Many large manufacturers in and outside Japan are competing for larger market share in the same space, expecting a growing demand for projectors in the areas of entertainment, which requires glamor and strong visual performance as well as digital signage that can attract people’s attention. “It is becoming more and more difficult to differentiate ourselves with stand-alone hardware products,” says Kazuyuki Kitagawa, Director of Service & Support at Panasonic AVC Networks. “In order for Panasonic to grow market share and overall business, it is essential for us to develop solutions that deliver significant added value.” Panasonic believes projection failure and quality deterioration should never happen. This is what and has driven them to make their projectors IoT-enabled. More specifically, Panasonic has developed a system that collects data from projectors, visualizes detailed operational statuses, and predicts issues and address them before failure occurs. Their projectors are embedded with a variety of sensors that measure power supply, voltage, video input/ output signals, intake/exhaust air temperatures, cooling fan operations, and light bulb operating time. These sensors have been used to make the projector more intelligent, automatically suspending operation when the temperature rises excessively, and automatically switching light bulbs. Although this was a great first step, Panasonic projectors were still not equipped with any capability to send the data over a network.

Recent studies have found that patients return to the hospital at an alarmingly high rate among those who are hospitalized for heart failure, almost one in four are re-hospitalized within 30 days. Such a focus has led to novel approaches to improve patient care and reduce the need for re-hospitalization. Many of these strategies depend on technologies that employ remote patient monitoring (RPM), using the Internet of Things (IoT) and cloud computing, so that their health care team can track their progress without needing them to come to the office. At the Hochschule Furtwangen University (HFU) in Germany, students across multiple disciplines are working to develop this RPM technology into mechanical devices to aid in monitoring patients remotely. Their idea is to utilize the Internet of Things to develop “smart” wheelchairs and walkers that will transmit patient information to a dashboard developed in PTC’s ThingWorx to monitor various parameters and develop alarms specific to each patient. Achim Bumüller, Senior Assistant in the Mechanical and Medical Engineering Department, is managing the project along with five other faculty members dedicated to each discipline such as electronics, informatics, and mechanical engineering. “Since our university is located in the Black Forest of Germany in Baden-Württemberg, the project was originally developed due to the need for remote monitoring in the small villages that are 20-30 kilometers from their nearest doctor or hospital; however, the target has grown to include the necessity of monitoring patients inside a hospital, nursing home or other areas,” states Bumüller.