Customers of a certain age will no doubt remember the cartoon about this! Many OEM remote telemetry units have fallen in the same trap! Not ours, we like to think, as we have developed a road map for successful implementations.

Helping OEM’s [Original Equipment Manufacturers] embed M2M technology into their products and use our cloud based SmartHub to drive immediate value is a big & growing part of our business.

We thought it would be interesting to share a few case studies. To do this we are sharing

1   What they wanted to achieve, and what were the critical factors

2   How we did it and added the “pixie dust” of exceeding expectations

3   How long it took to get to start of production

OEM Remote Telemetry Unit for Water Chlorine Monitor

Key needs:

1. Battery Powered, so low power consumption
2. High Quality analogue inputs
3. Compact, to fit in tight space envelopes
4. IP 67 rating
5. Robust comms, even in poor signal and poor antenna situations
6. Geolocation mapping
7. Full SmartHub

Delivered by:

The Nano ULTRA-Edge was designed from the pcb up, to deliver world beating low power consumption at <150 microamps when the modem is not being used. This means running on a couple of D cells and reportng in once a day, then battery life will be measured in years not months!

This remote telemetry unit for OEM’s also boasts 4 [upgradeable to 8] high quality analogue signal inputs. With resolution at 16 bits and with gain ranges configurable from the CDL SmartHub between 0 and 33V this gives what we call “Instrument Grade” analogue quality.

The Nano ULTRA-Edge RTU offers a host of other features that met the clients other needs – more details here.

And as soon as a unit is powered up it immediately becomes visible on the CDL SmartHub with all those features, of dashboards, visualisation, alarms, audit trails, trends, etc etc. More info on the CDL SmartHub can be found here.

From first touching the OEM’s Chlorine Monitor to working product in the field was 2 months, and volumes are now 30/month.

Monitoring and controlling an OEM range of Mobile cooling plant

This OEM who operates throughout Europe and has a very large number of designs of plant [30 plus variants] and a fleet of thousands of units, saw the potential benefits of remote monitoring with real time information via our cloud based portal.

Key needs were:

1. Modbus communications
2. Real time local monitoring, triggering alerts when needed
3. SmartHub design to aid local commissioning as well as fleet maintenance
4. Simple and fast re-allocation of remote telemetry units to different models of equipment

Delivered by…

CDL developed a specific client SmartHub with drop down menus, prepopulated, to list the variants of equipment. Once a machine type is selected the Modbus tables for real time and periodic [hourly/daily] monitoring are pre-set for each machine type. Alert levels have default levels pre set too, and a “live” process visualisation of the pumps and compressors on each unit is displayed and updated each time the equipment logged in. The client reported that commissioning times had been reduced from many hours to less than an hour with the benefit of the SmartHub dropdown tables and menus! See a selection of Dashboards here

Using Firmware Over The Air [FOTA] to keep the remote telemetry unit up dated, and using CDL expertise in SIM card and GSM techology to ensure communications from even the most challenging sites, the client now has a mechanism to monitor equipment, track equipment, maintain SLA levels with their customers, optimise use of service/field staff, as well as the customer experience and reduced hassle for staff.

Development time, programming and testing took c 6 months. The client is now rolling out implementation at a growing rate, currently 10/month, and adding new equipment to the lists of equipment covered.

Enabling cloud communications and SmartHub portal for an OEM  Vibration & Noise Instrument

CDL were contacted by a manufacturer of specialist Vibration and Noise monitoring instruments [an area where CDL have their own products too] to “web enable” their existing products.

Key Needs were

• Speed to implement [they had existing clients impatient for this service]
• Access to operating data via RS232
• 20 second polling of data sets
• Local intelligence to monitor against thresholds [set via the portal] and send data immediately if thresholds breached
• Otherwise, GSM transfer of data sets at user selected intervals, typically 1/hour
• Customised dashboards/SmartHub features, including branding for access by their end clients

Delivered by…

These were met within 48 hours by use of:

1. Existing Nano ULTRA-Edge remote telemetry unit for OEM hardware and firmware [FOTA enabled] and RS232, serial comms expertise.
2. CDL SmartHub, whitelabelled for client use.
3. Over the subsequent few weeks a customised dashboard was created and additional features enabled as discussions and the client relationship grew.
4. Volumes currently running at c5 systems a month.

The OEM journey

Regardless of industry there is a certain pattern to enabling M2M or remote telemetry units for OEM’s and we understand that journey.

We’ve written about it here too.

The institute of Asset Management wrote about us here

Take the first step…

To have a conversation about your needs for M2M, Internet of Things, Remote telemetry units, and embedded technology with SmartHubs, feel free to email or call either of the following Directors of CDL: