Deliver Useful IoT Data to the Enterprise

The IoT is made up of an enormous diversity of hardware with mixed communication capabilities and networks. It's a complex architecture to administer and manage, and especially for processing transactions. Thingstream is in the business of connecting to and collecting data from multiple IoT devices and making it available for processing and analyzing in order to take actions or make business decisions.

In some cases, devices remain in the field for as long as a decade, enduring sometimes brutal conditions—and they need power to consistently send and receive messages over that time. Thingstream required a solution that could provide computations with minimal use of computing hardware.

"Where there is a need for an intelligent network, passing data from one place to another is only part of the solution," said Bruce Jackson, Thingstream CTO.

Lightweight Integration and Messaging

"When we were thinking about how to get data from Internet of Things devices into the enterprise to make it useful for business decisions, TIBCO seemed an obvious choice, and the relationship has been great," said Jackson.

Using the TIBCO Flogo® lightweight integration engine and TIBCO® Messaging, Thingstream built a platform—independent, end-to-end IoT architecture that worked out-of-the-box and without additional dependencies. With TIBCO, Thingstream attained proven, easy to implement technology and a rich set of integration capabilities that complement the Thingstream platform. The solution makes it easy for customers to bridge the gap between devices deployed on the edge and their other resources.

Fast, No-Code Development

TIBCO lets Thingstream offer a fast way to network IoT devices of all types. "Without ever having to develop code, you can literally click, drag, configure, and have a complete flow of data direct from Flogo® straight into the enterprise," said Jackson.

Thingstream's bi-directional IoT platform receives messages and also sends real-time messages back to edge devices. Via TIBCO Messaging and its support of the Eclipse Mosquito MQTT protocol, the platform either accepts or ignores messages—depending on the need to react.

Small, Open, Low Power

The lightweight Flogo deployment model aligns with Thingstream's requirements for low energy consumption of IoT devices.

"There's a tradeoff between processing power on a device and battery life. You really want something that will compile down into something that's small and efficient but platform independent at the same time, and that's really the goal of Flogo. So for us, it was a great match," said Jackson.

Business Value from the IoT

"We have a lot of customers who are moving product across national borders or oceans, and they're tracking not just position but vibration, temperature, and humidity to describe environmental conditions for their customers,' said Jackson.

With Thingstream devices in refrigerated shipping containers, shippers can give their customers real-time access to conditions as proof of appropriate handling.

"You can't sell the ability to move goods from A to B at a certain temperature with a minimum vibration and low humidity if you can't track and measure those things for the duration of the journey.

"You're allowing them to create a new business opportunity from the data that you can capture, and that's a perfect example of how IoT changes what you can do and changes how you can build your business," said Jackson.