Both Amazon and Apple are developing technology that helps you know the location of anything

Although their technology has enormous potential for application, both Amazon and Apple are tight-lipped about their ability to remotely locate objects.

The highlight on Amazon's Alexa and Echo event stage is not the new generation smart speakers or Alexa virtual assistant currently present in nearly every product that users wear on their daily. The really important product at this event of Amazon is the company's new wireless connection protocol , Sidewalk .

Normally for wireless control of smart devices, users have two main options, Bluetooth and Wifi. But with the limited distance these connections have, users will need to get close to those devices to start ordering them. If you choose data connections such as 4G or 5G, the connection protocols are quite complex and energy consuming.

Amazon Sidewalk wireless connection protocol.

Amazon Sidewalk , meanwhile, uses the 900MHz band to connect - similar to amateur radio stations - so the device control distance can be extended to 500m or even kilometers, but it costs less power due to lower frequency usage. Moreover, with mesh networking, Amazon Sidewalk can even expand the reach of a city.

The extended range of connectivity offers unprecedented benefits. An example would be the company's launch next year: the Ring Fetch dog collar , which can issue a warning when your pet runs outside the garden around the house. If the Amazon Sidewalk protocol becomes popular on a large scale, you can also determine if your dog with a Fetch collar is in a neighbor's house or play area nearby.

Similarities between Apple's ambitions and Amazon

Coincidentally with Amazon when Apple also has the same ambition of the ability to locate objects from that distance. That ambition, hidden in the U1 chip , only appears briefly on the stage of the last iPhone event, and it is not even mentioned by the company.

Through Sidewalk, Amazon shows its ambition of a city-wide connection network.

While Amazon uses the 900MHz band to connect to remote devices, Apple's U1 chip uses the ability to navigate via ultra-short-range broadband to be able to accurately locate objects in a room. Combining the strengths of both companies' hardware, they can easily pinpoint the exact location of almost everything.

To demonstrate the connectivity and coverage of Amazon Sidewalk, the company distributed to its 700 employees who live in the Los Angeles basin of broadcasting devices using Amazon's Sidewalk protocol. Because the devices are within 500m to a mile of each other, Amazon basically " can cover where people live in Los Angeles ."

This not only helps you wirelessly connect your device to an unbelievable distance, but can also locate any device in the city.

Meanwhile, Apple, with its habit of tightly controlling its software and services on the iPhone, is still unable to provide compatibility between its devices and rival devices in the smart home ecosystem.

There is tremendous potential, but U1 only appears faint at the Apple event.

Even so, Apple's hardware popularity is sufficient to build a network of access points needed when integrating a critical U1 chip. The large scale of these access points will be useful for retrieving lost objects, even if it is in a hidden corner of the room.

There is enormous potential in the future, but now is not the time

While both tech giants can easily deploy their own technology solutions, why are they so silent about them? While the Sidewalk protocol was only introduced by Amazon during the event, Apple also said the U1 chip will make sending files via AirDrop more convenient - not much added benefit for making a chip. like U1.

It is likely because of the controversy regarding technology privacy rights in recent years, making both companies cautious about this issue. Remote location via wireless connections is the most tightly controlled ever in iOS 13 and Android 10 updates.

Ring Fetch, used to track pets as they let them play freely.

Or maybe it's because its performance is not good enough, and there are not many applications for it. Perhaps brands will only begin to promote it stronger when the products you have and the applications on it can exploit the full power of these technologies.

Even so, these technologies are still extremely important to the ambitions of both Amazon and Apple in the near future. Apple's long-rumored augmented reality glasses and future iPhones may contain U1 chips to create augmented reality surfaces that precisely place objects on the actual object as you point the glass. his intelligence on them.

For Amazon, vice president of equipment and services, Dave Limp, when introducing Sidewalk, mentioned water sensors for planting trees, mailbox sensors, as well as the potential for using weather sensors. Even bigger are child-tracking devices, the elderly and even Scout delivery cars, which are also part of Sidewalk's future. With a low-power connection protocol and wide coverage like Sidewalk, Amazon is opening up a huge new potential for its smart devices.

Sure, there will be a couple of failures in the implementation of the project, but in the long-term future, Apple's near-range connectivity, and Amazon's long-range intermediate connectivity are likely to define the Hardware and service efforts of each company over the next decade.