New-Tech Europe | June 2017

Embedded Solutions Special Edition

without incurring unsustainable maintenance overheads. The exciting opportunity for IoT device designers Batteries are an effective way of powering many consumer electronics devices, but in IoT and industrial scenarios, they’re not necessarily suitable. With the need to deploy at scale and with mains power typically unavailable, the overhead of periodically recharging or replacing batteries would quickly become unsustainable. But by using modern RF, solar or thermal energy-harvesting with low- power components in low-power designs, manufacturers can now create batteryless devices. And by incorporating e-paper displays into their kit, designers can add whole new ways for humans to interact with industrial and IoT gear, free of the challenges that come with battery-reliant devices. Scott is CEO of Pervasive Displays and has over a decade of experience in software in addition to 12 years working in displays businesses. During his career, Scott has been a founding partner at four start-up companies, including Pervasive Displays. Scott sits on the board of several other technology businesses as a consulting partner. He was a board member of One Laptop Per Child (OLPC), which looks to provide children in developing countries with a rugged, low- cost, low-power, connected laptop. Scott has an MBA from the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley as well as a BA from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, US.

Figure 2: Toppan’s batteryless EPD with built-in RFID tag (Source: Toppan Printing)

e-paper display is readable without a backlight. Moreover, where LCDs require a constant current to display even a static image (due to their continual need to refresh), e-paper is bistable, meaning once an image is in place, it consumes no energy. Power is only required to change what’s shown on an EPD. Better still, the current required to update modern e-paper displays, such as those from Pervasive Displays, can be as little as 2 mA. Because e-paper doesn’t require a lot of energy, and what’s on the display remains visible even in the absence of a power source, it’s perfect for use in industrial and IoT scenarios. It also means it’s ideal for RF, thermal or solar energy-harvesting. The Toppan batteryless EPD with RFID tag While energy-harvesting can’t be used in every situation, it’s

sufficient to drive some surprisingly sophisticated devices. Take Toppan Printing Co. Ltd.’s new batteryless EPD with a built-in RFID tag. This gives the dual benefit of being readable by machines and humans. The device works using RF energy harvested from the NFC reader or writer. It’s available with displays between 1.44 and 2.7 inches, and is under 7 mm thick. It has sufficient memory to store three images, which can be shown on its EPD, as well as 884 bytes of RFID data. Toppan’s batteryless EPD is aimed at the logistics and warehousing markets, where it can take the place of paper labels in manufacturing and to manage assets or inventories. Thanks to the built-in RFID facility, the tag is also machine-readable, thereby enabling easier and automated tracking. Crucially, because it doesn’t require a battery, the device can be used for large-scale deployments

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