Android Things on TechNexion Pico i.MX7D, i.MX6UL and soon i.MX8M


Google Android Things launch partner, TechNexion Pico Pi SoM is an ARM Powered Google Android Things IoT development System on Module, the NXP Pico i.MX7D Dual Core ARM Cortex-A7 with ARM Cortex-M4, NXP Pico i.MX6UL and soon also it will be with 64bit i.MX8M Quad Core ARM Cortex-A53 and ARM Cortex-M4. These TechNexion Android Things System on Modules can dock into a Raspberry Pi form factor for development and expansion of advanced IoT projects using Android Things, you can read more about Android Things at http://iot.google.com and https://developer.android.com/things/hardware/developer-kits.html

you can see the TechNexion Android Things SoM at the Google I/O keynote about Android Things 19 minutes, 50 seconds into the video here:

Toradex at Microsoft Booth with Azure IoT Hub, Windows 10 IoT Core and Windows Embedded Compact

Posted by – May 19, 2017

At the Microsoft booth, Toradex demonstrated its multiplatform system connected to the Microsoft Azure IoT Hub – the Cloud Parking demo. Toradex System on Modules (SoMs) were employed in the access control, license plate recognition and the payment system, the communication between them made only through the internet, using only the Azure services. Linux, Windows 10 IoT Core, and Windows Embedded Compact are used as Operating Systems on the modules. Additionally, an interesting Toradex showcase included their new Heterogeneous Multicore Low Power demo featuring the Colibri iMX7D based on the NXP i.MX 7 Dual Core SoC.

Hololens at Microsoft Embedded World Booth Tour and Toradex, Azure Windows 10 IoT Core


My first time trying on the Microsoft Hololens headmounted augmented reality system running on an Intel cherrytrail system selling at $3000 on the Microsoft store. In this video I walk around the Microsoft booth at Embedded World, checking out some of Microsoft’s partners including Microtronics smart bicvcle running Silicon Labs ARM Cortex-M system through Windows Server. This video features Toradex at 4:13 into the video demonstrating its multiplatform system connected to the Microsoft Azure IoT Hub where Linux, Windows 10 IoT Core, and Windows Embedded Compact are used as Operating Systems on the modules featuring Heterogeneous Multicore Low Power Colibri iMX7D based on the NXP i.MX 7 Dual Core SoC.

Fotokite Pro drone, tethered autonomous drone with Unlimited flight time, aerial live video

Posted by – May 19, 2017

As a spin off from Swiss ETH Zurich University, the Fotokite Pro is the drone that CNN, BBC and many other News media are already using to easily create live aerial video for example to report live when people were queuing to vote at the US election, it is the only drone approved to be used by the FCC because it is tethered. Being tethered allows it to be lighter since it doesn’t fly with a battery, it can fly for an unlimited amount of time getting power through the cable, it’s safe because it is tethered not needing on board GPS, on board computer vision, and more. A live low-latency uncompressed Full HD video downlink enables effective framing and live broadcast using an external HDMI or SDI port. The Fotokite Phi in the consumer version, more compact, lighter and most affordable GoPro-carrying quadcopter yet that was successfully crowdfunded for $249 each at Indiegogo.

Intel Altera ARM Powered FPGA 96Boards Chameleon96 development board by Novtech

Posted by – May 19, 2017

Running Altera Cyclone V SoC HPS consists of a dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore processor, a rich set of peripherals, and a multiport memory controller shared with logic in the FPGA, giving you the flexibility of programmable logic and the cost savings of hard intellectual property (IP) with the Intel ARM SoC FPGA Embedded Development Suite. The Arrow Chameleon96 Community Board features an Intel PSG Cyclone V SoC FPGA based system that adheres to the Linaro http://96Boards.org open platform specification. The board includes industry standard interfaces and expansion headers for 96Boards compatible mezzanine cards and interface kits. Unlike other 96Boards, the Chameleon96 board includes Intel PSG’s SoC FPGA which combines the performance of a dual core ARM Cortex-A9 processor with the flexibility of programmable logic, providing the ultimate in system customization. Programmable logic is ideal for accelerating embedded software with custom hardware.

The Chameleon96 board includes a quantum-resistant Key Agreement Protocol and Digital Signature Algorithm reference design from SecureRF. These Public Key methods feature small, fast, and very low-energy solutions designed to accelerate the development of authentication and data protection solutions for the Internet of Things. For availability of additional security methods for the Chameleon96 board, including Secure Boot, Secure Firmware Updates and Secure Firmware Delivery.

Texas Instruments Industry 4.0 for the Smart Factory

Posted by – May 19, 2017

TI is displaying how they plan to increase efficiency and flexibility of smart factories, demonstrating analog components for temperature measurement, humidity, bluetooth interfaces, IO-Link to AM5728 dual-core ARM Cortex-A15 at 1.5Ghz and more.

Makeblock Airblock and Neuron electronic modules for makers

Posted by – May 12, 2017

Makeblocks are modular arduino robots for stem education. The Airblock is a Modular and Programmable Drone with drone mode, underwater and hovecraft. The the airblock sells for $179. The ultimate robot kit is an Arduino and Raspberry Pi compatible robot kit that can take the form of a Rolling Tank, Detecting Robot, Catapult Ram, and Robotic Ant. There are ten assembly ideas in the box. The ultimate robot sells for $189. The starter robot kit is a lower end arduino compatible robot kit that sells for $149. The starter kit can be made into a robot tank or a three-wheel robot car. And then there is Makeblock Neuron which is an An Electronic Building Block Platform successfully got crowdfunded at on Kickstarter.

Android Things (Brillo) explained by Karim Yaghmour and Chris Simmonds at Embedded World

Posted by – May 9, 2017

Karim Yaghmour (author of Embedded Android: Porting, Extending, and Customizing) and Chris Simmonds (author of Mastering Embedded Linux Programming) talk about the state of Android and Linux in the Embedded World.

Christophe Arviset, ESA Gaia and Euclid Missions Online Data Sharing

Posted by – May 9, 2017

Christophe Arviset is the Head of the Data and Engineering Division at ESA’s European Space Astronomy Centre (ESAC). The European Space Agency’s (ESA) current mission Gaia and upcoming one Euclid will generate massive amounts of astronomical data to be made freely available on-line through powerful data management systems. This big data era brings a change of paradigm and associated big challenges for building these missions’ archives. The current use case of “bring the data to the user” is being replaced by the new concept of “bring the user to the data”. This new generation of science archives is transforming into science exploitation and collaborative platforms, where the users can send her/his code to the data, run it on computing and storage services provided directly by the archive (where the data reside), and easily share all this with other scientists they’re collaborating with.

You can watch Christophe Arviset’s keynote at Linaro Connect here:

ARM mbed OS 5.4 with med Cloud device management, bootloader and filesystem infrastructure

Posted by – May 9, 2017

The mbed OS 5.4 release incorporates functionality to prepare for mbed Cloud device management services including bootloader and filesystem infrastructure and the certified Thread 1.1 stack for developers with target platform support up to 74 targets. Since there’s been releases up to mbed OS 5.4.4 you can read more about it here.

Ohmatex Smart Clothing with NIRS (Near Infra-Red) and EMG sensors for ESA

Posted by – May 9, 2017

Ohmatex of Denmark is an expert in smart textile technology developing products and solutions for integrating electronics into textile. Ohmatex currently has a contract with the European Space Agency (ESA) to develop a garment with NIRS (Near Infra-Red) and EMG sensors to monitor leg muscle activity during astronaut training. Filmed at the IDTechEx show!

Smart Textiles at the North Carolina State University

Posted by – May 9, 2017

Students at the North Carolina State University work on smart clothing, designing interesting dresses, smart clothes, for it to be useful and look good.

Flex (Flextronics) Flexible electronics, wearables, augmented reality


Flex (formerly known as Flextronics) is the world’s second largest global electronics manufacturing services (EMS), original design manufacturer (ODM) company by revenue, after Foxconn to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). Headquartered in Singapore and has manufacturing operations in over 40 countries, totaling approximately 200,000 employees.

TSCH (time synchronized channel hopping) by Dust Networks of Linear Technology

Posted by – May 9, 2017

Dust Networks of Linear Technology pioneered time synchronized channel hopping TSCH, in which all motes in the network are synchronized to within a few microseconds. Filmed at the IDTechEx show!

Highly conductive textiles for wearables by the Korea Institute of Material Science

Posted by – May 9, 2017

KIMS project group consisting of Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS), Korea Institute of Machinery and Materials (KIMM), Jinwoo Textile Co. Ltd., and Alink Co. Ltd. is established for developing industrial production systems of highly conductive textiles and thin films which are applicable to flexible and wearable electronics. Filmed at the IDTechEx show.

Fairphone2 with Ubuntu Touch ported by UBPorts

Posted by – May 8, 2017

UBports has ported Ubuntu Touch to the Fairphone 2 smartphone. The Fairphone 2 is designed to be ethical, repairable, upgradeable, and controlled by the user. The Fairphone 2 has a Snapdragon 801 processor, 2mp front camera, 8mp back camera, 5″ 1080p display, 32GB of storage, 2gb of ram, MicroSD and Micro-USB.

Sentio Superbook Lapdock using DisplayLink

Posted by – May 8, 2017

Sentio is the new company name making Andromium OS “Android Continuum” and their SuperBook Lapdock project that has collected $2.9 Million on Kickstarter. This DisplayLink Powered Lapdock is a laptop dock that can connect to any Android phone that has USB OTG, it can connect over USB Type C or Micro USB and offers a desktop experience with trackpad and Keyboard. The lapdock relies on Andromium OS to provide this desktop experience. It is not confirmed yet (as far as I know) how many apps will be supported to run as multi-window, they are not changing the Android firmware, they run Andromium OS as just an app. The display is 11.6″ (HD or FullHD) and offers 8 hours of battery life. The Price is to be $100 dollars and up after they start shipping to their backers on Kickstarter.

GPU for ARM Cortex-M, Think Silicon NEMA, 0.1mm2 @ 28nm

Posted by – May 8, 2017

Think Silicon NEMA GPU Series and NEMA dc are claimed to be the world’s smallest 2D/2.5D/3D GPU and display controller. They have been specifically designed for area constrained wearable devices, embedded systems and IoT platforms where power consumption and battery life is crucial while still maintaining vibrant graphics and fluid smartphone performance-like user interface performance. The NEMA GPU Series is what Think Silicon claims to be the only GPU which works with SoCs sporting a 32-bit MCU such as the ARM Cortex-M by utilizing the MCU by just 3-4%. Think Silicon’s GPU for Embedded silicon footprint can be of 0.1mm2 @ 28nm, has leakage power GPU consumption of 0.07mW. Implementing Think Silicon’s patented compression technologies (TSFBc and TSTXc) limits memory power consumption to just 0.03mW (in DDR-less systems). With Think Silicon’s proprietary graphics API NEMA|GFX and the GUI Developer Toolkit NEMA|GUI, developers can use these tools provided by Think Silicon to create their individual Graphical User Interface in a fraction of time. Tools and the GPU Bitstream (NEMA|Bits) are available for free to download at http://think-silicon.com

Pertie Gligo E Ink Smartwatch

Posted by – May 8, 2017

The Gligo watch two is a E Ink smartwatch. The E Ink display is segmented and there are analog hands for telling time. The smartwatch can provide notifications, time and heart rate. The e-ink smartwatch is available in a wide array of styles. The price is $50-60 in bulk.

Maxustech Welle: Ultrasound Touch and Gestures onto any surface

Posted by – May 8, 2017

Maxustech presents Welle that uses Ultrasounds to enable a pressue sensitive touch surface on any table or wall for interacting with a user interface. This touch surface uses ultrasound technology to track your motions. The touch surface can be used for remotely controlling devices such as IoT. Maxus Welle is successfully being crowdfunded on Kickstarter