Jordan O'BrienSamsung is doing everything it can to ensure it leads the way with the ‘Internet of Things’, with the company revealing the Artik platform – a family of processors that can power everything from smartphones to drones.
The Internet of Things World conference in San Francisco saw the announcement of the platform, with Samsung’s president, Young Sohn, showing off three new processors backed by custom software.
Samsung is hoping that its Artik platform will help developers create new sensor-enabled devices and accelerate the adoption of the ‘Internet of Things’.
The first of the three modules supporting the Artik platform have been aptly named, ARTIK 1, ARTIK 5 and ARTIK 10, with each being designed for different scenarios.
The smallest of the three modules is the Artik 1, which has been designed with low-powered devices in mind.
The module itself is set to cost ‘less than $10’, which would translate to roughly £6 in the UK, although the company wouldn’t reveal exact pricing.
Samsung’s Artik 5 is slightly larger, although still relatively small with the module being about the size of a 10 pence piece.
The Artik 5 has been designed with smartwatches and drones in mind, with a 1GHz dual-core processor, 512MB of DRAM and 4GB of internal storage. WiFi, Bluetooth and video encoding capabilities are also all present.
While those two modules are geared towards newer connected devices, the third, the Artik 10, focuses mostly on devices that are ubiquitous with the consumers of today.
The Artik 10 has been designed for smartphones and home servers, as well as other resource-intensive devices, with the eight-processor module coming equipped with 2GB of DRAM, 16GB of storage, WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity, as well as HD video capabilities.
Again, Samsung refused to give exact pricing but promised that it’ll cost less than $100, around £60 in the UK.
While the hardware is important, Samsung’s SmartThings Open Cloud is arguably what makes the Artik platform viable for the ‘Internet of Things’ market.
The cloud service has the sole goal of making it easier for developer to create apps and services for IoT devices and decrease the barrier of entry start-ups who want to develop IoT applications.
Samsung is not hedging all its bets on Artik, with the company already having announced a smart home automation hub earlier this year. Developers wanting to get involved with Artik however are encouraged to pick up an Artik developers kit, which includes an Artik 10, that is being offered by the company.