Just over 30,000 trade visitors came to Nuremberg from February 23 to 25 to find out about the latest embedded system innovations. That's over 3,000 more visitors than in the previous record year of 2014, and the number of 939 exhibiting companies from 38 countries also represents a new record. The same applies to the embedded world Conference: with 1,666 participants, the record result from the previous year was surpassed. "For its 14th edition, embedded world once again impressed with more exhibition space, exhibitors and trade visitors. The event also continued to grow in terms of internationality overall," summarizes Richard Krowoza, Member of the Management Board, Nürnberg Messe.

Cooperation in the IoT sector

True to the trade fair motto "We are the Internet of Things", exhibitors presented new collaborations for this area in order to establish the topic and put it into practice. Under the slogan "Enabling IoT", TQ, for example, presented a modular gateway solution in cooperation with Gemalto as the basis for individual customer-specific products. TQ focuses on topics such as processor technology, hardware and system integration for ODM projects. Among other things, Gemalto covers the area of mobile connectivity based on 2G/3G/LTE modems and also offers M2M and IoT services. This complete package is intended to provide a basis for enterprise IoT and Industry 4.0 solutions and connect the worlds of M2M and IoT.

The hardware platform is based on TQ's embedded solution kit 'MSys' with the Intel Atom processor E3800. The connection to Gemalto's M2M / IoT cloud services via the integrated 'embedded Sensorlogic Agent' enables remote access to the gateway's parameters as well as to the devices and sensors connected via the fieldbus interfaces. APIs for Windows and Linux are available as software interfaces.

Advantech has also announced a collaboration with ARM, Bosch Sensortec, Sensirion and Texas Instruments (TI) to develop a new IoT sensor platform called M2.COM. The sensor and module manufacturers have designed an open platform for IoT sensors and sensor nodes to implement a wide range of IoT applications and standardize the various platforms and technologies, which should enable more efficient IoT development.

First SMARC 2.0 products

Another topic at the trade fair was the new SMARC 2.0 specifications. Congatec, for example, announced that it would provide comprehensive support for the latest specifications. This means that SMARC 2.0 modules will be available across the entire range of relevant processor technologies - from Intel Atom processors to various ARM designs. Christian Eder, Director Marketing at Congatec and board member of the SGET standardization committee, explains: "With the big step from SMARC 1.1 to 2.0, we have managed to give this standard a clear future perspective. This enormous progress has brought many new interfaces and eliminated numerous outdated features. Although designs based on 1.1 may no longer be compatible with 2.0, users are compensated for this with numerous new functions."

MSC Technologies presented a first SMARC 2-0 module - including a suitable carrier board for evaluation, testing and series production. The SMARC 2.0 module 'MSC SM2S-IMX6' is based on the i.MX6 system-on-chip from NXP and supports quad-, dual- and single-core CPUs. The MSC SM2-MB-EP1 carrier board comes in mini-ITX format and is designed to allow access to most of the features of the new SMARC 2.0 standard. Adlink also presented the new 'LEC-BW' module based on the new standard.

The organizers also announced initial news about next year's trade fair: For example, embedded world 2017 will take place from March 14 to 16, 2017 due to the overlap with the carnival vacations.