Central control of devices using "ExpEther" enables production lines to be flexibly adapted

Tokyo, May 25, 2016 - NEC Corporation (NEC; TSE: 6701) today announced the development of a network technology that enables production lines to be flexibly adapted through real-time remote control of devices such as sensors, displays, and robots at manufacturing sites and other locations.

The spread of the Internet of Things (IoT) in recent years has led to demand in manufacturing sites and other locations for vast numbers of sensors and manufacturing equipment to be connected in a wireless network and for these devices to be controlled in real-time. Factories can be challenging environments for communications owing to radio wave reflections and attenuation from the presence of robots and metal. NEC's new network technology creates a stable wireless connection between computers and manufacturing equipment in challenging environments such as these.

"This technology achieves stable connections in wireless network environments inside factories, where communications are frequently lost, through the application of 'non-retransmission model redundancy encoding,' which transmits information accurately, without the need for retransmission. NEC aims to commercialize the technology in FY 2017," said Yuichi Nakamura, General Manager, System Platform Research Laboratories, NEC Corporation.

Features of the new technology include the following:

1) "Non-retransmission model redundancy encoding" enables lost packets to be restored

NEC developed a "non-retransmission model redundancy encoding" system that restores lost packets on the receiver's end without the need for retransmission in the wireless area of "ExpEther," NEC's proprietary technology that controls devices centrally in real-time. This is achieved by means of a low latency connection between several devices distributed around the site and a single computer in a remote location. For the data to be transmitted using ExpEther, the number of packets to be encoded at one time is decided based on the status of the radio wave, and the encoded packets generated and sent one by one until the correct information is received for each encoded unit. This enables the transmission delay requirements for PCI Express to be met, and achieves stable transmission in a wireless environment where packet loss frequently occurs.

2) Meets transmission delay requirements with the computer system’s delay model as a mathematical formula

Wireless transmission using the "non-retransmission model redundancy encoding" system makes it possible to estimate the transmission delay of packets by creating a model of the mathematical relationship between parameters such as encoded units, or radio wave conditions and the transmission delay. Adjusting the parameters when carrying out "non-retransmission model redundancy encoding" and using this delay model makes it possible to guarantee that the transmission delay requirements for PCI Express are met.

This technology will be presented on May 26 at the IEEE International Conference on Communications (IEEE ICC 2016) to be held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia from May 23 (Monday) through May 27 (Friday). IEEE ICC 2016：http://icc2016.ieee-icc.org/