Imagine stickers that can sense things and talk to computers without needing bulky batteries or expensive chips. These sensors use a mix of light and radio waves to send data, similar to how a remote control and a Wi-Fi router work together. Because they are printed like ink on paper, they are cheap to make and easy to recycle.
Traditional IoT sensors are expensive to produce, hard to recycle, and suffer from battery failure. They often lack the flexibility to switch communication methods based on the environment.
A hybrid optical-radio IoT node prototype and a network architecture. The project is delivering four demonstrators, including smart tags and large-area repeaters.
If you are a medical supply chain provider dealing with tracking sensitive equipment in hospitals — this project developed a reconfigurable optical-radio IoT network that improves positioning accuracy and reliability. This ensures critical assets are located precisely using hybrid signals.
If you are a smart packaging manufacturer dealing with the high cost and waste of traditional silicon chips — this project developed smart tags using printed electronics. This results in a cost-efficient and environmentally friendly solution for item tracking.
If you are a warehouse operator dealing with dead batteries in thousands of sensors — this project developed energy autonomous nodes that harvest energy from both optical and radio sources. This creates a more reliable energy system for large-area monitoring.
The project maximizes the use of printed electronics instead of traditional components, which the objective describes as a cost-efficient and environmentally friendly solution.
Based on available project data, the use of printed electronics technology is intended to make the nodes cost-efficient and sustainable for implementation, though specific manufacturing volumes are not listed.
Based on available project data, the project is currently in the development and demonstration phase; specific licensing terms are not provided in the summary.
The dual-mode approach allows the system to be reconfigured to use optical, radio, or both, making it highly flexible and adaptable to changing scenarios.
The project period runs from 2023-01-01 to 2025-12-31, with four demonstrators scheduled for the final stage.
The consortium is well-balanced for technology transfer, featuring 11 partners across 8 countries. With an industry ratio of 36% (including 4 SMEs), there is a strong link between the 3 universities and 4 research centers and the commercial market, ensuring that the printed electronics are developed with business models in mind.
Contact Oulun Yliopisto in Finland for technical specifications on printed nodes.
Contact us to match with the SUPERIOT consortium for pilot testing.
