This news has been extracted from New Electronics article from Neil Tyler available HERE
Farnell element14 is become the first distributor to stock the recently launched ARM mbed IoT Starter Kit – Ethernet Edition for IBM Internet of Things Foundation. The agreement will open up opportunities for technical enthusiasts around the world looking to experiment and innovate with the Internet of Things (IoT). Available now from element14 the new development kit will enable people with limited or no experience of embedded design or web development to create IoT applications and devices.
Worldwide interest in IoT is high, with a recent global survey of more than 3,500 adults, commissioned by element14, revealing 43% want to be able to connect more devices and appliances to the Internet. This figure rises to 71% across China and India.
Commenting on the agreement David Shen, Group CTO at Premier Farnell, said: "The new ARM mbed IoT Starter Kit provides an ecosystem to develop IoT enabled applications. It allows designers of all skill levels to get their devices connected to the cloud and begin reading the kits sensors remotely in a matter of minutes."
"The agreement with element14 makes the ARM mbed IoT Starter Kit easily available to any developer, almost anywhere on the planet, at a price they can afford," said Zach Shelby, vice president, IoT business marketing, ARM. "A major focus for mbed is to lower the barriers to IoT innovation, enabling anyone to become an entrepreneur. This kit helps to deliver on that ambition."
The new development kit, which guides users through the processes for developing cloud-ready IoT devices, comes with an ARM mbed-enabled development board, built on the Freescale FRDM-K64F Kinetis microcontroller, which has an ARM Cortex-M4 processing core running at 120MHz. An Ethernet connection links the kit to IBM's Bluemix cloud service, which acts as a guide on how to use the board.
The kits also features a sensor expansion board, which contains a 128 x 32 graphics LCD, 256KB RAM, 1MB of flash storage, a speaker, five-way joystick, temperature sensor, accelerometer, potentiometers and a PWM (pulse-width modulation) control line to receive digital signals.
The ARM mbed IoT Starter Kit is available from Farnell element14 in Europe. Data sheets and application notes can be found on the product pages together with a range of associated accessories and 24/5 live tech support is available for any queries.