Jennic Enable Wireless Transportation of Real-time Logistics Data

Jennic, a manufacturer of innovative 32-bit wireless microcontrollers announces the release of its Logistics Reference Design, providing a comprehensive platform for use in monitoring and tracking of Goods in transportation. Based upon Jennic’s Patented Sleeping Beacon Technology, the platform allows battery powered, time-synchronised sleeping wireless sensor networks to be evaluated for Logistics applications. Sensors in the network periodically communicate environment data such as temperature to a central controller, which communicates with a back-office system to provide real-time transportation data to logistics personnel and for auditing purposes.

The Reference Design is provided as two packages, to enable first evaluation, followed by development and customisation. The evaluation package is designed to allow the benefits of the ultra-low power wireless solution to be rapidly assessed with use of Jennic’s standard evaluation kit and a PC for the back-office GUI. The Windows based GUI displays real-time data relating to the sensor network; including node temperature, battery voltage and RF channel. It also allows the frequency agility features of the solution to be evaluated, through the effects of RF interference and channel blacklisting.

The developer package is supplied as a drop-in application for the Jennic SDK, along with project files and application source code. Provision of source code ensures developers can access right into the heart of the solution, to perform customisations; typically the integration of a GPRS/GSM modem link to the back-office.

Colin Faulkner, Jennic Product Marketing, commented, “Our sleeping beacon technology offers the perfect solution for mobile, battery powered sensor networks, addressing logistics requirements such as cargo and vehicle security, and environment monitoring. The Logistics Reference Design provides OEMs with a fast, effective platform for developing bespoke solutions, providing all the enabling technology on which to build their system.”

When deploying a monitoring system based on Jennic’s Logistics Reference Design, transport companies can expect to see a fast return on their investment, through a reduction in quality issues, insurance claims and fuel costs by reducing unnecessary transportation.

At the heart of the design is Jennic’s IEEE802.15.4 standards based wireless microcontroller technology operating in the unlicensed 2.4GHz ISM band, providing a solution for a global market. To enable rapid time to market, Jennic offers a range of pre-certified surface mounted wireless modules that have full compliance with all RF regulatory requirements meaning lower certification costs.