DISTRIBUTION
THE ROLE OF DISTRIBUTION IN DESIGNING FOR THE IOT SPACE
Robbie Paul, director, IoT business development for Digi-Key Electronics looks at how distributors can aid design engineers in designing for the IoT space
odern design techniques have evolved substantially to allow for today’s engineer to focus on their unique value add, rather than need to reinvent the wheel for every new invention. And yet it’s widely accepted that nearly 75% of Internet of Things (IoT) projects fail. Not because of an overly stretched design engineer or flawed design, but because of the business case, or lack thereof. With all the tools available it’s so easy in 2021 to get IoT-connected, but what is the business value?
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An example of a lacking business case would be a connected toaster. You can toast your bread from your phone, but who cares? Take that example up a notch to an internet-enabled slow cooker, and things start to make more sense. You can adjust your dinner and watch the temperature while you’re at work, so everything is cooked evenly and well by the time you arrive home for dinner.
Design engineers can leverage three key trends when designing for the Internet of Things (IoT) space in order to greatly reduce time to data visualisation. This is critical because it enables engineers to focus on the activities that make their design significant and valuable.
Rapid prototyping
The first trend to look at is rapid prototyping. The key here is to not over-engineer - you have to keep in mind the most viable product. In order to get there quickly, engineers should leverage resources like Digi- Key’s reference design library (RDL) and take a modular-based approach. There are already complete ecosystems created such as Arduino, Raspberry Pi or Adafruit Feather for engineers to build into. From there they can select the appropriate add-
8 MAY 2021 | ELECTRONICS TODAY
on technologies like shields, hats, feather wings, Click boards, XBee, etc., or expand via connector ecosystems like Grove or Qwiic to create an initial proof of concept.
There’s no need for every engineer to be an RF expert. Communications are simplified with modules allowing for easy
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