PowerCloud Systems, a Californian-based outfit, recently provided me with a demo of a very interesting solution for the parental control market. Skydog is a combination of software and hardware that enables parents to manage profiles and devices within a home network.  The management is done through a dashboard app that is accessible both online and on mobile, and essentially allows the user to customize Internet access of every member of a home network, across all connected devices. The hardware piece is essentially a gigabit router with up to 3 wireless and wired virtual networks for separate service zones. The smart router offers a number of functions, including bandwidth management controls for each user. The software part is a web-based application, which allows for a combination of both active and passive features. On the active part, the software offers filtering, blocking and restrictions on time, usage and access. Passive features include remote monitoring, notification, and activity tracking. Skydog also includes a nice array of security features as well, with a built-in firewall (with SPI and NAT), malware and phishing protection, unknown device connection blocking and automatic device fingerprinting, among others. The whole package leverages the power of the cloud, so that remote access is possible and no software installation is required on the different devices.

Having just returned from a whirlwind of company visits with a host of technology companies, a couple of things have struck me about the indoor location and retail technology markets.

Cybersecurity education is on the agenda in Algeria, with efforts to push the discipline at the academic level. CyberSec is a group of private sector enterprises focusing on awareness-raising about the dangers of cybercrime to the economic prosperity of the country. Presided by Abdelaziz Derdouri, CyberSec has been actively organizing a number of events for SMBs in order to inform and educate on cybersecurity for the commercial sector. Most recently, the CyberSec group has turned its efforts to raising awareness among the younger generation. On October 23, 2013, CyberSec organized the first Regional Conference on Cyber Security together with the University El Hadj Lakhdar of Batna and the Al Bayan ICT Academy. More than 200 students attended and the group distributed over 2,000 awareness brochures.

At first sight, 6LoWPAN seems like a dreadful acronym, but once you actually say it aloud a few times it starts actually making some phonetic sense. That is good, because the chances are that we’ll be referring to it quite frequently in the future. It stands for “IPv6 over Low-Power Wireless Personal Area Networks” and the technology it refers to is meant to enable wirelessly connected sensors to send data to the web by using IP. The gist of this is that, without IPv6, there wouldn’t be enough IP addresses to go around for the IoT and, without the low-power capability, the sensors with their tiny batteries and processors couldn’t take advantage of the new addressing scheme. The ability to connect the sensors directly to the web is, in turn, a significant piece of the overall IoT puzzle for two main reasons. First, the web can streamline the implementation of cloud-powered IoT applications by minimizing the need for routing sensor traffic over smartphones and other gateway devices. And second, the openness of the web can strengthen the network effect around the IoT.

With the recent update to the Windows Phone platform that adds support for 6 inch screens, Nokia can now offer a phablet to consumers. ABI Research believes that this is a good thing for Nokia, who has been trying to help Microsoft establish itself as the third mobile ecosystem. Considering how difficult success in the smartphone market has become, not being able to make smartphones such as phablets only made it harder for Nokia to compete on equal footing with Android OEMs.

The pay TV market has been witnessing growing competition over the past few years, especially in markets with a higher pay TV penetration, which have experienced a slower growth in subscriber base. Market maturity, increasing competition from alternative online TV services and uncertain economic situations are among the factors contributing to the slow subscriber growth. Pay TV operators have been finding ways to maintain the subscriber growth. Recently, pay TV operators such as TrueVisions from Thailand, Comcast from the U.S. have announced prepaid TV services as one of the churn reducing strategies. Prepaid TV customers will need to buy a set-top box and the basic package upon subscription for the first time. At the end of initial subscription period which is normally one month, customers are can decide to continue or stop the service.

It was a contrasting summer for smart meter deployment news in Europe.

There is a lot of speculation among the pundits about NOK acquiring the ALU radio business.  That wouldn’t be a bad thing for NOK, as they would bulk up their scale with valuable footprint in the USA.  LTE is just beginning a good run with lots of future business.  It would also provide ALU with cash to further develop their “Manage for Growth” businesses.  The French government should be happy as ALU continues as a French entity.