Tags: Technology Industry, Telecommunications, Wholesale and Retail
By Alexander Villafania
MAKATI CITY, METRO MANILA – Imagine this: A woman goes to a supermarket to pick out her groceries for the day. She is in a hurry and can’t afford to stay too long. Fortunately, the grocery has a “green line” wherein the woman promptly goes through to finish groceries.
There is no cashier and only a bagger waits at the end.
As she goes through a metal arch, a beep indicates that she has already paid for her grocery using her credit card and the bagger puts in the groceries. She gets a text message telling her the amount of her groceries and that has already been paid. Normally, going to the grocery would take the woman around 30 minutes or even longer if there are long queues. But she only did this in less than 15 minutes.
A scenario like this seems to come from some science fiction movie but this automated payment system is very much possible. It is an example of an “intelligent system.”
In fact, it could already be used in the Philippines. The technology is called machine-to-machine (M2M) wherein various tasks are automated by several machine that communicate with each other. There is little to no human intervention necessary in an M2M environment as the machines themselves “talk” to complete tasks and only need to issue reports to human managers.
M2M is an updated version of machine telemetry wherein machines talk on one-way systems. In M2M, the machines can talk “wirelessly” and over large distances.
In the case of the grocery example, the automated cashier registers the items in the grocery basket, which all have electronic barcodes or radio frequency tags that indicate its item type, manufacturer, expiry date, and price. The automated cashier adds up the items and sends it to the grocer’s bank, which automatically charges it to a credit card or debit account of the user.
An electronic receipt is generated and sent by the bank to the user’s mobile phone. In such cases, a soft copy of the actual receipt is automatically sent to the user’s email.
In the Philippines, M2M can be a widely used application in different fields, from manufacturing, distribution and logistics, and retail. Globe Telecom launched its own M2M products just recently, one of the companies in the Philippines to have launched the idea recently.
Jesus Romero, Globe Telecom Enterprise Business Head, said M2M is still in its early phase in the Philippines especially since many companies are yet to be more familiar with the basic concept of automating their existing processes.
However, he said that it does not mean the Philippines is not ready for M2M. The relative lack of automation in certain processes is also an advantage as these types of companies can start their automation and M2M processes at the same time.
Romero explained that in an M2M process, wireless devices are attached to existing equipment. These M2M devices transmit information garnered from the machines they are attached to and link up with several others for specific tasks. The information technology manager only needs to monitor the reports from these machines.
“It lessens the cost of management and also speeds it up,” Romero said.
Early this year, Globe’s rival Smart Communications introduced its “Smart Enterprise” division to focus on business-oriented services, notably on M2M. Smart’s Chief Wireless Advisor Orlando Vea said that M2M can improve transactional efficiency between remote offices of a company with its partners and suppliers.
On the consumer side, Vea noted that ordinary users would benefit from services that have M2M capabilities. In one example, M2M can be used to manage health records between medical institutions. This means that users’ medical records can be accessed by an admitting clinic or hospital in case of emergencies.
Another example is prepaid electricity metering which would allow users to handle their electricity much better instead of just waiting for their monthly bills.
A report by research firm Ovum showed that M2M deployments would be a major business strategy for telecommunications operators since their networks would be used primarily for information transfer between M2M-capable machines.
The growth of M2M, at least in the Asia Pacific region, would also be fueled by the need of companies to improve services and lowering costs.
Business intelligence consultant Berg Insight also noted on the potential size of M2M for the home consumer market: $9.5 billion. “Smart home” technologies would refer to automating certain systems within a residence.
Related Stories:
Globe predicts growth in wireless services among SMEs
RP telecoms can increase revenues via data services, says Ovum
Social networking drives mobile data use among Filipinos
Wireless Web connection continues to grow in RP
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