Category: Big Data Applications

Feed: Feed | Tractica. Author: Aditya Kaul. Last week, Pebble launched its third-generation smart watch, called Pebble Time.  Pebble is considered a smart watch pioneer, having raised over $10 million during its Kickstarter debut in 2012. Since then, Pebble has sold more than 1 million smart watches. (Source: Pebble) With the Apple Watch coming in April, Pebble had no choice but to come up with something compelling enough to remain competitive in an increasingly crowded field. Its monochrome e-paper first edition smart watch could only go so far in competing with the AMOLED, full color, animated display of the Apple ... Read More

Feed: Feed | Tractica. Author: Manoj Sahi. Global military expenditures in 2013 totaled $1.75 trillion, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) whereas global spending on food and agricultural research and development (R&D) was around $54.2 billion in 2008 (the latest year for which complete data are available). Both security and food are equally essential, but the relative amount of money being spent on these areas raises serious questions. The current pattern of growth in military and agricultural robots shows the same disproportion. The global market size for military robots was more than five times that of agricultural ... Read More

Feed: Feed | Tractica. Author: Clint Wheelock. The nascent smart watch market experienced a period of tremendous innovation and growth during 2014, with global device shipments more than doubling from 2.3 million units in 2013 to 5.0 million units in 2014.  A number of prominent industry players launched smart watch products, including Samsung, Sony, Motorola, and LG among others, and Google introduced its Android Wear operating system for smart watches.  However, according to a new report from Tractica, the defining moment for smart watches during the year was the announcement of the Apple Watch in September 2014.Now set for launch ... Read More

Feed: Feed | Tractica. Author: Bruce Daley. Why are cars that drive themselves considered smart, but airplanes that fly themselves considered mindless?  Despite working in similar ways, airplanes are not described as being “intelligent” or “pilotless”.  Even with a longer history, more sophistication, and greater success, avionics are regarded with a measure of contempt.  According the Dictionary of American Slang, being on autopilot means you are a cognitive state in which you act without self-awareness.  When you are on autopilot, your body is going through the motions but your mind is gone.  Yet cars that can drive themselves have been ... Read More

Feed: Feed | Tractica. Author: Aditya Kaul. Wearable devices in the enterprise environment are likely to mirror recent trends related to consumerization of IT in the workplace, as we have seen with smartphones, laptops, and tablets. The concept of “bring your own wearable” (BYOW) is that employees will purchase and use their own personal wearable device in the workplace, similar to the “bring your own device” (BYOD) phenomenon experienced by IT departments in recent years. As the wearables market grows, we are likely to see a number of employees wearing their own smart watches, fitness trackers, or even smart glasses ... Read More

Feed: Feed | Tractica. Author: Insight Designs. Human interaction with computing devices has quickly moved beyond the personal computer to include smartphones and tablets, and now stands on the brink of further diversification as the user interface moves closer to the body. Wearable computing is moving past the early adopter stage and the industry is beginning to see the first glimpses of how it will have a profound influence on the future of human interaction with technology. The wearables market is a mix of several different device categories, all of which are worn or attached to the body to serve ... Read More

Feed: Feed | Tractica. Author: Aditya Kaul. Over the last few days, there has been a lot of talk about Android Wear sales, or the lack thereof. Interestingly, people have figured out how to get ballpark numbers for Android Wear smart watches by using Google Play download estimates. These estimates don’t give us an exact figure, but they provide a good general indication of how Google’s flagship wearables platform is doing. The data suggest that only between 500,000 and 1 million Android Wear watches have been sold so far. Let’s dissect these numbers a bit more and get some context ... Read More

Feed: Feed | Tractica. Author: Amy Windju. On February 14, a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) document was leaked concerning proposed changes to regulations for the small commercial drone industry in the United States.  The following day, the FAA issued a statement confirming what these changes may be. My previous blog post focused on how American tech giants such as Amazon and Google have left the U.S. to conduct drone testing as FAA regulations prohibited these companies from conducting testing in the U.S. Now, it appears the FAA has changed course and will now permit the flight of small drones in ... Read More

Feed: Feed | Tractica. Author: Manoj Sahi. There was a time when raising the initial funds to develop an innovative idea into a commercial product was an immensely painful process. Thanks to the internet and the concept of crowdfunding, life has become a bit easier for innovators and entrepreneurs. Crowdfunding is also compelling to venture capitalists, and it’s no wonder that many VC firms are turning to crowdfunding platforms to access new deal flow. The crowdfunding industry has been growing rapidly and entrepreneurs in the robotics industry have already started getting a taste of success on various crowdfunding platforms like ... Read More

Feed: Feed | Tractica. Author: Insight Designs. As mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets have become ubiquitous, and simultaneously as personal identification and authentication grow in importance in the connected world, biometric technologies are becoming an increasingly integral part of mobile devices. Biometrics, whether for mobile devices or large stationary systems, typically performs one of two functions: authentication, proving that someone is who they claim to be, or identification, figuring out who someone is. Nearly all consumer-facing use cases are authentication and nearly all identification uses are enterprise-facing, especially government use cases. Somewhere in the middle, financial institutions are ... Read More