the nerve centre for the device, giving users complete control over eSIM profiles and the possibility to continually update eUICC functionality by adding new applets over time. Adding this intelligence to the eUICC is particularly important for remote and mission critical applications, since it effectively future-proofs the devices, meaning they can remain in the field for many years without the need for physical intervention.

Charles Towers-Clark, CEO of Pod Group commented:
“The future of connected devices depends on the development of open eSIM standards that enable interoperability between network operators, hardware manufacturers and solutions providers. Our eUICC strategy has been to create an agnostic solution which will give users the flexibility to manage their connectivity, future-proof their devices and add intelligent applets as required, without being tied-in to one connectivity provider.”

“As we move towards a world of a trillion connected devices, it’s crucial that cellular devices have reliable and scalable connectivity and can be easily deployed in different locations,” said Paul Williamson, VP and GM, Emerging Business Group at Arm.

“The Arm Kigen technology unlocks new levels of IoT integration, enabling Pod Group to offer secure cellular IoT connectivity at scale.”

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• Arm and leading security testing labs collaborate to provide independent evaluation of Platform Security Architecture (PSA) implementations in IoT devices

• Arm, Brightsight, CAICT, Prove&Run, Riscure and UL establish PSA Certified to build trust in connected devices and grow IoT deployment

To support widespread deployment of secure IoT solutions based on the Platform Security Architecture (PSA) framework, Arm and its independent security testing lab partners Brightsight, CAICT, Riscure and UL, along with consultants Prove&Run, today announced PSA Certified.

Through independent security testing, PSA Certified enables IoT solution developers and device makers to establish the security and authenticity of the data collected from a diverse world of IoT devices.

“PSA gave the industry a framework for standardizing the design of secure IoT devices, and PSA Certified brings together the leading global independent security testing labs to evaluate the implementation of these principles,” said Paul Williamson, vice president and general manager, Emerging Businesses Group, Arm.

“This will enable trust in individual devices, in their data, and in the deployment of these devices at scale in IoT services, as we drive towards a world of a trillion connected devices.”

PSA Certified provides a simple and comprehensive approach to security testing. It comprises two elements: a multi-level security robustness scheme and a developer focused API test suite. The security testing is based on third-party lab-based evaluation that builds trust through independent checking of the generic parts of an IoT platform including: PSA Root of Trust (the Root of Trust is the source of integrity and confidentiality), the real-time operating system (RTOS) and the device itself.

Validating the foundational security of IoT devices

PSA Certified enables devices makers to get the security required for their use case through three progressive levels of security assurance which are assigned by analyzing the use case threat vectors. For example, a temperature sensor in a field may require different security robustness (level 1) than a sensor in a home environment (level 2) or in an industrial plant (level 3). Following the testing, all PSA Certified devices will have electronically signed report cards (attestation tokens) for determining which level of security has been achieved, allowing businesses and cloud service providers to make risk-based decisions.

More security value for developers

As part of the program, the PSA Functional API Certification enables standardized access to essential security services, making it easier to build secure applications. Free test suites have been published for chip vendors, RTOS providers and device makers to test their PSA APIs and harness the hardware security of the latest silicon platforms.

PSA Certified is already gaining traction with leading silicon and IoT platform providers. Cypress, Express Logic, Microchip, Nordic Semiconductor, Nuvoton, NXP, STMicroelectronics and Silicon Labs have all achieved Level 1 certification. Nuvoton and OS provider ZAYA have achieved both PSA Certified Level 1 and PSA Functional API Certification, and Arm® Mbed OS will provide out of the box compliance with PSA Certified Level 1 and PSA Functional API Certification in its upcoming March 5.12 release.

PSA: A comprehensive framework for IoT device security

PSA Certified is the next step in the Platform Security Architecture (PSA) journey, bringing a tangible measure of device security to the IoT. PSA is a four stage framework that guides IoT designers through the journey of creating a secure connected device. It goes beyond instructions and principles, with a comprehensive set of downloads, including Threat Models and Security Analyses documentation, hardware and firmware architecture specifications, open source Trusted Firmware (TF-M) and API test kits.

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Agreement combines iSIM, IoT software and network services to dramatically reduce complexity and enable fully open, remote provisioning of IoT devices.

Arm and Vodafone today announced a strategic agreement that will significantly reduce complexity and costs faced by organisations when implementing IoT solutions.

Expanding on the companies’ previous collaboration around integrated SIM (iSIM) technology, this partnership brings together Vodafone IoT global platform and connectivity, and Arm’s IoT software and services to provide enterprises with programmable, connected system on chip designs that eliminate the need for traditional SIM cards. This allows customers to securely deploy, remotely provision and manage massive numbers of IoT devices across global markets at a significantly lower cost and complexity.

“Fragmentation, security and cost are three limiting factors in IoT, and we believe a strong partner ecosystem is critical in solving these challenges,” said Dipesh Patel, president, IoT Services Group, Arm.

“This partnership will enable global enterprises to significantly reduce the cost and complexity of securely connecting their IoT devices at scale so that they can quickly drive real value and actionable insights from their IoT data through our Pelion IoT platform.”

“Vodafone has been focused on building its global IoT platform & connectivity, to enable the fast deployment of IoT services,” said Stefano Gastaut, IoT Director, Vodafone. “Working together with Arm, we will combine the strengths of both companies to benefit our customers and break down the barriers, such as cost and complexity, which are hindering the adoption of IoT for many.”

This strategic partnership between Arm and Vodafone enables remote provisioning for devices using Narrow Band-IoT (NB-IoT) and Long Term Evolution for Machines (LTE-M) technologies and provides secure, open, standards-based deployment to any application and service provider across the globe. Arm® Kigen iSIM provides anyone deploying IoT devices globally with the means to develop and deploy a single IoT product that can be shipped and connected anywhere in the world. Vodafone’s global IoT network enables organizations to connect IoT devices across the broadest global footprint through the Vodafone IoT platform or the Pelion IoT platform.

Arm and Vodafone’s leadership in NB-IoT and LTE-M technologies will unleash the potential of IoT by massively broadening the range of objects that can be connected and unlocking business and societal value. For example, using data from sensors on connected devices will help address challenges in feeding the earth’s growing population by improving yields of agriculture and livestock and reducing chemical and water use. This will also help utilities to more efficiently manage scarce resources such as water, gas and electricity and reduce carbon emissions.

This represents a major step towards enabling a wide ecosystem of device makers that will help businesses to tap into the potential of a trillion connected devices by 2035 and access the vast amount data they provide to drive better business outcomes. Joint solutions from Arm and Vodafone will be available in the first quarter of calendar year 2020.

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NEC Corporation today announced a strategic collaboration with Arm Limited (Arm) to drive the development of secure Internet of Things (IoT) solutions for Smart Cities using artificial intelligence (AI).

There is already a wide range of IoT connected devices in the market today and the selection will continue to rapidly grow. Ensuring the security of these devices is a top priority that poses a major challenge for many companies.

As part of addressing these issues, NEC will adopt the Arm® Platform Security Architecture (PSA¹), an industry standard framework for building securely connected devices, which includes the concept of threat modeling, architectural guidelines and implementation resources that reduce the cost, complexity, and risk associated with IoT security.

NEC has an accomplished history of enhancing the security of products, systems and services while contributing to the safety and security of customers in many different fields. NEC’s innovative IoT security technologies² are consistent with the spectrum of mitigation approaches that the PSA framework encompasses.

Chet Babla, vice president solutions, IoT Device IP, Arm, said:

“The pace of deployment of IoT devices is growing rapidly, and Smart Cities will be an important use case for AI-enabled IoT. Ensuring that IoT devices are secure is non-negotiable, and why Arm is working with partners such as NEC to shift the economics of security by providing the common framework that PSA enables.”

NEC is also slated to unveil the development of a box-type accelerator³, a specialized device featuring real-time facial recognition that will be securely managed and provisioned by Arm Pelion Device Management.

This accelerator will be equipped with the Arm Cortex®-A53 processor. It will accelerate the device’s facial recognition process and enable faster analytics by offloading the analytics workload carried out on servers or the cloud, thereby helping to reduce costs for networks and systems.

NEC’s facial recognition technology is ranked as the world’s most accurate and fastest by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) benchmark tests⁴. NEC has already implemented over 700 biometric systems, including face recognition technologies in more than 70 countries and regions throughout the world.

“We expect the new accelerator to promote further adoption of face recognition throughout many areas, including the public safety, entertainment and transportation fields, as it contributes to the security and convenience of consumers worldwide,” said Naoki Hashitani, SVP, NEC Corporation.

NEC has already begun developing a Smart City project leveraging Arm technology in the resort town of Shirahama in western Japan. NEC aims to begin a proof of concept hospitality project with Smart Check-In and Smart Shopping features in December 2018. These services are expected to enable visitors to check-in to hotel rooms and make cashless payments through the use of facial authentication. The project includes facial recognition with the new accelerator and is expected to be a reference model for expansion into a wide range of new areas.

“We aim to revitalize the regional economy leveraging IoT technologies and look forward to collaborating with NEC to drive the digital transformation that will help create new business for the Shirahama area,” said Shin Okada, President and CEO, NankiShirahama Airport, Inc.

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Curiosity Platform leverages SoftBank strengths to build a dedicated, virtualized and distributed core network, paired with a new OS for immediate data intelligence; Arm delivers unmatched security from chip to cloud and superior device/data management; Packet’s bare metal servers bring the IoT core network to the edge.

Sprint has unveiled the Curiosity IoT platform, a new standard in how IoT is managed and secured.

Enterprises will now be able to manage IoT devices and connectivity over the air across multiple SIM profiles. Intelligence from device data will be generated instantly through the dedicated, distributed and virtualized core, built together with the new operating system. And the ultimate level of security will be provided from the chip to the cloud.

“On top of our dedicated IoT core and operating system built together with Ericsson, our close collaboration with fellow SoftBank company, Packet enables an advanced distributed core network using bare metal servers at the edge that may be activated in minutes,” said Ivo Rook, senior vice president, IoT & product development at Sprint.

“Arm changes the way devices are managed over the air and how data is analyzed, while delivering unparalleled security from the chip to the cloud. Overall, Curiosity IoT reflects our unique approach in creating the absolute best operating and management environment for IoT – from system managers enhancing their increasingly IoT-centric operations to the most demanding applications in the immediate economy.”

“Sprint’s unique IoT platform design called for a distributed core to bring the network to the data, rather than the data to the network,” said Zachary Smith, CEO at Packet. “They didn’t have to look any further than within the SoftBank family, with Packet distributing the core and enabling automation in a matter of minutes, as opposed to months.”

Hima Mukkamala, senior vice president and general manager at Arm, said:

“IoT provides a tremendous opportunity for organizations to obtain actionable insights from their devices and data, but require strong company integrations to manage the vast industry fragmentation and security challenges. We are working with Sprint from device-to-data and bringing the IoT security and business-critical services that are vital for unlocking value from IoT.”

Curiosity IoT: A New Era Reinforced by SoftBank Family Innovation

• Dedicated, virtualized and distributed IoT core: reduces distance between the device generating data and the IoT application processing that data for immediate, actionable intelligence from 1,000 miles to <50 miles using Packet bare metal servers
• Operating system
• Arm’s Platform Security Architecture (PSA) framework provides a common secure foundation for IoT devices: a holistic set of threat models, security analysis, hardware and software specifications, along with open source firmware
• For trusted IoT intelligence, secure and structured IoT data is easily ingested from devices and integrated for analytics with other enterprise data using Arm® Pelion Data Management
• Through the Arm Pelion Connectivity Management and Arm Kigen SIM solutions, customers can securely manage and provision SIM connectivity across all devices deployed anywhere using any network protocol including cellular, satellite or LoRa
• Built-in security, simplified management and over-the-air firmware updates for a wide range of IoT device types deployed on premises or in the cloud through Arm Pelion Device Management

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• Arm acquires enterprise data management leader, Treasure Data, enabling device-to-data IoT platform

• Technologies from Treasure Data, the acquisition of Stream and Arm Mbed Cloud will be combined to form the industry’s first end-to-end IoT connectivity, device and data management platform

• The new Arm Pelion IoT Platform will enable organizations to quickly, securely and sustainably create actionable insights from IoT, enterprise and third-party data

The Internet of Things (IoT) will give businesses superpowers. Whether it’s an energy provider drawing data from its infrastructure to sense failures; a sensor-equipped building anticipating and then proactively dealing with occupants’ needs; or a retailer using data streams from its stores and warehouses to streamline operations – IoT systems can be transformational.

But unlike fictional superheroes who’re often born with their abilities, any business wanting to develop IoT superpowers requires help. That must come from the technology sector, and three specific elements: investment, solutions and ecosystems.

IoT investment is evident, with the $100 billion SoftBank Vision Fund being a prime example of major support in advanced technologies. For solutions, we need to make it easy for organizations to provision, update, connect and manage devices, as well as make sense of the incredible amount of diverse data that the IoT is generating. Lastly, IoT requires a strong ecosystem of companies working together to deliver value – one company cannot solve everything alone.

Dealing with data is hard

An Information Age article summed up the massive data explosion, when they cited IDC predictions that 163 zettabytes (ZB) of data will be created or copied by 2025. That’s ten times the 16.1ZB of data generated as of 2016. However, according to a 2018 commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of Arm, 67 percent of organizations face challenges with data silos and more than half struggle with data preparation.

To deal with data volumes and complexity, businesses need to be able to seamlessly connect and manage their IoT devices, as well as manage their data flows. Arm has focused on supporting companies with this for several years, but a full solution taking care of all of a company’s data needs, from device-to-data, has only become possible today after we acquired Treasure Data.

The role Treasure Data will play in Arm’s IoT strategy

Treasure Data is a global leader in enterprise data management providing the ability to aggregate and translate massive volumes of scattered and siloed data. The company’s technology deals with data from any source – CRM, ecommerce systems, edge, IoT devices, and any third-party data. The result for customers is an ability to derive meaningful and actionable insights from any disparate data mix.

Treasure Data is the final piece of our IoT enablement puzzle. Its technology, along with that of another recent acquisition (Stream) for connectivity management, combined with Arm Mbed Cloud and our knowledge of the IoT hardware foundation creates something entirely new. We call it the Arm Pelion IoT Platform.

What will the Arm Pelion IoT Platform do for devices and data?

The Pelion IoT Platform will enable companies to seamlessly and securely connect and manage IoT devices and data at any scale. It’s designed to work on public and private clouds, on-premises and in hybrid environments, delivering ultimate flexibility in IoT system architectures. This will allow companies to quickly turn IoT and enterprise data into insights capable of unlocking new opportunities for them and their customers. The Pelion IoT Platform will also provide unified billing that lowers infrastructure costs, increases operational efficiency, and eliminates integration headaches.

What will Arm Pelion IoT Platform do in practical terms?

The Pelion IoT Platform will make IoT outcomes real by delivering:

• Device Management – Secure and consistent IoT device provisioning, identity and access management and updates for any system set-up;
• Connectivity Management – Support for a range of wireless connectivity standards for any device, region or use case, including enablement of eSIM secure identification;
• Data Management – Analysis of trusted data, from individual devices to enterprise-wide big data deployments, including third-party data (works horizontally across apps and use-cases).

The Pelion IoT Platform delivers a strong combined partner ecosystem of 140+ partners spanning silicon, mobile, network operators (MNOs), channel, technology providers and more. It incorporates much of the technology that propelled Treasure Data’s cloud-based Enterprise Customer Data Platform (CDP) into the market-leading position it enjoys today. Treasure Data provides the unique ability to handle massive amount of streaming web, mobile, and IoT data. It enables their 300+ customers to work with mindboggling amounts of device data points. Today, Treasure Data’s platform handles two million events a second and processes hundreds of thousands of queries and 50 trillion records a day, blending that data into other existing enterprise analytics tools to unlock massive value.

Why is the Pelion IoT Platform different from a host of other IoT solutions?

There are many vertical IoT Platforms focusing on specific device classes. Some also focus on specific kinds of data insights they’ll support. There are vendor-specific platforms that seek to tie customers into specific clouds. The linking word here is ‘specific’.

The Pelion IoT Platform is different because it is a truly horizontal platform capable of managing any number or type of devices and connectivity, dealing with any type of data (internal and external) and linking to any cloud. In short, it offers the ability to tie into ‘Any device, Any data, Any cloud’ – we think of it as a triple A IoT experience.

Still growing Treasure Data’s CDP business

We are bringing Treasure Data technology into the Pelion IoT Platform, but the Treasure Data Platform will also continue as a leading standalone technology service for existing and new customers. It will remain an important part of industry IoT enablement, providing the ability to harness new, complex edge and device data within a comprehensive customer profile to personalize their products and improve their experiences. Treasure Data customers will see the CDP continue to evolve. They now also have an opportunity to work with the Pelion IoT Platform. Read more about Treasure Data.

A final thought

There are two reasons to celebrate today. First, the closure of the Treasure Data acquisition and the welcoming of new colleagues who share our vision and a similar innovation heritage. Second, the creation of the Pelion IoT Platform, which marks a crucial turning point in the evolution of IoT.

Can we give businesses the superpower of dealing with any kind of data? We think we can. The value will be experienced by our direct customers and the wider world of businesses that will benefit from IoT unlocking new insights, and those insights unlocking new value.

The Pelion IoT Platform is alive today.

The post Arm acquires Treasure Data to set the stage for IoT transformation appeared first on IoT Business News.

ARM is releasing a new suite of products to accelerate secure IoT technology deployments at scale by businesses.

The ARM® mbed IoT Device Platform products and technologies will be unveiled at ARM TechCon 2015, Santa Clara, CA, from 10-12 Nov. The release includes mbed Device Connector, a free service that businesses can use to connect and securely manage IoT devices. It also includes the enhanced mbed OS (Technology Preview version) and new mbed Reference Designs. The products will shorten hardware design time, giving innovators greater ability to focus on product differentiation.

“ARM mbed partners now have access to the fundamental building blocks to develop and securely deploy IoT devices at any scale,” said Krisztian Flautner, general manager, IoT business, ARM.

“Since the launch of the mbed IoT Device Platform last year, we have focused our efforts on providing the mbed Partnership with the tools to scale deployments from a single cloud-connected sensor to a host of more intricate devices that enterprise-grade IoT solutions demand.”

New secure and scalable ARM mbed products
The latest ARM mbed products will accelerate the deployment of IoT devices and provide enhanced features that enable more scalable and secure devices:

• mbed Device Connector allows developers to connect devices within prototype deployments, build secure web applications quickly and easily integrate them with cloud solutions. Available at connector.mbed.com, mbed Device Connector is free for developers to use on up to 100 devices, handling up to 10,000 events per hour.
• mbed OS Technology Preview version is the latest iteration of the modular, efficient OS for ARM Cortex®-M based MCUs. Built to enable the IoT to scale, developers can take advantage of product innovations including mbed TLS, the first native OS support for Thread and basic manageability of devices. It is available from mbed.com.

Businesses deploying IoT applications need to address all aspects of connectivity, security and productivity. To accelerate this, ARM has also created two new reference platforms as part of a roadmap of mbed Reference Designs that will help developers cut the time from prototype to final device design with the use of open-source resources.

The mbed Zone at ARM TechCon 2015 will show demonstrations of the first two designs:

• mbed Wearable Reference Design, featuring an efficient wrist-based connected device capable of delivering a fully interactive user-experience while achieving a battery life of around eight weeks.
• mbed Smart City Reference Design aimed at infrastructure monitoring and smart industrial applications using Sub-GHz 6LoWPAN & CoAP mesh network protocols for large numbers of devices. This supports quick deployment, configuration and management of routers and end devices compatible with a variety of backhaul technologies in industrial applications that will reduce the bill of materials for end devices.

“ARM is enabling developers to prototype complex end point interactions while simultaneously creating allied web services in the cloud,” said Paul Teich, principal analyst, Tirias Research.

“mbed Device Connector can be used for free with up to 100 devices, handling up to 10,000 events per hour, and this will allow developers to take products to a fairly advanced stage before they need to decide on their next step. This is going to have an effect on the rate of innovation as it reduces the risk for everyone.”

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ARM has partnered with Thundersoft, a world leader in smart device platforms, to establish the ARM Innovation Ecosystem Accelerator.

The collaboration creates an Internet of Things (IoT) one-stop shop for startups and established OEMs, providing integrated hardware and software expertise as well as resources from the ARM® ecosystem. The Beijing facility is the first of four planned and is aimed at further advancing China’s IoT industry.

The first office in Zhongguancun, Beijing, will offer an ARM mbed IoT Device Platform innovation lab and an ARM Cortex®-based IoT system on chip (SoC) design lab alongside joint facilities with ecosystem partners. The accelerator will provide workshops, training, and design services for mbed OS and Cortex processor-based development platforms. System integration services aligned to the needs of the local design environment will also be available to further facilitate and speed up the path from prototype to production.

Allen Wu, president of Greater China, ARM, said:

“China is the largest IoT market in the world and there is a compelling growth opportunity for local companies if we address today’s fragmented technology landscape.”

“ARM is once again collaborating with a key partner to make the strongest commitment to China and the IoT industry. We are providing the ability for any company, big or small, to access integrated resources and expertise to simplify product development and accelerate time-to-market. The ARM Innovation Ecosystem Accelerator is a powerful and open platform containing the resources of the world’s biggest technology ecosystem that will enable local companies to innovate, grow and succeed in the smart and connected world.”

“IoT is a new market full of opportunities in China, and most innovation will come from startups,” said Hongfei Zhao, chairman, Thundersoft.
“The challenges that startups are facing include the lack of complete product experience, resources, and ecosystem support. Our joint efforts with ARM can provide not only software and hardware components, but also system-level product development services and the support of the entire ARM ecosystem. We can address the pain points of IoT applications/services developed by startups and OEMs to save cost and time, and increase their chances of success in the market.”

“The ARM Innovation Ecosystem Accelerator integrates the leading technologies and resources from the ARM ecosystem,” said Lu Shan, director general, CSIP.
“This will enable us to innovate and develop a diverse range of smart products and services. With that, it will empower China’s IoT industry development. CSIP and ARM share a common vision in terms of encouraging industry collaboration and development. Given the strong support from government, we believe there will be more and more innovation and services realized on the ARM platform, supporting fast growth for the Chinese IoT industry.”

“At Horizon we have a great vision for artificial intelligence-based (AI) products full of unique creative ideas,” said Dr. Kai Yu, founder and CEO, Horizon Robotics.
“However, moving from prototype to mass production requires additional external engineering expertise and technical support. The ARM Innovation Ecosystem Accelerator is an ideal one-stop shop providing AI-capable chips, software and hardware systems, and access to a unique platform supported by industry leading companies. This will allow us to speed up our development of solutions based on artificial intelligence algorithms and go to mass production at our desired pace.”

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IBM Cloud IoT Platform to Deliver New Device Management, Risk Management and Analytics Capabilities; New IoT Service for Electronics.

IBM today announced an expansion of its Internet of Things (IoT) platform – called IBM IoT Foundation – through an integration with ARM, providing out of the box connectivity with ARM® mbed-enabled devices to analytics services. This fusion will allow huge quantities of data from devices such as industrial appliances, weather sensors and wearable monitoring devices to be gathered, analyzed and acted upon.

IBM also announced the first in a series of IBM Cloud-based, industry-specific IoT services with IoT for Electronics. The service will enable electronics manufacturers to gather data from individual sensors that can be combined with other data for real-time analysis.

The IBM IoT Foundation is a platform upon which a family of fully managed, cloud-hosted offerings on the SoftLayer Infrastructure is built. IoT Foundation makes it simple to derive value from Internet of Things (IoT) devices. It includes:

• Analytics tools capable of dealing with large quantities of fast-moving data,
• Access to IBM Bluemix, IBM’s Platform-as-a-Service, that is capable of handling the immense flow of data and provide anytime access for decision makers; and
• Security systems capable of helping organizations protect IoT data as rigorously as they do their own confidential financial, IP and strategy information.

“Deploying IoT technology has to be easy, secure and scalable for it to feel like a natural extension of a company’s business,” said Krisztian Flautner, General Manager, IoT Business, ARM.

“By collaborating with IBM, we will deliver the first unified chip-to-cloud, enterprise-class IoT platform. This will empower companies of any size with a productivity tool that can readily transform how they operate, and the services they can offer.”

The integration between IBM and ARM will allow products powered by ARM mbed-enabled chips to automatically register with the IBM IoT Foundation, and connect with IBM analytics services. This unifies the ARM mbed IoT Device Platform and the IBM IoT Foundation at the point where information gathered from deployed sensors in any connected device is delivered to the cloud for analysis. The IoT connection also enables delivery of actionable events to control equipment or provide users with alerts or other information. For example, the triggering of an alarm message on a washing machine to ask the owner to confirm a breakdown engineer appointment if a fault is detected.

This integration can help clients improve engagement, accelerate innovation and enhance operations through connected devices and analysis of the data. Custom hardware built around ARM’s flexible and efficient chip technology and IBM’s leading IoT services for predictive maintenance, better asset performance, operational risk management and managed continuous engineering, can help provide organizations with enterprise-grade tools designed to help them build value from their IoT devices. Original design manufacturers and OEMs – such as Ionics – are already seeing value in the IBM and ARM integration as it assimilates the IBM IoT Foundation at the chip architecture level.

“We’re excited to work with IBM because we believe that an effective IoT solution should be built from the ground up – from chipset through services – and is by far the best choice to have a complete end-to-end solution,” said Earl Qua, Vice President of Ionics. “Working with IBM we have tapped into our respective company’s expertise to create a platform that is built and customized for the unique nature in which companies are utilizing IoT.”

Electronics manufacturers are already adopting IBM’s cloud services to connect everything from dishwashers to Smart TVs to pro audio equipment:

• “By using IBM IoT services, we are able to real-time manage and control Smart TV content in over 30 countries. This provides us the opportunity to continuously balance costs with increased customer experience. Lastly, we have eliminated the need to set up hardware within traditional IT infrastructure – allowing a drastic reduction in provisioning time.” – Marc Harmsen – Global Marketing Lead and Product Manager EMEA Philips Television at TP Vision.
• “At Gibson Innovations, design and quality lead the way. IBM’s service capabilities – leveraging cloud, IoT and analytics – allow us to provide unique user experiences for connected devices. Additionally, the advanced analytics enables the development of new applications and services as well as device management and monitoring in a security-rich infrastructure. This is extremely valuable in maintaining and increasing loyalty among our customers,” said Henry Chiarelli, Executive Vice President of Gibson Brands.

“Since 2008, IBM has helped thousands of customers embrace the Internet of Things – to help cities become smarter, hospitals to transform patient care and financial institutions to improve risk management,” said Pat Toole, General Manager, Internet of Things, IBM. “The IoT is now at an inflection point and it needs the big data expertise of IBM and little data expertise of ARM to ensure it reaches its global potential.”

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Acquisition will offer hardware and software-based security features, boosting protection for sensitive data and content on any connected device.

ARM has acquired Israel-based Sansa Security, a provider of hardware security IP and software for advanced system-on-chip components deployed in Internet of Things (IoT) and mobile devices. The company currently enables security in more than 150 million products a year and Sansa Security technology is deployed across a range of smart connected devices and enterprise systems. The deal complements the ARM security portfolio, including ARM® TrustZone® technology and SecurCore® processor IP. Terms have not been disclosed.

“Any connected device could be a target for a malicious attack so we must embed security at every potential attack point,” said Mike Muller, CTO, ARM.

“Protection against hackers works best when it is multi-layered, so we are extending our security technology capability into hardware subsystems and trusted software.”

“This means our partners will be able to license a comprehensive security suite from a single source.”

Sansa Security technology makes it easier for manufacturers to build secure products by offering a complete hardware subsystem that adds additional isolation of security operations from the main application processor. This is complemented by software components operating on top of trusted execution environments to perform security-sensitive operations. The acquisition builds upon ARM’s embedded TrustZone technology, creating extra protection against malware and malicious software. It is a system-wide approach that underpins security-related chipset and trusted software needs. This enables the protection of any connected device and management of sensitive data and content.

“Our technology is already being used to protect data gathered and transmitted by a multitude of IoT and mobile devices,” said Coby Sella, CEO, Sansa Security.
“Joining ARM will enable us to scale the business by helping ARM’s global technology partners to address their most pressing security needs. Aligning what we do with the world’s leading IP company, allows us to develop our products and capability to new levels.”

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Running mbed on EFM32® Devices Will Accelerate Deployment of Energy-Friendly Internet of Things Applications.

Silicon Labs, a leading provider of microcontroller, sensing and wireless connectivity solutions for the Internet of Things (IoT), today announced a collaboration with ARM to define and deliver the first power management application programming interfaces (API) for ARM® mbed platforms. Adding power management APIs to mbed will bring energy efficiency to standards-based solutions optimized for ultra-low-power, battery-operated connected devices. The new APIs will enable the mbed community of more than 100,000 registered developers to optimize their mbed-enabled ARM Cortex®-M architecture-based designs for the utmost energy efficiency and longer battery life.

In addition to enabling developers to manage processor and peripheral states, the mbed power management APIs are designed with real-world, low-energy application scenarios in mind. A new feature exposed by the APIs on Silicon Labs’ EFM32® Gecko microcontrollers (MCUs) automatically determines and enables the optimal sleep mode based on the MCU peripherals in use, which can dramatically reduce system-level energy consumption. Low-energy optimization is achieved by enabling I/O operations to be executed in the background and by allowing those operations to continue even while the MCU core is in sleep mode or during other processing tasks.

The automatic selection of the optimal sleep mode, combined with low-energy, autonomous MCU peripherals, enables developers to significantly reduce the energy consumption of their IoT applications with minimal effort. For example, energy profiles of an application updating a clock display every second on a memory LCD – a common use case for IoT devices – have shown a current consumption reduction from 1.03 mA to 0.100 mA.

“The new power management APIs for ARM mbed make it possible for developers to create applications that take advantage of the low-power features of ARM Cortex-M based microcontrollers,” said Zach Shelby, vice president, IoT business marketing, ARM.
“This is an important step toward enabling full energy-awareness in IoT devices, and it is one of the key building blocks for mbed OS that is due for public release later this year.”

“As pioneers in low-energy processing solutions for the IoT, Silicon Labs and ARM have made enormous progress in defining and delivering the new power management APIs for mbed,” said Daniel Cooley, vice president and general manager of Silicon Labs’ MCU and wireless products.

“We’re excited to help deliver the industry’s first low-power mbed platform, which will play a key role in accelerating the deployment of countless battery-powered IoT applications.”

Availability

Silicon Labs plans to provide mbed-enabled EFM32 Gecko starter kits in April 2015. Silicon Labs’ initial platforms supporting mbed will include the Wonder Gecko, Leopard Gecko, Giant Gecko and Zero Gecko starter kits. Developers with existing EFM32 kits will be able to mbed-enable their hardware through a simple software update. For more information about Silicon Labs’ mbed platforms, please visit www.silabs.com/mbed.

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ARM today launched the ARM® mbed IoT Starter Kit – Ethernet Edition to channel data from Internet-connected devices directly into IBM’s Bluemix cloud platform.

The combination of a secure sensor environment by ARM with cloud-based analytics, mobile and application resources from IBM will allow fast prototyping of new smart products and unique value-added services. The first products developed using the kit are expected to enter the market in 2015.

“Securely embedding intelligence and connectivity into devices from the outset will create cloud-connected products that are far more capable than today,” said Krisztian Flautner, general manager, IoT business, ARM.
“Smart cities, businesses and homes capable of sharing rich information about their surroundings will be critical in unlocking the potential of IoT. The ARM IoT Starter Kit will accelerate the availability of connected devices by making product and service prototyping faster and easier.”

The IoT Starter Kit consists of an ARM mbed-enabled development board from Freescale, powered by an ARM Cortex®-M4 based processor, together with a sensor IO application shield.
Future versions of the kit will run the new ARM mbed OS and utilize ARM mbed Device Server software to deliver a wider range of efficient security, communication and device management features. Building on the momentum of recent announcements such as IBM’s IoT Foundation and the ARM mbed IoT Device Platform, ARM and IBM will continue to work together on interoperable, open, secure and scalable connectivity between devices and the cloud.

“The Internet of Things is about bringing the physical and digital worlds closer together, to allow businesses to better understand and interact with what is happening around them,” said Meg Divitto, vice president for IoT, IBM. “In order to make this work for businesses, it needs to be simple to connect physical devices into the cloud, and to build applications and insights around them. IBM Bluemix and the new ARM mbed starter kit are designed to substantially enhance that effort.”

The IoT Starter Kit is being launched to coincide with the opening of Embedded World in Nuremberg, Germany. Prototypes have been given to early adopters including the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC). STFC is engaged in broad research in areas such as space science, the environment, medicine and computing, and is using several kits to create a big data demonstrator project.

David Moss, high performance computing, big data and visualisations solutions manager, STFC Hartree Centre, said:

“The ARM mbed Starter Kit will provide us with a great starting point for projects that require instrumentation of any device.”

“We anticipate that the capabilities provided by the kit and its connection to the IBM IoT Foundation will help us to realise rapid business value during the development and production phases of our work.”

Cambridge Consultants, a production development and technology consultancy business working with a range of companies from leading blue chips to startups is also experimenting with the kit.

“We are seeing the democratisation of technology and the ARM IoT Starter Kit is the perfect example of a foundation that can empower design by any individual or company,” said Tim Murdoch, director of digital services, Cambridge Consultants. “Coupled with the link into IBM’s cloud platform we now have a fast route for makers to take any product to market and develop services around it quicker and more cost-effectively than ever before.”

Today’s announcement marks a significant collaboration between ARM and IBM.
The jointly developed Starter Kit offers Ethernet connectivity, with possible future versions also being looked at for cellular, wi-fi and Thread. ARM is talking to leading global electronics distributors to package and market the Starter Kit.

“From the edge node through the network to the cloud, Freescale technology is powering emerging IoT applications with secure, embedded processing solutions for the Internet of Tomorrow,” said Freescale’s John Dixon, Director of Marketing for Freescale. “We are excited to be part of the ARM mbed IoT Starter Kit with our Freescale FRDM-K64F Freedom development platform. This partnership enables those developing IoT applications to add intelligence to everyday items and quickly see their designs come to life.”

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ARM has signaled the importance of security in IoT with the acquisition of Offspark, the IoT’s leading security software company.

Offspark, a Dutch company, specializes in IoT communications security and its PolarSSL technology is already deployed in a wide variety of devices including sensor modules, communication modules and smartphones. As security is a requirement for all IoT deployments, this will help developers using the ARM® mbed platform to design and build IoT products with world-class communication security and software cryptography.

PolarSSL is the IoT industry’s most pervasive embedded Transport Layer Security (TLS) solution. It will form the core of the ARM mbed communication security and software cryptography strategy and will be rebranded as ARM mbed TLS. The technology will remain open source and will be made available to developers for commercial use.

“We have always said that security must be the foundation of any IoT system and the acquisition of Offspark is evidence of us making that happen,” said Krisztian Flautner, general manager, IoT business, ARM.

“PolarSSL technology is already deployed by the leading IoT players. The fact that those same companies also utilize ARM Cortex® processor and software technologies means we are now able to provide a complete bedrock solution for the industry to innovate from.”

“ARM is undeniably the front-runner in the embedded world and combining with them is the perfect way of scaling our business,” said Paul Bakker, CEO, Offspark. “Security is the most fundamental aspect in ensuring people trust IoT technology and that is only possible with a truly tailored solution. Together, ARM and Offspark can provide security to the edge of any system and we look forward to working with our partners to help them deliver some exciting new projects.”

ARM mbed TLS will be available for standalone use and as part of mbed OS, providing leading support for TLS and DTLS optimized for embedded devices and complements the Cryptobox technology of mbed OS that enables secure execution and storage. mbed TLS not only targets embedded devices but will continue to expand with features for the non-embedded arena as well. ARM will release mbed OS under an Apache 2.0 license which will include mbed TLS, Thread, and other key technologies toward the end of 2015.

The release of mbed TLS 1.3.10, is now available under GPL and to existing PolarSSL customers on polarssl.org.

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ARM® has announced a new software platform and free operating system to simplify and speed up the creation and deployment of Internet of Things (IoT) products.

The ARM mbed IoT Device Platform has been built around open standards and will bring Internet protocols, security and standards-based manageability into one integrated solution optimized for energy and cost-constrained devices. It is supported by the established and expanding mbed hardware and software ecosystem that will provide common building blocks for IoT devices and services. This new platform will accelerate the growth of the IoT by enabling innovators to focus on value-add features and differentiation.

The mbed IoT Device Platform includes the following elements:

• mbed OS: a free operating system for ARM Cortex®-M processor based devices that consolidates the fundamental building blocks of the IoT in one integrated set of software components. It contains security, communication and device management features to enable the development of production-grade, energy-efficient IoT devices. It is available to mbed partners in Q4 2014 for early development, with the first production devices due in 2015. Key benefits:
  • Enables companies to focus on innovation and differentiation, reducing development costs and time to market
  • Free for developers and for deployment, supported by an ecosystem of more than 100 OEMs and major chip vendors
  • Increases developer productivity by enabling software component reuse for shorter development cycles
  • Support for key standards such as Bluetooth® Smart, 2G, 3G, LTE and CDMA cellular technologies, Thread, Wi-Fi®, and 802.15.4/6LoWPAN along with TLS/DTLS, CoAP, HTTP, MQTT and Lightweight M2M.
• mbed Device Server: a licensable software product that provides the required server-side technologies to connect and manage devices in a secure way. It also provides a bridge between the protocols designed for use on IoT devices and the APIs that are used by web developers. This simplifies the integration of IoT devices that provide “little data” into cloud frameworks that deploy “big data” analytics on the aggregated information. Built around open standards, the product scales to handle the connections and management of millions of devices. mbed Device Server is available now. Key benefits:
  • Improves efficiency, security and manageability for devices utilizing a standards-based and IoT-optimized approach
  • Reduces the complexity of integrating IoT capabilities into existing cloud services
  • Unifies device and application data management using the same technology foundation and eliminating the need for duplicate infrastructure for clients and servers
  • Provides access to a large unified market of devices through open standards and the widely-deployed ARM partner ecosystem.
• mbed.org: the focus point for a community of more than 70,000 developers around mbed. The website provides a comprehensive database of hardware development kits, a repository for reusable software components, reference applications, documentation and web-based development tools. It is already well-established:
  • 1,000,000 project builds last year
  • More than 30 official boards
  • Eight years of IoT server and 6LowPan products
  • Five years of 24/7 cloud service operation
  • More than 9000 published projects.

“Deploying IoT-enabled products and services requires a diverse set of technologies and skills to be coordinated across an organization,” said Simon Segars, CEO, ARM. “ARM mbed will make this easier by offering the necessary building blocks to enable our expanding set of ecosystem partners to focus on the problems they need to solve to differentiate their products, instead of common infrastructure technologies. This will accelerate the growth and adoption of the IoT in all sectors of the global economy.”

The mbed partner ecosystem has been expanded to enable participation by a wide range of silicon, module, original equipment manufacturer (OEM), system integrator, cloud and operator partners. Launch partners for the mbed IoT Device Platform include Atmel, CSR, Ericsson, Farnell, Freescale, IBM, KDDI, Marvell, MegaChips, MultiTech, Nordic Semiconductor, NXP, Renesas, SeeControl, Semtech, Silicon Labs, Stream Technologies, ST, Telenor Connexion, Telefonica, Thundersoft, u-blox, wot.io and Zebra.

Krisztian Flautner, general manager, IoT business, ARM, said:

“Today’s IoT devices largely exist in isolation and it has been impossible to realize a truly interconnected world where devices are interoperable with many different cloud services. The ARM mbed IoT Device Platform will solve this by providing a common communication and management toolkit that can be used for a wide variety of purposes.”

“We expect mbed to significantly speed up the large scale deployment of a new breed of both IoT devices and cloud services.”

Partner quotes

Atmel: “By adopting the ARM mbed platform, Atmel broadens its breadth of easy-to-use hardware, software and development tools to help bring more IoT products and services to market,” said Steve Pancoast, vice president, software and applications, Atmel Corporation. “The mbed platform expands Atmel’s ecosystem for IoT developers across various functions from Makers to professional designers, offering an operating system solution that allows devices to talk to one another. We are excited to offer a Thread-compliant solution with the ARM mbed platform and to bring more interoperability to IoT devices.”

Ericsson: “As a leader in wireless networks, Ericsson welcomes initiatives to unify and accelerate the Internet of Things,” said Erik Ekudden, vice president, head of technology strategies, Ericsson Group Function Technology. “ARM’s mbed platform has the potential to enable thousands, if not millions, of connected applications in Ericsson’s vision: the networked society.”

Freescale: “Freescale and ARM share a common goal of rapidly enabling the Internet of Things, and Freescale already offers the industry’s broadest portfolio of mbed-supported MCUs,” said Geoff Lees, senior vice president and general manager, MCU group, Freescale. “ARM’s new mbed IoT Device Platform embodies this shared vision, and for customers looking to speed time-to-market, Freescale offers software services that streamline mbed-related development for Freescale MCUs.”

Marvell: “The Marvell E-Z Connect Wireless Microcontroller SoC family, including the MW300 Wi-Fi microcontroller, the MB300 Bluetooth microcontroller and the MZ100 ZigBee microcontroller, is the industry’s most complete line of silicon platform solutions for Internet of Things (IoT) applications,” said Philip Poulidis, senior vice president and general manager, mobile and IoT business units, Marvell Semiconductor. “We are targeting the broadest range of IoT applications such as wearables, home automation and security, personal health care, automotive, lighting and industrial. Marvell’s best-in-class silicon solutions utilize our decade-long leadership in developing embedded wireless solutions and our new products will now be designed to work with the ARM mbed platform to make it easy for original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to rapidly bring new, innovative IoT applications to market.”

SeeControl: “This is a much-needed effort to streamline the universe of technologies and options that define the Internet of Things (IoT),” said Bryan Kester, CEO, SeeControl. “The ARM platform offers a superior mix of IoT security tools, protocols and enabling technologies to enable hyperconnected edge networks that deliver a lot of computing without excess power consumption. Our enterprise customer and developer community are more productive than ever with the SeeControl and ARM mbed suite.”

wot.io: “ARM is one of the industry’s finest when it comes to microprocessing technology and we’re honored to partner with an organization of its caliber,” said Allen Proithis, president and founder, wot.io. “With ARM mbed as an integrated part of wot.io’s data service exchange for connected device platforms, wot.io is further fulfilling its vision to enable anyone deploying an Internet of Things solution to quickly connect, enhance and monetize data for business ROI.”

Zebra: “ARM’s mbed platform will deliver unparalleled opportunities to accelerate and promote the use of standards-based IoT solutions and it’s a perfect fit with Zebra’s ambitions for the future,” said Phil Gerskovich, senior vice president, new growth platforms, Zebra Technologies. “Zebra’s Zatar IoT platform combined with mbed IoT Device Platform technology will help to redefine the way devices connect to the Internet by facilitating efficient and secure communications.”

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Working with Oracle and ARM, Freescale defines a scalable, standards-based platform to support the secure delivery of IoT services.

Continuing its commitment to establish a secure and open infrastructure for the delivery of Internet of Things (IoT) services, Freescale Semiconductor today demonstrated the hardware platform that forms the foundation of the one box concept at the 2014 Freescale Technology Forum.

Featured prominently in today’s opening session at the 2014 Freescale Technology Forum, the IoT gateway is a flexible hardware platform to be equipped with multi-party software, and engineered to support the secure delivery of IoT services to end-users in a home, business or other location; thereby supporting the rapid deployment of a vast array of innovative IoT services.

The platform’s demonstration represents a significant milestone in Freescale’s one box initiative. Working with Oracle and ARM, Freescale developed this initiative to focus on the creation of a secure, standardized and open infrastructure model for the delivery of IoT services. The concept combines standards-based, end-to-end software with a converged IoT gateway design to establish a common, open framework for secured IoT service delivery and management. A “box” (or service gateway) built on the platform can consolidate boxes from multiple IoT service providers into a single, unified appliance that can support multiple service providers.

“Simplifying the deployment of secure services is critical to fueling widespread adoption of the Internet of Things,” said Geoff Lees, senior vice president and general manager of Freescale’s Microcontroller business.

“We are pushing the industry forward with an innovative enabling product platform that will help overcome some of the biggest barriers facing our customers.”

Freescale plans to offer the new platform in Q4 2014 with a software suite that integrates and pre-validates security and connectivity components, allowing developers to add value through application software development and connectivity of new edge node products.

Powered by a Freescale i.MX 6 applications processor built on the ARM Cortex®-A9 core, the platform runs Oracle Java SE Embedded and is suitable for basic networking and sensor connectivity. The solution supports the Wi-Fi, Bluetooth® low energy and 802.15.4 wireless interfaces. The initial Freescale IoT gateway platform also includes Oracle Event Processing for Oracle Java Embedded to facilitate quick reactions at the gateway level, as well as ARM Sensinode NanoServices software and Freescale-based processing.

Key features of the first product platform to be released:

• Fan-less gateway based on the low power i.MX 6 series processor measuring just 5.3″W x 3.9″D x 0.8″T
• Supports 802.11b/g/n out of the box with Bluetooth low energy and 802.15.4 (including ZigBee protocol) accessories and software available
• System can be configured as a Continua® Healthcare Compliant gateway for interoperability with home health products
• Pre-integrated Oracle software including Oracle Java SE Embedded as an application development framework, and Oracle Event Processing for Oracle Java Embedded, for building embedded applications to filter, correlate and process events in real-time
• ARM Sensinode’s NanoServices, providing end-to-end web services optimized for resource-constrained edge nodes

Pricing and availability

The dual-core i.MX 6 processor-based hardware platform is priced at $159 (USD) for the base model, and is available for order in September 2014. A version of the IoT gateway platform built on QorIQ LS series processors will be available in Q4 2014. This gateway platform will offer gigabit line rate Ethernet and PCIe connectivity, as well as additional wireless connectivity options including 4G/LTE and 802.11ac for edge nodes requiring high-speed data transport and efficient packet routing.

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Partnership Enables the Developer Community to Rapidly Create Devices Using CSR’s Wide Portfolio of Connectivity and Location Solutions with the Flexibility of ARM Microcontrollers.

CSR plc today announces that it has joined the ARM® mbed platform, an industry venture designed to nurture the growth of the Internet of Things (IoT), as a component partner. The partnership provides the mbed community access to CSR Bluetooth®, Bluetooth Smart, Wi-Fi® and GPS connectivity solutions and makes it easy for them to be integrated into existing microcontroller projects.

The ARM mbed IoT device development platform is an initiative which provides hardware and software building blocks to developers, lowering the barrier of entry for rapid development of Internet-connected products and concepts based on ARM microcontrollers. The project also enables easy integration of connectivity and software components.

As a component partner, CSR is providing access to its world-leading range of connectivity and location solutions. CSR will be working to provide the mbed community with simple software access to its desirable wireless connectivity technologies including GPS, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

Developers can take advantage of the diverse peripheral options offered by the ARM microcontrollers available from multiple vendors such as NXP, ST, and Freescale on the mbed platform and use CSR solutions to accelerate swift development of a vast array of IoT applications.

Anthony Murray, Senior Vice President, Business Group at CSR, says:

“Whether a developer wants to build a consumer wireless home security system or requires connection for sensors to an industrial control system, this partnership gives them simplified connectivity coupled with total flexibility of microcontroller selection.”

“With so many diverse devices being made that will be connected to the Internet, as well as with each other, this partnership reflects our commitment to ease developers’ efforts in getting their connected products to market quickly, easily and cost-effectively.”

“The ARM ecosystem is a cornerstone in the Internet of Things and the mbed platform being built together with our partners will play a vital role in accelerating the development of connected devices based on the ARM architecture,” said Simon Ford, director of IoT platforms, ARM.

“Lead partners such as CSR who are contributing a portfolio of connectivity and location solutions to mbed make these fundamental technologies accessible to developers. This is important to enable the growing community of entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs who are bringing the Internet of Things to life and shaping digital connectivity across industry, infrastructure and society.”

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New collaboration enables developers to create smart products with ARM-based industry-leading STM32 microcontrollers and accelerates the Internet of Things.

ARM®, the world’s leading semiconductor IP supplier, and STMicroelectronics, a global semiconductor leader serving customers across the spectrum of electronic applications today announced that ST has joined the ARM mbed Project. The agreement will give developers using ST’s STM32 microcontroller range, based on the ARM Cortex®-M processor series, free access to the mbed software, development tools and online collaboration platform, enabling them to realize their own visions for the new wave of intelligent electronics products.

ARM mbed is a collaborative industry project to nurture the Internet of Things (IoT) and meet the needs of a new professional developer audience. It delivers free tools and fundamental open-source hardware and software building blocks for the rapid development of innovative ARM-based devices. The project also enables the easy integration of connectivity, sensor and cloud service software components and the tools and support for a dynamic, collaborative developer and partner ecosystem.

ST’s STM32 microcontroller range starts at starts at just $0.32, and the MCUs address the full spectrum of applications from simple products to entire platform solutions. Combined with the mbed platform, this offers software portability, diverse connectivity options and a rapid development approach for a full range of Internet of Things (IoT) applications.

“The mbed project is bringing together leading technology companies to create a step change in productivity for embedded device development,” said Simon Ford, director, IoT Platforms, ARM.

“We have learnt from the web and smartphone revolutions that by building an open-source software platform with reusable software components and free development and collaboration tools, we can enable the creation of IoT and smart devices on a previously unimagined scale.”

“By joining the mbed project, ST is enabling developers across diverse markets to quickly prototype and create new products based on leading-edge STM32 microcontrollers,” said Daniel Colonna, Microcontrollers Marketing Manager at ST.

“The support for mbed will be launched in Q1 with a brand new line of STM32 microcontroller development boards to provide a consistent way to develop with devices across the STM32 portfolio at hardware and software levels.”

The first mbed-enabled STM32 development boards will be launched in February 2014, and support for other boards and targets will follow. Find out more and get involved at http://mbed.org

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ARM®, the world’s leading semiconductor IP supplier, and Telenor Connexion, a leading enabler of connected business solutions and part of Telenor Group, one of the world’s largest mobile operators, announce that Telenor Connexion has licensed ARM Sensinode software.

The agreement makes Telenor Connexion the first connected business solutions provider to offer end-to-end ARM Internet of Things (IoT) technology to its global customers. ARM Sensinode software enables Telenor Connexion to provide standards-based, energy-efficient and secure machine-to-machine (M2M) services that reduce time to market for smart products.

Telenor Connexion is currently serving customers in the telematics, asset management, mHealth, and advanced meter infrastructure (AMI) segments on three continents. ARM Sensinode software will add to Telenor Connexion’s offer of new IoT-focused value added services, including data management and data security, with an initial focus on cellular-connected endpoints. This agreement builds on the innovative and market-leading ARM Internet of Things technology that has already been integrated into Telenor Connexion’s range of Enterprise solutions.

Telenor Connexion plans to expand its portfolio of standards-based products and support IoT applications using ARM’s IP technologies and its NanoService data management and Web application platform. Telenor Connexion will develop connected business solutions that leverage ARM Sensinode technology, including key standards such as OMA Lightweight M2M, IPv6, TLS, DTLS, and CoAP. ARM continues to be a key contributor to the development and commercialization of many of these industry-standard technologies for which it provides best-in-class end-to-end software technology.

“We are delighted that Telenor Connexion recognizes the benefits and effectiveness of ARM Sensinode software,” said John Cornish, executive vice president and general manager, System Design Division, ARM.

“This relationship with a long-time leader in the creation and delivery of global M2M solutions represents a significant step forward for ARM, for Telenor Connexion, and for the new Internet of Things industry in building the embedded web.”

“In the future, everything that can benefit from being connected, will be connected, which makes the IoT a rapidly growing area. The advanced technology from ARM is an enabler for our M2M optimized solutions and will contribute to Telenor Connexion taking a standardized approach,” said Rickard Widerberg, VP of Product Marketing at Telenor Connexion.

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ARM® today unveiled the findings of a new comprehensive report by the Economist Intelligence Unit, “The Internet of Things Business Index: A quiet revolution gathers pace”.

Highlights:
» 96 percent expect their business to be using IoT in some respect by 2016
» More than three in five (61 percent) executives agree that companies that are slow to integrate IoT will fall behind their competition
» Collaborative business models, skills development and common standards needed for business to take full advantage of the Internet of Things

The report, sponsored by ARM, found that 75 percent of C-suite business leaders are actively researching opportunities created by the Internet of Things (IoT). The report also revealed that 30 percent of business leaders feel that IoT will unlock new revenue opportunities, but just as many (29%) believe it will inspire new working practices, eventually changing the model of how they operate (23%). The report concludes that the implementation of common standards will be paramount to enable communication between millions of connected devices and stop the ‘Internet of Silos’.

ARM CEO Simon Segars says:
“The Internet of Things runs on ARM. By connecting the next 30bn devices, the ARM ecosystem is transforming lives by improving the management of our cities, health services, environment and education systems. Our technologies provide the functional building blocks in a huge range of products including cars, heart monitoring systems, washing machines and lighting. Energy efficiency and miniaturisation are essential in these technologies, for example, the ARM Cortex-M0+ processor fits within the width of the average human hair – an essential component if we are to unlock the full business benefits of IoT. With this kind of innovative design, alongside our diverse, dynamic business ecosystem, we can unlock the full business benefits of IoT.”

The report highlights the need for a collaborative approach with companies needing to ‘learn to cooperate with players across industries’, encouraging standards that will avoid the so-called ‘Internet of Silos’ where data is created, but not shared amongst service providers to benefit the user.

Who is leading the charge?

• European businesses are ahead (see page 7 of report) of their global counterparts on the leader-board, in the research and planning phases of implementing IoT
• Manufacturing is leading the way (see page 7 of report) with IoT amongst the industries tracked, driven by the need for real time information to optimise productivity. One in four manufacturing companies already has a live IoT system in place. This sector is followed closely by construction and real estate

The top five barriers for companies increasing the use of IoT (top responses) are:

1. Lack of employee skills/knowledge
2. Lack of senior management knowledge and commitment
3. Products or services don’t have an obvious IoT element to them
4. Immaturity of industry standards around IoT
5. High costs of required investment in IoT infrastructure

“The self-stocking intelligent fridge is a step closer to becoming an everyday reality,” said James Chambers, editor of the report, “but conversations about IoT are clearly moving on. Two in five C-level executives are now telling us that they discuss IoT regularly.”

“Whether we will all end up wearing clothes connected to the Internet remains to be seen – but it’s hard to think of any business that can’t be part of the IoT revolution.”

Common Standards for Shared Success with IoT

The report suggests that only by removing data silos and establishing common standards will the IoT to achieve the scale needed to operate across all markets successfully. The emergence of big data is also an impact, with Honda handling terabytes of data stored in databases for 1.4m users. Now, more than ever, managing that data and being able to analyse the little data coming from the uptake of IoT.

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