SAN RAMON, Calif., and PORTLAND, Ore. — The EnOcean Alliance and the Open Interconnect Consortium (OIC) today announced a new liaison agreement. This collaboration joins one of the most established wireless building controls alliances with a leading Internet of Things (IoT) association. Both organizations are working to deliver seamless, interoperable connectivity for the IoT. The cooperation will result in solutions using both technologies — the EnOcean energy harvesting wireless standard and the OIC specification.

The Open Interconnect Consortium has developed a common connectivity framework that the organization said allows developers an easier and quicker time to market for their products. The OIC framework works horizontally across and between IoT vertical segments and benefits companies that want to develop products to address these markets. Using the OIC standard removes the various “island” solutions and instead provides a common solution for smart home, industrial, health care, and more.

The EnOcean Alliance includes more than 400 member companies. Founded in 2008, the nonprofit organization is dedicated to improving buildings’ comfort, carbon footprint, and security through the use of energy harvesting wireless control solutions based on the EnOcean standard (ISO/IEC 14543-3-1X). The devices work without batteries and allow maintenance-free operation. At the same time, the self-powered sensors build a foundation for the Internet of Things as they allow data collection at places where wires or batteries reach their limits.

“A major challenge of the ever-growing Internet of Things is the ability to deploy devices from multiple manufacturers with compatible communication and supporting services, at massive scale,” said Mike Richmond, executive director, Open Interconnect Consortium. “The multitude of wireless and battery-less sensors represented by the EnOcean Alliance ecosystem are exactly what we have in mind when we say that software for IoT has to be cloud-native from the start. We're thrilled to be working with them.”

“Interoperability is a major task for the EnOcean Alliance. From the very beginning, we built a community with the goal to have products from different vendors communicate with each other. With the explosive growth of the IoT space, interoperability can no longer be limited to one organization. It needs to be expanded to all control standards out there on the market. The OIC consequently pursues this goal by creating not only standard-crossing but industry-crossing interoperability. It’s great that we can now integrate IoTivity with the EnOcean ecosystem into this future-shaping framework. I’m looking forward to a vital know-how exchange and solutions, which will open up new connectivity possibilities,” said Graham Martin, chairman of the EnOcean Alliance.

For more information about the Open Interconnect Consortium, visit http://openinterconnect.org.

For more information about the EnOcean Alliance, visit www.enocean-alliance.org.

Publication date: 10/6/2015

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