The Things Network founders talk about their project and their IoT fascination

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The Things Network founders talk about their project and their IoT fascination

Dec

25

2015

The Things Network is a community to set up an internet-of-thing-data network with the LoRaWAN technology. LoRaWAN or simply Lora is an open protocol which include easy it can be played with a simple Arduino development board.

The costs of the network equipment and chips to connect to an access point Lora, are low. Ideal to tweak it. Also found under the influence of The Things Network worldwide are increasingly Lora antennas. For example, in the Netherlands and Belgium various networks available and that number is rapidly expanding.

With headquarters in The Things Network practically around the corner from Tweakers HQ, it was obviously a matter of time before we would go there once myself along for an interview. We spoke to the founder Wienke Giezeman and tech lead Johan Stokking.

Listen to the entire interview with Wienke and Johan as a podcast back

The Things Network is a community to create an internet-of-things with the data network LoRaWAN technology. With a simple Lora router thousand euros, you can connect 10 000 devices Giezeman explains. That was the start of the iot data network in Amsterdam that The Things Network along with ten parties set up in the capital. All those parties abolished an Lora gateway and on August 21 the city-wide network was live.

The Things Network at Rockstart
The Things Network at Rockstart
The Things Network at Rockstart

Rock Start building Amsterdam – Links: Johan Stokking, tech lead Right; Wienke Giezeman, initiator – Close-up of test project to measure water height

That story spread quickly round iot within the community and were soon more and more locations with opaque networks. But it also showed that a Gateway 1000 euro still quite a threshold. This resulted in the development of a cheaper gateway. After some research, the developers of The Things Network found that a router Lora little more than 200 euros have to cost. That was a Kickstarter project and within eight days, the funding was already around. Ultimately, the project raised 300,000 euros within. The Things The Things gateway feature and other devices to be delivered in July 2016.

The Kickstarter project was at least one thing clear: there is a need for a simple network where no telecom provider needed to hang anything on the Internet. The idea of The Things Network came into existence only after the first version of Lora saw the light with a broad alliance behind by many telecom companies and chipmakers and an open network protocol for iot applications. It is a so-called spread-spectrum-radio protocol. All data from one node goes to all the gateways that are within range. Unlike spread-spectrum Wifi and Bluetooth for example, point-to-point protocols where a user name and password is required.

On the other hand there are the devices which must survive for long without new energy source. Some devices should be able to do even with a ten year battery. There are three types of devices: Class A devices only occasionally send data. Class B has a pre-set cycle, for example, that the node every five minutes, listening to a signal. Then there is class C, which needs an external power supply, because it constantly in contact with the node.

By way of example Giezeman and Stokking a project with sensors in dumpsters. Such a sensor only needs to do something when the container is full. There is also a project with rhinos, but really anyone can think of something. In other words, people without a technical background can come up with very interesting applications.

The community of Things The Network now consists of about 3,000 people. Giezeman gives an example of someone who just is busy with Boston in the US with a project concerning the testing of seawater. He also indicates that it is a chicken-and-egg problem: first, the network needs to be there. Now that there is some places, there will be all users with new ideas. “Tell the story only once during the birthday of your grandmother, almost everyone knows there is a use for it.”

The foundation behind The Things Network aims to provide neutral routing. Thus, the foundation focuses on the development of cloud services, and safely. At this time, 128bits AES encryption is used for that.

For tweakers, it’s just nice to own a unit to be deployed together with an example Semtech SX-1301 chipset and a Raspberry Pi. “With that you build for more than 200 euros a private gateway,” says Johan. In The Things Network Gateway is also an Arduino development board. The advantage of people who are already close to Lora a network is that they do not need their own access, so they can all continue without its own access point. An overview of The Things Network shows where now are all already open networks. Besides The Things Network also telecom providers in many countries are busy setting up Lora networks such as KPN in the Netherlands and Proximus in Belgium.

Playing with LoRaWAN can. GoT on several wires which are already talking about the jobs of differen

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