November’s release of the Connectivity Standards Alliance’s (CSA) Matter 1.0 standard was both a tremendous achievement and an exciting inflection point.
To date, smart-home devices haven’t always been able to communicate with each other, and smart homes haven’t always been easy to set up and manage. Building smart-home products has been difficult because the market is so fractured.
The Matter standard was created to make it incredibly easy to network smart-home devices (securely) and very simple to manage them. Developers of smart-home devices used to have to learn all the particulars of all the different smart-home ecosystems; now, they can just rely on Matter to handle communications with other devices.
We expect that wide interoperability, seamless connectivity, easy management and security—all relying on Matter—will be the catalysts that spur more growth in smartphones, laptops and increasingly intelligent home devices. We think Matter will make it possible to move beyond populating homes with individual smart devices or small islands of automation and begin to enable whole-house smart homes in 2023.
While the industry celebrates Matter 1.0 today, it should be even more excited about what ongoing development of Matter will enable for the future: more devices in even more diverse applications, not only in the home but also in industrial and commercial facilities. Matter 1.0 is just the beginning, and Silicon Labs will continue to be a key player by providing industry-leading products and Matter development solutions.
Silicon Labs’ solutions for Matter over Thread, Matter over Wi-Fi and Bluetooth LE commissioning for Matter are Matter-certified through CSA’s testing and certification process.
Internet of medical things
Health care is being transformed by remote patient monitoring. Driven by telehealth capabilities and artificial intelligence, medical professionals and their patients are finding great benefit in devices that detect medical episodes and monitor medication adherence. The ability to securely capture and transmit accurate patient data is leading to better medical outcomes, with the added benefit of reducing the number of in-person visits.
Connected IoT medical devices that are getting widely adopted include CPAPs (breathing aides), mPERs (emergency-alert devices), blood-glucose monitors and heart-rate monitors.
Recently, Bardy Diagnostics developed a new ambulatory cardiac monitor called the Carnation Ambulatory Monitor (CAM) patch. This small, lightweight device completely reimagines traditional cardiac monitors (Holter devices, a commonly used alternative, are cumbersome). The CAM patch, based on Silicon Labs’ EFM32 architecture, was designed for continuous operation for up to 14 days.
With the potential to revolutionize ambulatory cardiac monitoring and diagnostics, the CAM patch is an excellent example of how leaders in medicine and semiconductor technology can come together to develop state-of-the-art medical devices that help to keep patients well without interfering with their daily lives.
In 2023, Silicon Labs will continue to look for new opportunities to actively engage with medical partners seeking to exploit the potential of the internet of medical things.
AI and ML join the IoT
Also in 2022, Silicon Labs introduced the BG24 and MG24 families of systems-on-chip (SoCs) targeted at AI and machine-learning (ML) applications. BG24 devices support Bluetooth Low Energy (LE) while MG24 SoCs support Matter.
We invited more than 50 global customers to begin developing and testing these new solutions; our partners experienced quite a bit of success.
One example is Edge Impulse, which is now using the BG24 and MG24 to deliver a powerful embedded ML platform for companies building AI-aware products, including automated data labeling, pre-built digital-signal processing and ML blocks, live classification testing and digital twins that have reduced complexity and are easy to develop.
Another example is SensiML, which is also using the BG24 and MG24 SoCs to explore innovative and intelligent AI and ML applications for its customers.
In May, Silicon Labs hosted an online webinar entitled “AI/ML: Bringing Intelligence to the Edge on the MG24.” This resource is available online and is a “must see” for developers looking to deploy AI and ML in edge devices.
In 2023 and coming years, application developers will be able to use platforms like the BG24 and MG24 to push intelligent devices that can learn on the fly out to the IoT network edge.
Wi-Fi
IoT devices must have robust cloud connections, and many are required to provide an engaging user experience. For designers looking to get their IoT products to the market quickly, low-power Wi-Fi is the best choice to connect devices to the internet. Wi-Fi is the most prevalent protocol already available in homes and offices and can take advantage of low-power mechanisms to enable battery-operated devices to last longer.
Wi-Fi has been around for years and years, but we aren’t anywhere near exhausting its utility; the industry continues to improve Wi-Fi technology and continues to develop new frontiers for the standard to make Wi-Fi even more useful in the future.
In 2022, Silicon Labs continued to invest significantly in creating the hardware and software solutions required to optimize the power consumption in IoT devices and is the leader in low-power Wi-Fi 4 for IoT.
Looking forward to 2023, we have plans to further reduce power consumption in our products that support Wi-Fi 6 (the latest commercialized version of Wi-Fi). We are making them scalable, compatible with all major ecosystems and emerging standards, and interoperable with other wireless protocols.
That starts with our first Wi-Fi 6 SoC, the ultra-low–power SiWx917. We announced it in 2022 and, depending on when this article runs, it either just became available or it will be very soon. We designed the SiWx917 to be a sort of IoT multi-tool, an IoT product platform that will cover pretty much every household IoT device need. OEMs will be able to use it to build battery-driven IoT systems—everything from doorbells to robots—that:
- Support Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth LE, as well as work with Matter
- Work well alongside many other IoT devices (relying on sophisticated communications features like OFDMA, MU-MIMO, BSS coloring and others)
- Can connect through a single computer, smartphone or hub
- Will be incredibly energy-efficient, drawing minimal power
- Can learn using AI/ML capabilities
- Will be secure
Wi-Fi 6 is still relatively new, but the industry is already in the process of defining Wi-Fi 7. Wi-Fi 7, expected to be finalized in 2024, will have many improvements, the most eye-catching of which might be its speed. It should be so much faster that it might become a legitimate alternative to Ethernet cables in some applications.
Bluetooth
Also in 2022, Silicon Labs introduced its new Bluetooth Location Services solution using accurate, low-power Bluetooth devices to simplify angle-of-arrival (AoA) and angle-of-departure (AoD) location services.
This platform combined hardware and software to deliver industry-leading energy efficiency using the BG22 SiP modules and SoCs. The platform can operate for up to 10 years on only a coin-cell battery, with advanced software that can track assets, improve indoor navigation, and better locate tags with sub-meter accuracy.
This feature allows direction-finding that is accurate to within centimeters. When the industry added these capabilities to the Bluetooth specification, it envisioned all sorts of possible applications. Smartphone makers could adopt it to help customers quickly and easily find misplaced handsets. Shops could use it to help guide customers to the products they are looking for. Museums could use it to usher patrons to specific works of art they wish to see.
Borda Technology, which provides “IoT for Healthcare” products like asset management, asset utilization, patient throughput management and patient safety through real-time location services, was one of the first companies to adopt this new platform. The simplicity of Silicon Labs’ BG22 platform helped Borda dramatically decrease how long it takes to install its solution from several months to only a matter of weeks.
In 2023, we expect to be surprised by many more applications that developers create taking advantage of Bluetooth AoA and AoD.
Wi-SUN
Like other industries now leveraging the power of the IoT, utility companies are increasingly looking to use data received from devices to inform how they can better streamline and manage inefficiencies, identify where and when maintenance is needed and predict customer usage.
This is where the Wireless Smart Ubiquitous Network (Wi-SUN) continues to emerge. The Wi-SUN protocol delivers a large-scale, standards-based mesh-networking solution in long-range sub-gigahertz frequency bands that is impossible to achieve with existing mesh-networking IoT standards such as Zigbee, Thread, Z-Wave and Bluetooth mesh. Silicon Labs was an early adopter of Wi-SUN technology and in 2022 announced its FG25 SoC and the EFF01 RF front-end module.
The FG25 sub-gigahertz SoC can operate on a coin-cell battery for 10 years, making it an excellent fit for Wi-SUN’s ability to form mesh and star network topologies. It is optimized for low power and performance, both for the network and connected devices. Other use cases for Wi-SUN will include streetlights, asset tracking, environmental monitoring and structural monitoring, meaning the number of potential device connections in large cities could be of the order of millions, so lower power consumption will be a crucial requirement in future deployments and a continued focus for Silicon Labs in 2023.
Looking to 2023
2022 saw the world reawaken from the pandemic, and Silicon Labs wasted no time sharing the latest developments in its broad suite of IoT technologies with a remobilized world. With the new year quickly beckoning, it aims to enhance existing offerings while continuing to bring yet more innovations to the fast-evolving IoT space.