Tony Poulos’ dream of being micro-chipped like a dog may not be as far fetched as he imagines.
I read Tony’s blog on Motorola’s application for a patent covering connected tattoos a couple of days after a Qualcomm executive mentioned micro-chipping during a presentation on mobile modems.
Alex Katouzian, senior vice president of product development at Qualcomm Technologies, said future mobile monitoring could cut mortality rates in people with chronic diseases almost in half (45%), during a presentation at the firm’s inaugural Modem Performance Workshop.
Potential developments include “embedding chips in your skin – band-aids that have a chip in them,” Katouzian told the workshop, which took place in San Francisco last week.
The world is becoming increasingly mobile, with a growing range of products and devices gaining connectivity. Katouzian pointed to connected cars, TVs and refrigerators, and telemedicine as examples, and noted modems must be able to connect those products, while still meeting differing global standards and industry specifications. “Testing all this worldwide becomes very complex.”
An efficient modem will consume less battery life in mobile devices, by offering faster call and data connections, which has a knock-on effect on network efficiency and overall quality of service, Katouzian explained.
The firm demonstrated its Gobi modems in a series of benchmarking tests against unnamed rival kit, showing video handoff between 4G and 3G, video upload, and webpage downloads.
As for Mr. Poulos, I’ll leave him with this thought. For every airport check your chip gets you past, it will also track every twist and turn of your favorite road on your favorite motorbike.
I’m not sure I’m ready to know how slowly I take my favorite bends compared to how fast I think I am, no matter how fast the data is uploaded.