eWON s.a. A Belgian electronic and industrial engineering company that manufactures intelligent Ethernet gateways and industrial IP routers has announced the release of viewON 2, a graphical environment for designing animated HMI pages for its eWON product line.

From the press release published at M2M Automation:

“viewON 2 enables you to create HMI web pages containing entire synoptics with various objects and animations, within minutes, in just a few mouse clicks and with no specific web skills or knowledge required. viewON 2 provides powerful graphical tools and animations such as rotation, translation, bar graphs, color on state, etc. as well as graphical components for graph trends and alarms management.

Thanks to viewON 2, it is now possible to remotely monitor and interact with automated processes for remote assets from your web browser interface, through your own customized HMI. Whether you are an engineer, a maintenance operator, a machine builder or system integrator, viewON 2 gives you the graphical capabilities to implement your own improvements in the monitoring and control of remote assets/machines.”

Spectrum Controls is the USA distributor for eWON.

Laird Technologies (via its subsidiary Ezurio) has released a new range of 802.11 WLAN processor modules that provide a wide range of AT commands and web configuration to make the Wi-Fi transition simple for M2M equipment designers.

From the press release:

“The WLAN modules include pre-approved 802.11b/g radio; full web server for remote control and access; integrated interpreter and poweful wireless scripting language and drivers and TCP/IP stack. The modules also feature full UART interface; integrated or external antenna and low power operation for battery-powered applications. In addition, modules offer secure WEP, WPA, and WPA2 implementation; Bluetooth coexistence and co-location support and a low-cost development kit.”

Telecommunications Online has a podcast available in which Editor in Chief Sean Buckley talks to Alex Brisbourne, President & Chief Operating Officer of Kore Telematics about the state of the M2M market.

Listen here

I talked to Bill Ingle of newly formed Beecham Research the other day. He introduced the new firm as one that will focus on M2M market research.  As you’ll see in the following press release, the firm was founded by Robin Duke-Woolley, who has extensive M2M experience.

“We are pleased to announce the recent launch of Beecham Research Limited, a specialist M2M research and analysis firm with worldwide coverage. The company has a close association with Harbor Research Inc. and the CEO of the company is Robin Duke-Woolley, a Principal of Harbor Research who has been involved with the M2M market for many years. The company is based in London, UK and also operates out of Boston MA, USA.

As of April 1, Beecham Research also has a representative office in Bonn, Germany, headed by Georg Steimel who is also the current Honorary President of the M2M Alliance in Germany.

In addition, we are pleased to announce the appointment of Silvia Machmer as our senior representative based in Milan, Italy. Machmer is founder of the Consulting firm Machmer International Consulting, operating in Europe and India.

These appointments are aimed at increasing our support and activities in Europe.

Beecham Research will be publishing its annual Worldwide M2M Forecast, covering all major technologies and all key business sectors, during the next month. This forecast represents the most comprehensive view available of the rapidly-developing M2M market worldwide. This will be followed by 9 business-sector based reports, to be published over the coming months.

Furthermore, Beecham Research is working closely with TelematicsPRO of Berlin on a new series of M2M conferences, commencing with an event on 9-10 October 2008 in Berlin.”

Panasonic has released a car navigator they call Strada that allows you to control your web-enbaled home from your car. Unfortuneately it’s only available in Japan!

From the press release:

Drivers in Japan can check on their pets, turn lights and air conditioning on and off and lock their front doors — all from inside their cars — with a new navigation system from Panasonic.

In addition to guiding drivers to destinations as regular global positioning system navigation gadgets do, the $3,400 Strada F-Class will link to the home through any Internet-capable mobile phone.

Users could use the phone itself to communicate with your Web-enabled home, but Panasonic says it’s easier while driving to use the Strada F-Class.

Users just touch icons on the navigation system’s screen that read “turn off the light” or “lock the door.” They can make it look as though they’re home — to ward off burglars — by turning lights off and then on, all while they’re away, said Naohisa Morimoto, an official with Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., which puts out Panasonic brand products.

The catch is that they need a Web-enabled camera, front door and other devices. Only about 2,000 homes in Japan have such Net-linking systems, Morimoto said. But Panasonic offers home servers for about $1,900 in Japan, and cheaper ones are available.

Panasonic hopes to sell about 8,000 of the Strada F-Class monthly in Japan after they go on sale June 13. There are no overseas sales plans.

RF Monolithics and Dust Networks have announced a new strategic alliance agreement for embedded wireless sensor networking solutions.

From the press release:

Under the agreement, RF Monolithics (RFM) and Dust will collaborate on the integration of Dust SmartMesh-XD embedded systems into OEM modules, gateways and other products which RFM will configure and sell, for a variety of wireless sensor networking applications including asset management, environmental monitoring, condition-based maintenance, and building automation

Joy Weiss, president and CEO of Dust Networks, said: “Dust Networks is pleased to be working with RFM to integrate SmartMesh-XD in their product offerings. The highly reliable and low-power Dust-enabled products offered by RFM will address a wide range of wireless monitoring and control solutions in the fast growing M2M market.”