{"id":4595,"date":"2017-09-20T22:21:36","date_gmt":"2017-09-20T22:21:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/redmonk.com\/jgovernor\/?p=4595"},"modified":"2017-09-21T13:57:29","modified_gmt":"2017-09-21T13:57:29","slug":"thingmonk-talks-day-2-on-trains-tractors-and-the-twitter-of-sensors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/redmonk.com\/jgovernor\/thingmonk-talks-day-2-on-trains-tractors-and-the-twitter-of-sensors\/","title":{"rendered":"Thingmonk Talks Day 2: on Trains, Tractors and the Twitter of Sensors"},"content":{"rendered":"

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We had a set of fantastic speakers at Thingmonk. Thanks to all of them.<\/p>\n

Andy Stanford Clark, IBM CTO for UK and Ireland, kicked off Day 2 with an explanation of the \u201cDigital Twin\u201d concept we\u2019d called out as an umbrella theme for the event. In case you\u2019re wondering what on earth that is, for a crisp high level explanation I highly recommend this talk<\/a> by Chris O\u2019Connor at IBM. Stanford-Clark however brought his own perspective – he argued that once you have a digital twin of your physical assets you can begin to run what if scenarios. Take trains for example. Schaeffler makes bearings: it creates digital twins of its assets in order to help customers evaluate safety and speed across rail networks. Airbus is now creating digital twins of its places from its original engineering diagrams, which allows for simulation. How will the plane act in different environments – such a 90 mile an hour headwind? Multidisciplinary teams are working on the same model, which makes it more effective, and in that sense digital twin begins to echo moves we\u2019ve made in software engineering towards agile development. Stanford Clark said digital twins allow for mass customisation for industry.<\/p>\n

Next up was Yodit Stanton, founder of OpenSensors.io, a London-based startup focusing on commercial building, environment and asset monitoring. Wired called it \u201cthe twitter of sensors\u201d. It has 100 paying customers – a lot more than many of SF-based VC-funded companies we talk to. An important leader the UK tech scene, she talked about the Top 10 reasons IoT projects fail.<\/p>\n

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  1. Thinking of IoT as an industry. It\u2019s not, it\u2019s something different industries will use.<\/li>\n
  2. Being a tech magpie instead of focusing on the problem at hand. Let\u2019s not call everything big data – you may not even need a database.<\/li>\n
  3. Not understanding that middleware is only 1% of the solution. Don\u2019t spend all your time on Kafka. See 2. above.<\/li>\n
  4. Thinking you can data jujitsu your way out of crap readings from lots of cheap sensors. Your event system will be like a sewage system if you feed it crappy data. Spend more money on better sensors to make your life easier.<\/li>\n
  5. Not building a multidisciplinary team\u2026 Opensensors is hiring<\/a>. Everyone on the team has to visit a customer at least one every month.<\/li>\n
  6. Not spending 40% of your time and money on logistics. Inventory management to manage hardware. Distribution partners. How to get sensors from the UK all over the world. It should take that long! Site assessments, you can\u2019t just chuck stuff at it. It\u2019s deploying a SaaS app.<\/li>\n
  7. Not understanding the importance of provisioning until after shipping.<\/li>\n
  8. Trying to run before you walk. De risk and iterate.5 sensors in a lab\n

    50 sensors in a Proof of Concept<\/p>\n

    500 sensors in the wild<\/li>\n

  9. Not learning from computing history. \u201cDear Child of SaaS\u2026 did you know we used to ship networked hardware and software reliably all the fucking time. We left documentation and most of are still alive working in the industry.\u201d<\/li>\n
  10. Not appreciating what a big deal this all is. Not billions of sensors, but “why are we doing this”?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Next up it was really cool to see a collaborative talk between folks from different companies – Charlie Isaacs and Martin Gale from Salesforce, and Andy SC from IBM again. Our first demo of the conference saw how Node-RED<\/a> could be used to wire up sensor events to Salesforce backends. Great \u201cstory\u201d too – making sure nobody opens your wine shipment on its way to you. It\u2019s not the first time we\u2019ve had cross vendor demos at Thingmonk but it is unusual at tech events. Mixed environments do however reflect the reality customers face. So that\u2019s kind of cool.<\/p>\n

    Next up we had Gary Barnett, a fellow analyst at another firm, but at Thingmonk talking about his role as CTO of the Air Sensa Network. At any good conference there is at least one talk that leaves you crying with laughter. This was the talk that did that. The Air Sensa goal is simple, even if achieving it is very hard: to make sensors that can measure small particulates – sub 2.5 micron – for under \u00a3100 per unit. Why bother? Mostly because we\u2019re not measuring this stuff\u2026 Barnett said there are only 15 sensors that can measure these small particulates in the whole of London. Today, he said: \u201c40M britons are living in areas of illegal air pollution levels etc\u201d. Gary\u2019s talk was funny, biting, and warm, all at the same time. When the videos come out shortly. I highly recommend you watch it, if only for brutal Ruby takedown, and gems like:\u00a0 10x devs are nice to have around but don\u2019t let them put anything into production.<\/p>\n

    Our next speaker was Boris Adryan. Very smart chap, spoke about organisational structure and tech teams. He echoed Stanton – the team structure should be interdependent, simple command structure, tactics, shared experience as a team. One fascinating insight was that the Lancaster Bomber in World War 2 had self-selected. The individuals worked out what the teams should be, and who should have which role.<\/p>\n

    What would an IoT conference be without a talk about Railways? Kamil Baczkowic spoke on Busting train delays on Great Western Railway. His company Luminate provides software and sensors for the national railway system. They don\u2019t call what they offer \u201cdigital twins\u201d but process interlocking, and standard data models allow for process interlocking, and predictions and what if scenarios across a complex network. What will the impact be if maintenance happens in Didcot, on a particular bank holiday?<\/p>\n

    \u201cIf you\u2019ve got 15 problems to deal with, you want to focus on the ones that are causing the biggest problems\u201d.<\/p>\n

    We then had a guest appearance by 11 year old Femi Owolade-Coombes.<\/p>\n

    \n

    Youngest speaker ever @thingmonk<\/a>. Femi owolade-coombes. 11 yo. Runs tourettes and autism friendly coding workshops. Amazing young man! pic.twitter.com\/bsnYoUCfeW<\/a><\/p>\n

    — Grumble Bundle (@monkchips) September 12, 2017<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n