The Internet of Things (IoT) - which many experts in the fields of IT and engineering believe is the fourth industrial revolution - holds the promise of delivering dramatic innovations for existing industries, while enabling the creation of entirely new markets. However, one of the biggest barriers to widespread IoT implementation is the lack of a secure, standardized and open infrastructure model for the delivery of IoT services. To address this challenge, Freescale Semiconductor and Oracle are working together to rapidly evolve the IoT with a new, secured service platform that will help standardize and consolidate the delivery and management of IoT services for the home automation, industrial and manufacturing automation markets. The solution combines end-to-end software with a converged gateway design (called the "one box" platform) to establish a common, open framework for secured IoT service delivery and management. A "box" (or service gateway) built on the platform can consolidate boxes from multiple IoT service providers into a single, unified appliance. The one box platform will help simplify and secure the delivery of IoT services to end users in a home, business or other location, supporting the rapid deployment of a vast array of innovative IoT services. "The one box platform represents a significant milestone in the evolution of the Internet of Things, establishing a standardized and secure platform for service providers to quickly and cost-effectively introduce differentiating IoT services," said Geoff Lees, senior vice president and general manager of Freescale's MCU business. "Freescale's extensive portfolio of secure, scalable embedded processing solutions is ideal for enabling this critical bridge to common standards for IoT infrastructure." Supporting a wide variety of IoT sensors and edge nodes, the one box platform is based on the broadly adopted, Oracle Java SE Embedded implementation and the industry-leading security and embedded performance of Freescale processors. It can scale up or down for multiple markets, deploying Oracle Java SE Embedded and integrating Freescale Kinetis microcontrollers, i.MX applications processors and QorIQ communications processors, as appropriate. The industry-leading on-chip security capabilities of these silicon families, with the world-class security attributes of Oracle Java SE Embedded and system-level approaches enable a highly secure environment for IoT device and service management. "The one box concept fulfills the demand for a common platform that can support the delivery and management of differentiated and highly secure IoT services," said Nandini Ramani, vice president of development, Java Platform, Oracle. "Java's flexible architecture meets these requirements with a highly secure virtual machine that is uniquely suited to almost any type of embedded device and designed to support remote application updates and downloads." The initial implementation of the one box platform supports home/residential applications, including smart energy, smart metering, telehealth and other smart home services. The home/residential one box implementation runs Oracle Java SE Embedded and is powered by a Freescale i.MX 6 series applications processor built on the ARM® Cortex™-A9 core. Demonstrations related to the Freescale/Oracle IoT collaboration, including the one box platform, are currently available at JavaOne San Francisco 2013 in the ARM booth (Booth #5001 of the JavaOne exhibition hall) and in Booth HHJ-004 of the JavaOne DEMOgrounds. Freescale Semiconductor
PDF
