The Healthcare and Enterprise Wireless Experience

IOT LTE-M and NB-IoT for application development

LTE-M

LTE-M (or eMTC or CatM1) is designed for low power applications requiring medium throughput. It has a narrower bandwidth of 1.4 MHz compared to 20 MHz for regular LTE, giving longer range, but less throughput. The throughput is 375 kbps downlink and 300 kbps uplink, providing 100 kbps application throughput running IP. It is suitable for TCP/TLS end-to-end secure connections. Mobility is fully supported, using the same cell handover features as in regular LTE. It is currently possible to roam with LTE-M, meaning it is suitable for applications that will roam across multiple regions. The latency is in the millisecond range offering real time communication for time critical applications. LTE-M is perfect for medium throughput applications requiring low power, low latency and/or mobility like asset tracking, wearables, medical, POS and home security applications.

NB-IoT

NB-IoT (also known as Cat-NB1) is a narrowband technology standard that does not use a traditional LTE physical layer, but is designed to operate in or around the LTE bands and co-exist with other LTE devices. It has a bandwidth of 200 kHz, giving it longer range and low throughput compared to LTE-M and LTE. The throughput is 60 kpps downlink and 30 kbps uplink. It is suitable for static, low power applications requiring low throughput. NB-Iot is perfect for static, low throughput applications requiring low power and long range, like smart metering, smart agriculture and smart city applications.

Enterprise Location Knowledge for 2020

Integra Systems, Inc. has been in and around the "Location Knowledge" space since 1999.

New models have now come onto the scene based upon the advancements in technology offerings in the business location tracking area. It is not about the technology in our opinion; but about the economic and process improvements by the use of the technology that can become realized.

For example; BLE with now 5.1 provides location accuracy never before obtained that will allow visibility of the client to change the game. This field location awareness will allow for potential new work flow and business improvements. See now also the release of BLE 5.2.

BLE is now in every smart phone; yet alone being incorporated into the WLAN AP enterprise infrastructure. This is a true convergence of use.

The bottom line is when standards prevail, costs drop, and adoption comes. Wi-Fi, BLE, and now the converged location knowledge space will provide major business value.

Now with NB-IoT and LTE-M, location tracking can also be provided inside and outside the walls of the enterprise taking advantage of 4G moving to 5G. A true location real time tracking ecosystem has now evolved for 2020 and beyond. When you now have the ability to have the data and mine this on real time basis, huge value is experienced to improve the overall business process.

Integra Systems has partnered with a world class proven solutions provider that is a ISO 90001 approved and a FDA audited facility that enables thousands of IOT devices per month via carriers on a global basis.

We can provide the hardware, software solution development, database output, and the deployment of any type of IOT wired or wireless solution on a global basis.

Download GFM327_0e_Bluetooth_Low_Energy_5.1

Download Bluetooth_5.2_Feature_Overview

Download 122019 - White Paper - Industrial IoT

Download IoT-Tracker-for-cold-chain-monitoring

Download IoT-Tracker-for-medical-equipment

Medical Device Security and FIPS 140-2

Integra Systems, Inc., has been an advocate of Laird initially in the WLAN module space, but also BLE for many years. The quality of their WLAN roaming algorithms while ensuring enterprise grade security is one reason for our recommendation. This is based upon our field experience of the challenges in the healthcare mobility environment. We have validated and verified through testing performance with one of their BLE modules. This is a very good article that details out medical device security and FIPS 140-2.

Download White Paper - FIPS in Medical Environments 0919

IOT Location Tracking 2019 moving to 2020

A lot has changed in the location tracking space in the past twenty years.

It is 2019 now turning to 2020 and the technology landscape is now following industry standards.

Standards will drive down costs.

Just look at how Wi-Fi emerged from 802.11 DS and FH prior to 1999, then with the release of 802.11b in 1999, finally with the Wi-Fi Alliance being formed in 2000.

The rest is history.

What has changed?

BLE is now a part of the overall WLAN enterprise. BLE is now being built into the WLAN AP. As a result, location based data now can be provided on a real time basis to a cloud based business model.

Smartphones that incorporate BLE and with BLE based tags now can leverage the existing WLAN infrastructure as the backhaul. This will improve the ROI. Look to BLE 5.1 being part of every smart phone going forward.

Bluetooth 5.1

Advances have been made to provide very precise location accuracy.

Bluetooth direction finding is the major feature of the Bluetooth 5.1 Core Specification. It is designed to enhance location services where previously only signal strength based technology has been used with Received Signal Strength Indication (RSSI).

Bluetooth direction finding will offer new and improved use cases for Real Time Location Systems (RTLS) for asset tracking in a wide range of scenarios from logistics and warehousing to value asset security in healthcare. It also brings added user experiences in proximity-based scenarios for enterprise awareness and contextual information for enabling new business process improvements.

Bluetooth direction finding can be used to detect location in either 2D or 3D dependent on the complexity of its implementation.

Angle of Arrival (AoA) and Angle of Departure (AoD)
Bluetooth direction finding is based around the two key concepts of Angle of Arrival (AoA) and Angle of Departure (AoD). This makes use of the angular phase-shifts that occur between antennas as they receive (AoA) or transmit (AoD) RF signals.

With the use of antenna arrays at either side of the communication link phase shift data can be determined and from this, location can be calculated.

Which approach to choose?

Whether AoA or AoD is chosen for use depends much on the use case, both can be used effectively, but in certain circumstances one or the other will be more suitable given a range of considerations

AoA allows for use of very simple, low cost tags to act as the source device of which can be used to determine the location of the asset. This system would have more complex locator units mounted in an unobstructed manner in location to determine and calculate the position of items that are tagged.

Such scenarios might include:
• Asset tracking in warehouses
• Value asset tracking in hospitals; government, establishments etc.
• Identification of the location of people and staff

AoD requires more complex tags than AoA from a hardware and software perspective. In this scenario the locator device can be simpler in terms of hardware design but does have software complexity for the determination and calculation of the direction finding functionality.

AoD based direction finding has some strong use cases that include smartphones and wearables. At this time smartphones do not support Bluetooth 5.1 but it is expected they will at some point.

Such scenarios might include:
• Wayfinding in large spaces such as airports, hospitals etc.
• Point of interest assistance in shopping malls, exhibitions etc.
• Search and finding of items such as keys, remote controls etc.

Using 4G (Silicon on the Chip), SOC, drives down costs at the edge level.
When the WLAN may not be present, low cost 4G tags can provide location accuracy in and outside of any building environment that will provide this location data to the cloud.

www.iot.solid.com

The bottom line is that the technology advances in BLE, 4G, and now pending 5G will drive down cost in a major way to provide location based accuracy information to the enterprise client. This will enable new business process and improvements that will impact the bottom line.

Download Product Brief - BT510 Sensor - PRELIM

Download DS_ArubaTags

Wireless Convergence - WLAN, BLE, 4G

View this photo

Over the past now twenty years since 802.11b came into the market in 1999 and the Wi-Fi Alliance was formed in 2000, it has been somewhat the “wild-wild west” in terms of integration of wireless in medical devices.

Manufactures of the SOC in concert with IEEE and the Wi-Fi Alliance have done a great job addressing not only security but also quality of service. This is evident by the global acceptance of Wi-Fi in our mobility world. The author was fortunate be a part of this on the ground floor starting in 1999 working for one of the founders of the Wi-Fi Alliance.

Integra Systems has advocated for over two decades the requirement that any medical device manufacture that decides to use Wi-Fi, conduct ecosystem testing.

This is the only way to validate and verify how the client device performs in a real world environment with security and the proper quality of service. We have written a white paper a couple of years back for www.ixiacom.com that is now a part of www.keysight.com surrounding this. We consider this best of practice that is required for deployments, but also see that is a requirement for regulatory approval.

Download Ixia-T-WP-Medical-Device-Testing

More and more healthcare applications are using sensors that connect via BLE to a smart phone that often uploads this information to the cloud.

While this is not connected to the IT ecosystem; the Bluetooth SIG has really advanced work to address security and also quality of service.

Download 1901_Feature_Overview_Brief_FINAL

In terms of BLE and Quality of Service

Robustness of the wireless link is provided by using adaptive frequency hopping, Lazy Acknowledgement, 24 bit CRC, 32-bit message integrity check with a latency of under 6 msec.

BLE Security

Security is provided by 128-bit AES in CCM mode and the application layer is user defined. The Advanced Encryption Standard is a specification for the encryption of electronic data established by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). AES has been adopted by the U.S. government and is now used worldwide. CCM is a mode of operation for cryptographic block ciphers. It is an authenticated encryption algorithm designed to provide both authentication and confidentiality. CRC (cyclic redundancy check) is used. It is an error detecting code commonly used in digital networks and storage devices to detect accidental changes to raw data. Blocks of data entering these systems get a short check value attached based upon the remainder of a polynomial division of their contents. On retrieval, the calculation is repeated and in the event the check values do not match, corrective action can be taken against data corruption. CRCs are good detecting potential errors caused by any noise in transmission channels.

The wireless industry to include manufactures and industry organizations have invested major league over the past twenty years to ensure the proper security and quality of service exists in the enterprise.

Download Bluetooth-Markets-Overview_Web

Integra Systems provides all aspects of embedded wireless design, V&V of network and co-existence testing for FDA submittals, but also enterprise predictive modeling for Wi-Fi deployments. Our experience crosses all vertical markets that is backed upon twenty plus years in this space.

Nordic Q3 2019 Newsletter

This is the latest Q3 2019 Nordic Newsletter.

Integra Systems, Inc. has worked with Nordic for a long time.... early days before BLE for SOC integration for many solutions at the PAN to the IOT.

We consider Nordic the gold standard in the convergence of the PAN with IOT.

What is exciting about this newsletter is the constant and continual evolution of the BLE standard to now include mesh and low power. The advent of the smart phone with BLE and the converged IOT standard to the enterprise will provide huge growth opportunity across multiple enterprise markets.

Download NS_WQ_Issue3_2019

CBRS - A New Frequency Band - Opportunities for Healthcare

News Alert: In September 2019 the FCC opened the door for private enterprise and carrier use of the CBRS band, labeled as “The Innovation Band”.

This shared 150MHz of spectrum has been harvested with the FCC under the guidance of the CBRS Alliance as OnGo; taking advantage of LTE and 5G protocols to deliver affordable, secure, interference/contention-free, high-quality mobile networks.

Healthcare applications and opportunities for this new band provide Wi-Fi networks to be off-loaded to the OnGo network: What are some of the benefits?

- Provisioning of an internal network that is owned and managed by the Integrated
Delivery Network
- Quality of service, policy control, and the provision of security for mobile users
that goes beyond Wi-Fi.
- Allows BYOD users to have the same quality of experience enjoyed on 4/5G while
inside a building environment.
- Drive down the cost of connectivity while enhancing the user experience.
- Decrease intrusion and security risk.
- Enhance the patient and family experience.

The ecosystem of vendors and providers that support the OnGo network are currently deploying commercial networks supporting the needs of enterprises from healthcare to hospitality and commercial real estate.

Healthcare and Hospitality have many similarities for private LTE/5G’s security, QoS, Policy Management and interference-free mobility operation. HTNG the Hospitality industry’s standards and best practices group has produced a CBRS Whitepaper available in the link below to help introduce you to the new band, OnGo and use cases.

Ballast Networks is a private LTE/5G managed services provider and a partner of Integra Systems.

https://www.ballastnetworks.com

Links of Files to Download

CBRS Alliance Mobile-Experts-OnGo.

Download Mobile-Experts-OnGo

CBRS for Hospitality White Paper

Download 2018_CBRS_for_Hospitality_White_Paper

FCC-Authorizes-Historic-OnGo-Deployments-in-3-5-GHz-CBRS-Band-Opens-Billions-in-Economic-Opportunity-for-U-S.

Download FCC Authorizes Historic OnGo™ Deployments in 3

Firewalls & Data Diodes - Best Practices for CyberSecurity

Most are very familiar with a software firewall. They are a check off box for network security.

Data diodes were designed on uncompromising technology intended to stop all unauthorized access to nuclear weapon systems.

They enforce a physical separation or "air-gap" between network segments that is enforced by the laws of physics, which are immutable and absolute - data will never be able to flow in the opposite direction, and therefore attackers will never be able to access networks through a data diode.

Integra Systems, Inc. has partnered with Owl Cyber Defense to drive new solutions through the medical device and healthcare space. See attached "What the Difference Between Firewalls & Data Diodes and CyberSecurity Best Practices.

www.owlcyberdefense.com

Download 19-OWL-DataDiodes-Firewalls

Download 19-OWL-W010-V2-Cybersecurity-Best-Practices

Integra Systems - Regulatory Testing Services

Over the past ten years Integra Systems, Inc. has performed testing services for a wide variety of medical device companies. This testing has had two components; ecosystem network testing for a WLAN enabled medical device and wireless-co-existence testing.

We have provided a very structured process of the authorship of a test plan and protocol, the actual testing, and the detailed end results. The end product provided has allowed companies to meet the requirements as stated in the attached document. (Radio Frequency Wireless Technology in Medical Devices - Guidance for Industry and Food and Drug Administration Staff - Document issued on: August 14, 2013)

In addition, the output documentation of this testing has provided a foundation for the proper field deployment.

Download 1618

Download Ixia-david-hoglund-medical-device-testing-6

Bluetooth v5.1 – Finally the Right Technology for Location Accuracy

Marketing Versus Reality
Since 1999 there have been a variety of technologies and RTLS solutions that have tried to provide location based accuracy that is reliable. The author here has a large amount of experience with many of these, starting out in 1999-2000, with outdoor location based solutions. For indoor based solutions; it comes down to three areas of focus. Providing the correct accuracy needed for the application, cost effectiveness, and reliability. All current technology offerings, Wi-Fi, UWB, Zigbee, Ultrasound, and IR have not really solved these challenges. A lot of this simply boils down to physics.

Why Standards Drive Adoption
The Wi-Fi revolution started in 1999 with IEEE approving 802.11b. Before that there was 802.11 DS and FH being used in enterprise solutions by a specific company for the use of mobile computing and bar code scanners. The author worked for that company. However, the Wi-Fi revolution did not really start until the Wi-Fi Alliance was formed in 2000. This allowed true interoperability between vendors at the client and access point side. Silicon vendors jumped in, standards kept improving, b, g, n, ac, and all the aspects of improving security and quality of service. The Bluetooth special interest group pretty much is following the same pathway of the Wi-Fi Alliance. The Bluetooth SIG has provided a detailed process and methodology that has driven interoperability and adoption.

How the Smart Phone has changed the paradigm
Previous to the smartphone we had laptops enabled with 802.11 that gave us true mobility away from the desktop. The smartphone while primarily used for 3G/4G connectivity also had 802.11 and Bluetooth as a combination SOC. Bluetooth also migrated from just mice and keyboards to being embedded literally in every vehicle today. This wide spread adoption has not only driven down costs, but driven up user requirements. With millions and millions of smart phones incorporating Bluetooth, it simply has become that standard that we really rely upon today. No smart phone today has Zigbee, UWB, Ultrasound or IR. However smart phones do have NFC.

Enterprise convergence to the cloud
Many applications today have moved to the cloud, the challenge is how do you get that information both in an enterprise way from say a Bluetooth enabled personal area network to that cloud? Today’s enterprise WLAN providers are now incorporating BTLE into their access points. Now the WLAN can be the backhaul to the BTLE PAN or client. Another option is simply to use a M2M IOT device. The author has provided a similar BTLE to WLAN to 4G IOT solution to the cloud. The IOT solution becomes very attractive as it is very cost effective, works, and requires no involvement of the IT organization.

Bluetooth v5.1
Current Bluetooth location based systems use signal strength to estimate distance. The Bluetooth v5.1 specification allows Bluetooth enabled devices to determine the direction of the Bluetooth signal that was transmitted. This new feature offers two different methods to determining the angle that a Bluetooth device is transmitting. These two methods are called Angle of Arrival (AoA) and Angle of Departure (AoD). These techniques require one of the two communicating devices to have an array of multiple antenna with the antenna array included in the receiving device when the AoA method is used and in the transmitting device when using AoD.

The Bluetooth Core Specification v5.1 gives the Bluetooth Low Energy (LE) controller in the receiving device the ability to generate data that can be used to calculate the directional angle of the transmitting device. Direction finding as a part of the v5.1 specification is result of several steps in the Bluetooth roadmap that will enable key enhancements to Bluetooth location services

RSSI (Received Signal Strength Indication) versus (AoA) Angle of Arrival
It is some near….versus it is precisely here.
Integra Systems is working with a technology provider that uses the latest BLE v5.1 specification that can provide accuracy from 0.1-1 meters, real time. A respected company with years of R&D and solutions to back this up.