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Maarten Ectors

Maarten Ectors

48 posts

VP IoT, NG Networking & Proximity Cloud

Maarten Ectors is responsible at Canonical for Internet of Things, the next-generation of networking and cloud solutions that are in proximity of the user or at the edges of the network. Previously he was strategy director for cloud, big data and IoT. Maarten reports to Mark Shuttleworth, the founder of Canonical.

Maarten Ectors
10 April 2017

The smartest industry 4.0 crane

Internet of Things Article

Lots of big name industrial players are launching IoT platforms and are hopeful that their big data analytics, open APIs, and other features will catapult them to be the leader of industry 4.0. If you don’t have an OT background, you aren’t relevant. I tend to disagree. We don’t need yet another CloudFoundry, Hadoop, Time ...

Maarten Ectors
5 April 2017

How Bosch Rexroth is innovating the PLC market

Internet of Things Article

Last year I introduced a new concept called App Logic Controller or ALC. You basically run an app store on a PLC type of device and as such any industrial protocol, edge analytics, cloud or other industrial integration is an app away. Developers can make industrial solutions in days if not hours via open source ...

Maarten Ectors
13 March 2017

The smart multi-personality vending machine

Internet of Things Article

This vending machine is unlike you have seen before. It is a telecom operator in a box. Minutes later it cures the chronic ill via an Uber for Doctors and saves public health care billions. Sell you a house. Be your bank. Anything is possible. The vending machine we displayed at MWC 2017 was ...

Maarten Ectors
13 March 2017

This elevator catches intruders, saves lives, generates money, …

Internet of Things Article

The world is becoming software defined and most people don’t realise what this means until software apps and app stores invade their day to day objects like elevators. This blog post is about the smartest elevator demoed at MWC17 and the future of elevators with app stores. What happens if we add artificial intelligence to ...

Maarten Ectors
11 March 2017

The cheapest and smartest mobile and IoT base station of MWC17

Internet of Things Article

How to solve the top telecom industry problems (declining revenues, spiralling costs, slow time to market) and revolutionise the wireless industry? Open Source Mobile and IoT Base Stations with App Stores. At MWC15 we presented the smartest top of the rack switch of the show. Many network experts did not believe that the cheapest server ...

Maarten Ectors
9 March 2017

The $1M/month revenue generating fountain each smart city should have

Internet of Things Article

What if smart cities can have fountains generating revenue instead of costing money? App Stores on Fountains, one of the many crazy ideas we demoed on MWC, that can come true shortly… Say IoT and lots of people will bring up Smart Cities. Ask them what is so exciting about Smart Cities and they will ...

Maarten Ectors
8 March 2017

How to become a LimeSDR innovator?

Internet of Things Article

After an amazing week at MWC, I got people reaching out to me that want to be a LimeSDR innovator. Here is a short guide on what to do and what we are working on next. Start by getting your LimeSDR. At Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, we started a new open source standard to ...

Maarten Ectors
23 February 2017

MWC17: The future of industrial IoT

Internet of Things Article

The internet of things, augmented reality, artificial intelligence, big data, robots/drones, blockchain, industry 4.0 and other hype terms are popping up everywhere. Our partners will be showcasing real industrial solutions that go far beyond the hype and are based on these cutting edge technologies. How to tell industrial IoT reality apa ...

Maarten Ectors
17 February 2017

MWC17: The future of wireless networks

Internet of Things Article

The telecom industry is not as buoyant as it was some years back. Telecom operators ‘ revenues are under pressure due to innovations from over the top players. Costs are spiralling out of control because of 4/5G deployments, fibre to the premise, social networking data explosions, 4K video streaming, IoT and more. Time to market ...

Maarten Ectors
6 February 2017

10 crazy IoT ideas that can soon become real

Internet of Things Article

1) Smart cities: revenue generating fountains What if instead of being a cost to cities, fountains become a revenue generator? Crazy idea? Just put the same coin accepting mechanism you find in vending machines and allow tourists to switch the fountain on for 30 seconds to get the ideal photo taken. But why not put ...

Maarten Ectors
31 January 2017

Industrial IoT revolution with Raspberry Pi compute module 3

Internet of Things Article

The Raspberry Pi Foundation released a long awaited version of their Raspberry Pi Compute Module 3. The great news is that you get 4GB storage, 1GB memory and the same processor as the Raspberry Pi 3 for $30. This means that it now becomes a real solution for anybody wanting to build industrial products and ...

Maarten Ectors
25 November 2016

Pycom and Canonical to enable LPWAN communications via snaps

Internet of Things Article

Pycom is the company behind the disruptive products such as the LoPy and SiPy which enable developers to easily get LoRa and Sigfox low-power WAN (LPWAN) communication happening. Their latest product, the FiPy combines LoRa, Sigfox and LTE-CAT M1/NB1. All also support Bluetooth Low Energy and WiFi. The FiPy can be currently pre-ordered on ...