Busy Japan-based IoT connectivity provider Soracom has introduced three services to help IoT users to take advantage of new generative AI capabilities. The KDDI-owned firm said the trio of new analytics services work together or separately to process and interpret IoT device data on the fly, and connect IoT devices to emerging generative AI engines available via the big hyperscalers’ cloud platforms.
Soracom Relay enables cameras running RTSP/RTP protocols to acquire and transmit data to Soracom’s Harvest Files for storage or to a cloud destination; the firm suggested AWS S3 or Amazon Kinesis Video Streams as example destinations for computer vision and video analytics. Soracom Query lets customers use SQL queries from business or customer lifecycle intelligence (BI/CLI) tools to mine IoT device data without having to set up servers or storage.
A statement explained: “This managed data warehouse capability with automatic data loading makes it easy to run complex analytical queries on large IoT datasets and feed the results to machine learning projects.” Meanwhile, Soracom Harvest Data Intelligence enables generative AI to analyze time series data and identify trends, patterns, outliers, and abnormalities.
Soracom Harvest Data Intelligence can also use the data provided to perform further analysis. It stated, in illustration of how the services might be combined: “A municipality can use Soracom Relay to monitor road traffic while Harvest Data Intelligence analyzes the data stored and Soracom Query can guide decisions on the best times.” The first two services are available in technical preview to interested parties; the third is available in public beta.
Soracom has also established an IoT x GenAI Lab with Matsuo Institute, which conducts research and development projects in AI. The new lab will explore the potential to gain new insights from diverse IoT data using generative AI, develop new products, and provide professional services specializing in the area of Generative AI, including IoT and large language models (LLMs), said Soracom.
Kenta Yasukawa, chief technology officer and co-founder at Soracom, said: “Applying GenAI to analyze IoT data has the potential to discover insights that are beyond our imagination. As a technology partner to the companies building tomorrow’s connected experiences, we’re committed to delivering leading-edge capabilities that accelerate their innovation and help them to succeed at scale and stay one step ahead in a changing world.”
Soracom, with five million global Iot connections, recently signed with Sigfox-owner Unabiz, in which the company has invested, to allow the Singapore firm to use its global cellular IoT coverage as part of its IoT solutions. It has just launched a new multi-carrier IoT service to cover the US market, piggybacking on the cellular networks of AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon. The new data plan, called US-MAX, offers automated-roaming between the three networks for best signal performance.
The firm is also offering “native support” for satellite messaging with its global IoT connectivity offer, so enterprise IoT users can pay for both terrestrial and satellite connectivity in a single platform. The firm announced a deal with Switzerland-based nanosatellite operator Astrocast last July, which has since been fully integrated into its global IoT platform, which offers cellular IoT (NB-IoT and LTE-M) and Sigfox, plus Wi-Fi and Ethernet.
