Lyon-based Wattsense offers an on-demand service for building connectivity. Their main product is the Wattsense Box. It connects various devices from different manufacturers and protocols from the building automation industry, collects data, and sends it for monitoring and control purposes into the Cloud. Wattsense customers include facility management companies, PropTechs, and real estate owners.

The Wattsense Box combines the functions of a gateway, PLC, modem, and edge device. The integrated converter unifies field communication protocols. Not only can telemetry data be collected, but control commands can also be sent back to the connected devices. The box is equipped with an integrated radio module and various connections such as Ethernet, RS485, LoRaWAN, KNX, M-BUS, and many other standards. The box maintains contact with the outside world, i.e., the cloud platform, either wired to Ethernet or mobile radio.

Background

The building control system has grown over the years. Many devices from different manufacturers in one building and many different interfaces and protocols make uniform monitoring and control complex and above all expensive. Wattsense has set itself the goal of removing the obstacles to cross-device connectivity. For more efficiency in building management and ultimately cost reduction, such as better monitoring and control for heating or air conditioning.

Challenge

One of the major challenges of digitizing building control is to establish a secure and reliable connection between the cloud platform and the devices in the building. Often it already fails because of an Internet connection, since property owners usually cannot simply access any connections of their tenants for data protection reasons alone. In cellars or boiler rooms, there is usually no connection either. In this case, the Wattsense Box demonstrates its capability in mobile communications.

1NCE Solution

The Wattsense Box uses the 1NCE IoT Lifetime Flat for reliable online communication without any cabling. Integrated is a future-proof 1NCE SIM card with combined 2G, 3G, and 4G functionality. This makes the Wattsense Box independent and quickly ready for use. The prepaid tariff from 1NCE without monthly recurring costs supports Wattsense in calculating the connection costs and thus makes an important contribution to the calculation of the final product pricing.