NIWeek: IoT, 5G, big data — and a cuttlefish robot

National Instruments’ NIWeek conference is two decades old, and NI’s Ray Almgren, VP of corporate marketing, spoke with RCR’s Kelly Hill to recap the event and talk about the industry trends reflected there.
This year’s event focused in particular on some of the industry’s most significant trends: the Internet of Things, big data, and the future of wireless networks in terms of the early development of 5G systems.
Almgren said in NI’s case, its involvement in big data is primarily related to analog big data being collected by its customers. In the IoT area, NIWeek focused on the development of IoT systems along with the testing of IoT devices, which often have significant wireless and computational capability.
During one of the NIWeek discussions, Jim Robinson, general manager of segments and broad market division and IoT for Intel, reminded the audience that “when we talk about the term IoT, we oftentimes get caught on the ‘things'” — but that the end-to-end systems, ranging from devices to network infrastructure, networking, data centers and comprehensive analytics, are really what will drive IoT value.
Almgren noted that although NIWeek began as an event solely showcasing the company and its products, it has expanded to broader industry significance and its most popular events are those offering expert views across the ecosystem.
NI also used the conference as a launching pad for several new products, including PXI features that enable programmable configuration and software-defined instruments.
NI highlighted innovations at the university level on day three of the event, including how its systems were used in developing a self-driving car that could handle navigating urban environments, as well as a fascinating new take on underwater robots. The team from ETH Zurich designed a robot with propulsion inspired by the agility of a cuttlefish, with fan-like projections on its sides. More information on that in the following video, and you can watch the robot in action in the archived videos from NIWeek on the company’s web site.
http://youtu.be/Cu0I2uisPeg
Get more insight from Almgren on the event in this interview:

If you missed #NIWeek, the company has made a series of videos from the keynotes available, as well as photos and presentation slides and other conference content.