IoT hackathon at the IoT Solutions World Congress
AllWize and the Wize Alliance organised a hackathon at the IoT Solutions World Congress on the 17th of October 2018. Participants of the hackathon had one day to create innovative applications with our IoT development tool the AllWize K1 - the first IoT development kit using the Wize technology. The applications had to be feasible not only technically but also in terms of business.
AllWize’s IoT development kits use Wize. This technology is revolutionary in the way it consumes very few energy (battery lasting up to 20 years), has a long range (communications up to 20km) and most importantly has a deep radio penetration meaning that devices can be put underground, in basements, inside buildings and still send signals (for more info on Wize click here). AllWize products are cheap and easy to programme thanks to Arduino. They are meant for people or businesses to test and make proofs of concept using the Wize technology.
The hackathon started with a short presentation of the Wize Alliance by François Moreau, head of the development committee of the Wize Alliance. Then Marc Fàbregas Bachs, CEO of AllWize, presented AllWize and the Wize technology and finally Xose Pérez, CTO of AllWize & maker, explained the rules of the hackathon and the technical aspects necessary for the development of IoT applications.
24 people participated at the hackathon and formed 5 groups composed of diverse profiles. It was necessary to have eclectic groups in order to come up with innovative ideas, develop a functioning applications in terms of hardware, software AND business. We had people with different backgrounds (developers, business people, physicists, programmers, engineers, UX designers, makers, etc) that created eclectic groups, like mini startups.
Here are the use cases the different groups had:
BeWize: monitor energy consumption around farms, scheduling the best time to irrigate crops to decrease consumption of water.
AllWize Safe: enable more security in remote areas like natural parks, an AllWize K1 would be given to the visitors to locate them in case of emergency using a GPS and an simple button.
PipeSnoop: detect water leakage in pipelines using a network of microphone sensors detecting a change in noise to enable maintenance of water systems.
FarmCo.: monitor livestocks using temperature and GPS sensors.
Groupe 2 (no specific name): control wild nests and detect animal movements using temperature, humidity and movement sensors.
At the end of the day, all the groups presented their project in a pitch competition judged by a jury composed of:
Patrick Cazein – Product line Manager at Sagemcom / member of the alliance's marketing and communication committee
Arnaud Philibert – Edel Energy / business developer and member of the alliance
Alain Désandré – Head of Smart Metering at GRDF / Head of Technical Committee of the alliance
David Hernandez - CEO of Aqualogy / Suez
Groups all made technically functioning applications and very useful business use cases. Nonetheless, the jury had to choose only one use case... and AllWize Safe (to be pronounced *always safe*) won them over with their example of mushroom seekers getting lost in Catalonian mountains 🍄.
Their idea is to equip national parks with AllWize Safe that would be distributed at their entrance. Visitors would then be able to get in touch with security even in places with no signal, thanks to Wize long range connectivity. The GPS integrated in the AllWize Safe would localise visitors in danger. They even though of next development of the company with drones embarking AllWize gateways circulating in national park to make sure that the coverage is complete. Pretty clever, huh?!
Overall, this hackathon has been a real success, groups really bonded during this intense day. They all were able to mix and provide their most valuable skills to make use cases come to life!
Thanks to everyone, this hackathon has been wonderful 🎉