NimbeLink
Speeding M2M Products to Market with end-device-certified Cellular Modems

Driven by M2M connectivity, the Internet of Things or IoT is bringing new opportunities to a variety of industries. However, many excellent concepts for M2M products are being held back by the complexity of developing and bringing successful products to market. NimbeLink offers the critical connectivity components these products need and the expertise to speed up their development.

Headquartered in Plymouth, MN, the company offers a range of easy-to-use embedded connectivity products, development tools, and expertise to help speed M2M products to market. With specialized knowledge in the M2M field, NimbeLink focuses on developing and implementing cellular and application-specific communication systems. NimbeLink’s internal ecosystem is specifically designed to understand and address customers’ needs and objectives rather than simply sell existing products. This allows customers to focus on their own unique areas of expertise and get their products to market as quickly and fully-developed as possible. “In the time it takes to develop a prototype, NimbeLink will have built a production-ready product,” says NimbeLink CEO Scott Schwalbe. “We call this rapid development process ‘protoduction’.”

The company’s products and services focus on exchanging data between edge devices and the cloud. NimbeLink’s Skywire, end-device certified, cellular modems are specifically designed for connecting M2M products to cellular networks easily and economically. “Our Skywire modems are the smallest end-device certified modems in the industry, and cover 2G, 3G, and LTE networks,” says Schwalbe. “To access the cellular network, products must be specifically ‘end-device certified,’ all Skywire modems are certified by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and most are fully certified by the cellular carriers, eliminating the substantial cost and delay of obtaining certification.” In addition to Skywire modems, NimbeLink has patents pending on edge devices that learn sensor behavior to ensure that alarms and alerts are based on real exceptions rather than normal fluctuations.

The company provides a full range of development kits that help designers integrate Skywire modems quickly and economically into their products. “By implementing NimbeLink M2M solutions, our clients help their own customers monitor and manage remote assets, eliminate truck rolls, and troubleshoot their operations without having a person at that site, all of which saves time and money,” explains Schwalbe.

NimbeLink offers plug-and-play connectivity components and expertise to speed up development of products

The company’s clients are in a variety of industries including agriculture, information technology, construction, healthcare, and consumer products. The applications are different, but are all designed to reduce costs and increase revenue for clients and their customers.

“The key factor differentiating us from our competition is that we start with the end in mind,” says Schwalbe. “After understanding the client’s requirements and the end objective, our company creates a tailored solution far faster than our competitors can. We try to earn the ‘nimble’ part of our name every day.” Another of NimbeLink’s goals is to create technology that will be viable for five to seven years, no small challenge in a fast changing industry. Currently, NimbeLink is working on developing low-power, long-range sensing while building experience with a growing range of measuring devices.

“As LTE cellular technology continues to develop, our company is focused on leading the way in technologies like LTE Cat-0, which meet lower-power needs in the M2M market. NimbeLink will continue to expand the family of Skywire modems along with building blocks to make them faster, easier, and more economical to implement and help our customers build winning M2M applications,” concludes Schwalbe.