subject: Neul Launches smart City In Cambridge [print this page] Wireless pioneer Neul today announced the deployment in Cambridge UK of the worlds first city-wide, fully-functional wireless network in white space, enabling a whole host of smart city applications.
Neul, in collaboration with BGlobal, today showcased the first-ever smart electricity meter reading over a white space network seen anywhere on the planet.
It is the first step towards smart grids that will allow electricity supply to be more efficiently matched to real-time demand.
As well as the smart grid, Neuls network opens up a number of fascinating possibilities for the smart city of the future enabling smarter transport and traffic management, city lighting and other municipal services.
The city of the future is being delivered through a new wireless standard called 'Weightless' specifically designed for embedding in electricity and gas meters, air quality sensors, recycling points, street lighting, parking spaces and traffic lights things rather than people.
White space is the unused and underused parts of the wireless spectrum. For example, around the world many TV channels are left vacant in most locations.
Neuls technology opens up these channels and will also allow underused frequencies within other UHF licensed and unlicensed bands to be used efficiently for wireless communication.
Neuls network builds on the successful completion of the first phase of the Cambridge White Space Consortium's network, also announced today.
The consortiums phase one network used Neul's equipment and cloud interface, together with the Weightless communications standard, to prove that its white space network co-exists perfectly with televisions and wireless microphones without causing interference or disruption.
Neuls network will now build on that foundation for commercial trials later this year with full roll out anticipated in 2013.
Glenn Collinson, co-founder and director at Neul, said: In a world of smart phones and mobile broadband it is easy to imagine that wireless connectivity has now been solved.
It hasn't. Mobile broadband is too expensive for 'things' in the smart city. Also mobile broadband means battery powered devices would need changing far too often. And all those sensors would load the cellular networks to such a level that there would be little network capacity left.
Mobile networks are great for people but terrible for machines. At Neul we have demonstrated that the smart city can happen now through Weightless.
Neuls network comprises:-
Five base stations around the city of Cambridge
One base station in a rural community south of Cambridge
A cloud-hosted network Operational & Management Centre (OMC) that efficiently and securely manages the communications between the internet and the things
Support for multiple geo-location databases that ensure wireless microphones, TV transmission and reception is not disrupted.
Will Strauss, chief analyst with Forward Concepts said: In the last few years weve heard a great deal about white space and the opportunities it will bring.
With many countries approving the necessary legislation, the launch of the worlds first city-wide white space network coupled with the demonstration of a smart meter reading over white space is a major milestone towards the realisation of these opportunities.
Technologies available today simply cannot realistically deal with the cost, power and propagation requirements of many elements of the Smart City.
This sharp movement towards a world of ubiquitous machine-to-machine communication has huge implications and the industry will be watching closely.
