Author Archives: Justine Astier

Ecoism, the invention that will make you save energy

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Ecoisme was created in 2013 in London, England where its headquarters are still located. The goal is to help people save money on electricity bills and to save energy resources at the same time. Their partners are energy distributors such as EDF, Virgin, Telekom, Dubai electricity and water authority.

Discovered during the CES 2017, Ecoism 2.0 is an energy monitoring system that monitors your heating, your oven, your television, and all your domestical eletronic device. Ecoisme can manage them according to the local tariffs and user habits.

But that’s not all, because Ecoisme is monitoring electricity usage of your major appliances and applying its machine learning algorithms Ecoisme can  predict when an appliance is likely to fail. It can help you to save some money by being better prepared of the future failure.

Ecoism is a sensor to connect to any electrical panel, by using two clamps and an application.
The Ecoisme kit consists of the sensor and the mobile application. It just needs to connect Ecoisme to electrical panel and download the app.
Then sensor turns fuse box into a data center. The application becomes energy manager, which takes care of energy bills. It lets know how to optimize energy within homes to be able eliminate overpayments. It gives you personalized advice and recommendations directly on your smartphone.

 

If you have solar pannels, Ecoisme is able to monitor the level of solar energy charge and will let its user know when its level has been exhausted or when they have extra energy for sale.

The nespresso of wine

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After winning the price of “Best Start up” CES 2016, the French 10-vins company has again surprised this year with its new model of D-vine called “Connect”.

This company based in Nantes (West of France), was created in 2012 by three graduated engineers passionnated by wine.

Initially, the company selling bottles of wine of 10cl, equivalent to a glass of wine. In 2014, the 10-vins team launched its machine called D-VINE. They presented their invention in the 2016 CES : a machine able to reproduce the effects of a carafe and the gestures of the sommelier to obtain the same effects at home and instantly without having to wait several hours that the wine is at good temperature and properly oxygenated.

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And they made it even better in this new 2017 edition of CES : they presented the “Connect” the  sister of D-vine. This time, the machine is more interactive and give advice to its users about the wine they should consume with the meal they are eating. With Connect, the company wants to “(…) bring a complete wine experience and make users’ lives easier with a personal wine assistant.”

 

The price of this machine will surely frustrate more than one as it is sold at the price of 800 euros. However as the founders of the company explains, their main customers will be the hotels.

End of 2017 10-wines aims to open a complete cocktail bar in California. Subsequently, it hopes to make available its D-Vine Connect for households in 2018.

Wait and see

iO camera soon available

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Available on January 10, 2017, the iO camera from Giroptic is a handheld camera to attach to iPhone or iPad via the lightning port. The Giroptic iO will offer a high quality 360 degree view, useful for the retransmission of events in live for example.

Giroptic is an international company based in San Fransisco, California and Lille, France. Founded in 2008 it is a pioneer in the 360 ​​degree.

The Giroptic iO has two sensors with an aperture at f / 1.8 and a viewing angle of 195 ° each (connections are automatically made). It is made of an aluminium case of 73 x 73 mm (70 grams) and integrates a battery of 915 mAh.

This version is only usable with Apple devices because it requires a lightning port. It will allow users to capture up to 7.37 Mpixels and videos (1920 x 960 pixels at 30 fps, H.264) at 360 degree and even to record live videos. For now, only YouTube is the only platform compatible for live video, but Facebook could be the next plateform to offer hosting.

“An Android version is on the way, but will not happen immediately” according to the company

 

http://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2016/12/13/13920330/giroptic-io-360-camera-attachment-live-stream-price-impressions

https://www.giroptic.com/intl/fr/giroptic-io

Giroptic iO puts a live-streaming 360 camera onto your iPhone

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Welcome to Amazon go !

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There we are, Amazon did it : the  e-marketplace has just opened its first supermarket in Seattle (United States). Called Amazon Go, the store has the particularity of not having check-out, all going through a mobile app associated with an Amazon account. Unfortunately,  this store is only in test for now and is just opened for Amazon’s employees. It should be open to the public at the beginning of the year. Moreover, if tests are successful, Amazon plans to open more than 2,000 grocery stores, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, citing sources.

To enjoy Amazon Go, people will need to install the application and scan the barcode displayed on the screen before entering. Afterwards, they could store their smartphone and they will only have to take the items that interest them. Once their shopping is over, they will simply have to go out of the shop, without having to open their bag. The exit of the user will be detected and, as the user passes through the exit, the user, without having to stop or otherwise be delayed, will be sent the invoice on smartphone, with an automatic payment in the wake.

Called “Just walk out technology”, Amazon remains rather vague about how the store will work. They’re explaining that they are using computer vision, deep learning algorithms, sensor fusion, technologies that can be found in self driven cars. More details will be given next years with the opening of their stores

 

 

 

Stay tuned !

 

References:

http://www.geekwire.com/2016/amazon-go-works-technology-behind-online-retailers-groundbreaking-new-grocery-store/

http://www.news18.com/news/tech/amazon-challenges-supermarkets-opens-line-free-grocery-store-1319789.html

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Li-Fi : 100 times faster than standard Wi-Fi

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Li-Fi has often made the news in recent years but has never been commercially materialized. However, things should start to move with the announcement by the French company Lucibel of the marketing of the first Li-Fi luminaire. Developed in partnership with the Scottish company PureLIFI and manufactured in France, the product is in the form of Led ceiling lighting connected to the Internet via an RJ45 (Ethernet) cable and a transceiver that provides modulation and Receives the signal sent by the connected terminal. The latter uses a Li-Fi USB stick to receive the data.

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The lifi, for light fidelity is “the internet by light”.

The term Li-Fi was invented by Professor Harald Haas of the University of Edinburgh at a TED conference in 2011
“Internet by Light” is the way Cedric Mayer -one of the co-founders of Oldecomm, a French start-up that sells this application to the general public- calls it.
The big advantage of the Li-fi (Light Fidelity) is to be able to emit 1GBit per second, 10 times faster than Wifi.

How does Li-Fi work?

Li-Fi and Wi-Fi are quite similar as both transmit data electromagnetically. However, Wi-Fi uses radio waves while Li-Fi runs on visible light.

As we now know, Li-Fi is a Visible Light Communications (VLC) system. This means that it accommodates a photo-detector to receive light signals and a signal processing element to convert the data into ‘stream-able’ content.

An LED lightbulb is a semi-conductor light source meaning that the constant current of electricity supplied to an LED lightbulb can be dipped and dimmed, up and down at extremely high speeds, without being visible to the human eye.

For example, data is fed into an LED light bulb (with signal processing technology), it then sends data (embedded in its beam) at rapid speeds to the photo-detector (photodiode).

The tiny changes in the rapid dimming of LED bulbs is then converted by the ‘receiver’ into electrical signal.

The signal is then converted back into a binary data stream that we would recognise as web, video and audio applications that run on internet enables devices. (http://www.techworld.com/big-data/what-is-li-fi-everything-you-need-know-3632764/)

 

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Advantages of LiFi

  • LED bulbs are increasingly used (we find them everywhere: car, house, city, etc.)
  • This makes it a potential access point
  • From an economic point of view, this technology is cheaper than radio technology
  • The LiFi has a theoretical transmission potential well above radio wireless (x10,000). At present, the bit rates reached are 10 Gbit / s
  •  Unlike its WiFi counterpart, the light does not cross the walls. It will therefore be easier to protect access to its network

    BUT….

  •    LiFi is currently a unidirectional technology. It must therefore be coupled with another technology (CPL, WiFi) or be used in specific cases (need only downflow);
  •  Obviously to operate the light should always be on and visible from the receiverConclusion : Thanks to advances in throughput and architecture, the LiFi becomes an increasingly credible and promising wireless technology. Despite the fact that it is unidirectional at the moment, the possibilities of use are numerous (road network, geolocation, underwater communication, etc.).

 

Sources: http://www.oledcomm.com/fr/product-overview

http://www.futura-sciences.com/tech/actualites/internet-li-fi-internet-haut-debit-lumiere-arrive-marche-maj-59745/

http://www.techworld.com/big-data/what-is-li-fi-everything-you-need-know-3632764/