Notes from the Meetup #3: Getting things talking to each other
The third edition of the SmartSheffield meetup was held on Monday the 6th Feb 2017, and despite the freezing cold and rain we were graced with a record turnout. So thanks everyone who came along!
Here are my notes from the talks and conversations:
Ian Stewart from Arqiva’s
The Sigfox Network Rollout
Arqiva is a British telecoms infrastructure company, who operate two low-power wide area network technologies in the UK: FlexNet, which is used for connecting things like electricity and water smart-meters, and is being used in national roll-outs of those devices, and Sigfox which is perhaps more relevant to the SmartSheffield community as it provides an accessible test bed for connected sensors and devices.
Ian Stewart and Simon Scerri-Taylor talked us through Arqiva’s strategy in general, and the Sigfox implementation in particular.
Here are the key points:
Sigfox is low energy, low bandwidth and low integrity (meaning it doesn’t guarantee that all messages will get delivered).
It is a ‘lightweight’ network, or a 'chirping’ technology rather than a transmission technology.
It provides no encryption natively.
It’s messages transport 9 bytes of user data, alongside the package metadata.
The metadata includes the timestamp.
There is no handshaking - messages are simply sent three times in succession to improve the chances of reception.
Devices can send a maximum of 140 messages per day.
Data is stored in Sigfox’s cloud storage facility, where it can be accessed by clients or transferred and processed elsewhere.
Sigfox devices can potentially run for over a decade on a couple of AA batteries
Range depends on the environment and power used, but it does penetrate buildings and coverage can quite easily be extended (receivers are the size of a thick laptop).
There is a strong global community and 3rd party support ecosystem for the technology.
Arqiva’s have implemented Sigfox networks in 11 cities, including Sheffield.
All this means that this network is suitable for a large number of small, cheap devices that don’t need to continually transmit data, but only sporadically, or when things change.
Ian’s presentation and Q&A is on Trello, here: https://trello.com/c/v3tmPO1j
Mark Wheeler from Broadway Partners
WiFi via TV Whitespace
Mark Wheeler from Broadway Partners presented their work in TV Whitespace, i.e. using unused television spectrum, to deliver Internet connectivity to areas that are under-served.
Many of these areas are in rural and hard to reach parts of the country, and Broadway Partners have run successful trials in such places, notably on the isle of Aaron in Scotland. However there are a large number of under-served and digitally excluded communities in cities and towns as well, and the company is also developing urban solutions, working with housing associations and local authorities to fill in 'not-spots’ where the traditional phone and fibre-based market is not providing adequate coverage. TV Whitespace is particularly suitable for this as it provides for non-line of sight transmission, along with high bandwidth - by the end of the year 100mbps devices will be available for under £100.
Mark’s presentation and Q&A are on Trello, here: https://trello.com/c/4G1o13sK
Scott Knowles from ObjectForm
Barclay’s Pop-up Eagle Lab and LoRaWAN
Scott Knowles from 3D Printing firm ObjectForm talked to us about the ‘pop-up Eagle Lab’ he is organising with Barclays next month, and particularly the LoRaWAN (Long Range Wide Area Network) node that he is setting up.
Barclays Eagle Labs are innovation / incubation spaces that Barclays Bank are setting up around the country - there are currently 9 in operation, and Sheffield could become the next. In preparation for that, Barclays in conjunction with ObjectForm and Sheffield Hallam University, are running an Eagle Lab for a month as a trial, from the 27th February in the beautiful Sheffield Institute of Arts building on Fitzalan Square.
There will be a whole range of activities and technologies to try out and experiment with, and Scott will be publishing full details of the initiative soon (and we’ll report it when he does). Of particular interest to SmartSheffield, though, is the fact that the lab will be setting up Sheffield’s first LoRaWAN node and provides a great opportunity for developers to try out applications and see what the technology is capable of.
This also provides an opportunity to set up a community-run communications network in the city, and join other northern cities like Leeds and Manchester in joining the Amsterdam-based “Things Network” which is a global community of grassroots LoRaWAN network operators.
Scott’s talk and Q&A is here: https://trello.com/c/CS9dks0p
Kurtis Wright
My Sheffield Pound
The 4th speaker of the evening was Kurtis Wright, who explained his ambition to create a local digital wallet for Sheffield, in order to provide a convenient payment mechanism for local independent retailers, and boost the local economy by reducing payment fees and providing opportunities to keep money circulating within the city.
In essence Kurtis’ scheme is similar to other local currency schemes such as the Brixton or Bristol Pounds, and just like those it is a Sterling equivalent and has a fixed 1-to-1 exchange rate, however it differs in that it is designed to be digital first, with payment transactions via bluetooth LE, and uses blockchain as it’s secure ledger to record transactions.
Kurtis’ ultimate aim is to create an entire local ecosystem around the currency, with an e-commerce platform and a range of business, delivery and logistics services enabled through it.
Kurtis’ presentation and Q&A is here: https://trello.com/c/W284yVuT
SmartSheffield News
There’s no video of SmartSheffield news this month unfortunately, but here are the topics I raised:
Public City Centre WiFi
Sheffield City Council is currently seeking bids for a concession contract to provide free public wifi in the city centre. Sheffield Digital recently issued an open letter to the council to encourage them to consider a number of aspects of keen interest and importance to the local digital community.
This letter can be found here, and a follow up post is here.
“In Praise of Air” comes to an end
The 2 year planning permission for The University of Sheffield’s giant ‘catalytic poetry’ experiment is about to end, which means the huge banner showing a poem by Simon Armitage on the side of the Alfred Denny building is going to come down. The banner is treated with a photocatalytic surface developed at the university, that harnesses sunshine and oxygen to break down air borne pollutants. It’s estimated that the banner has removed over 20 tons of pollutants from the air since it was put up twenty years ago, and represents a world first in urban air quality interventions of this type.
More information about this is available here.
Air Pollution Petition
On the theme of the city’s air pollution problem, there is a petition currently active on Change.org requesting a new Air Pollution Action Plan for the city.
The petition and accompanying open letter is here.
#SYGrit
There is a #SYGrit hashtag on Twitter that is used by local authorities, partners and the public to keep people informed about gritting across South Yorkshire, including asking people to report the levels of their local grit bins. This is worth bearing in mind should anyone experiment with using sensors to monitor grit-bin levels.
State of Sheffield Report
The State of Sheffield Report is being launched on Tuesday the 14th Feb. This will be the seventh year of the report, which is designed to take a sober and honest look at the city across a number of different dimensions, and represents a good way of understanding the major challenges that the city faces.
Information about the report, and its previous editions, can be found here.
Sheffield City Region Vision - A Better Future Together
For roughly a the last year, Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust and the two Sheffield universities have been working with other partners to develop a vision for the city region that takes a 25 year view of its challenges and opportunities. This vision document is being launched on Friday the 17th Feb.
More information can be found here.
SmartCity Funding Opportunities
Following the talks, we also discussed some smart city funding opportunities, and how we might work together to unlock some of them. Below are the three funds that I highlighted that could present opportunities for the Sheffield smart city ecosystem to develop consortia and pilot projects. In addition, we discussed whether to use some of the meetup time to develop ideas and proposals, but the consensus decision was that the meetups weren’t the best forum for this, mainly because this process needs time and attention, both of which are in short supply at the meetups especially following a good programme of talks and discussion.
Therefore, we will look to create some side-events to look at specific opportunities and invite the community to self-select their attendance and level of participation. We can either organise these or promote and support community members who want to initiate their own collaborations (likely both), so please get in touch and let us know if there is an opportunity you would like to work on and are seeking partners to develop with, and we’ll get the word out and help with venue, etc.
Here are the current funding opportunities that we highlighted at the meetup:
Innovate UK: Innovation in Infrastructure Systems - Round 2
In summary:
Projects must show significant innovation in one of the priority areas:
‘smart’ infrastructureenergy systemsconnected transporturban living
Proposals must improve business growth, productivity and/or create export opportunities for at least one UK small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) involved in the project.
There are 2 competition options:
£5 million for projects that last from 3 months to 1 year with costs from £25,000 to £100,000£10 million for projects lasting from 1 year to 3 years with costs between £100,000 and £5 million
The competition opened on 16 January 2017.
Initial registrations must be in before midday on 15 March 2017.
Full details can be found here.
Innovate UK: Sustainable Urbanisation Global Initiative - Food/Water/Energy Nexus
In summary:
This competition looks for new understanding and solutions to the systemic management of food, water and energy in cities. It is an international collaborative competition requiring the participation of at least 3 different countries.
The total available budget for this competition is €28.5 million, including support from the European Commission through Horizon 2020. The UK is to provide around £1.6 million in order to fund 6 to 7 UK projects. The maximum amount of funding for a UK project will be €300,000.
Collaborative UK consortia will be jointly funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) and Innovate UK. All UK consortia must include partners and work programmes that are relevant to all 3 funding agencies. The UK element of the competition will be managed by ESRC.
The competition opened on 9 December 2016
The deadline for pre-proposals is 6:00pm (GMT) on 15 March 2017
Full details are here.
Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund - Integrated & Sustainable Cities
This funding stream is still in the consultation phase and full details have not been released yet, however we know that the “Integrated and Sustainable Cities” application area is one of ten areas the UK government is looking to support with research and development funding under this umbrella, and there is an article on the current situation and planned activityat Innovate UK’s blog here.
Right, that’s it for this month. Thanks everyone for coming and getting involved!
We’ll announce the next meetup, and workshop activities shortly but meanwhile please mark Monday the 6th March in your diary as that will most likely be the date of the next meetup.
Cheers,
