Facilitating the provisioning of a local analytics device

• US 10,333,775 B2
• Filed: 12/06/2016
• Issued: 06/25/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 06/03/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Uptake Technologies, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Uptake Technologies, Inc.
• Inventors: Nicholas, Brad, Heliker, Brett
• Primary Examiner(s): Zand, Davoud A
• Application Number:
  US15/370,215
• Publication Number:
  US 20170353352A1
• Time in Patent Office: 931 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/0808 Diagnosing performance data testing of vehicles G01M17/00; testing of electrical installation on vehicles G01R31/005
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0803 Configuration setting
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/38 for collecting sensor information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/50 Service provisioning or reconfiguring
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/70 Services for machine-to-machine communication [M2M] or machine type communication [MTC]

Abstract

Disclosed herein are systems, devices, and methods for provisioning a local analytics device to interact with a remote computing system on behalf of an asset that is coupled to the local analytics device and that is associated with a particular customer account hosted by the remote computing system.

Claims

1. A computing device configured to facilitate provisioning a local analytics device to interact with a remote computing system on behalf of an asset coupled to the local analytics device, the computing device comprising:

at least one wireless network interface configured to (1) communicatively couple the computing device to the remote computing system via a first communication path that includes a wide-area network and (2) communicatively couple the computing device to the local analytics device via a second communication path, wherein the local analytics device is coupled to one or more on-board systems of the asset;

at least one processor;

a non-transitory computer-readable medium; and

program instructions stored on the non-transitory computer-readable medium that are executable by the at least one processor to cause the computing device to;

in response to transmitting an account credential to the remote computing system, receive, from the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface, an asset-management credential and one or more asset identifiers, wherein each asset identifier corresponds to a given asset associated with a customer account;

receive, from the local analytics device via the at least one wireless network interface, an asset signature, wherein the asset signature is indicative of a configuration of the asset;

based on the one or more asset identifiers and the asset signature, determine that the asset is associated with the customer account;

determine that a provisioning permission is associated with the asset-management credential;

based on (1) determining that the asset is associated with the customer account and (2) determining that the provisioning permission is associated with the asset-management credential, transmit, to the local analytics device via the at least one wireless network interface, a data-management credential for enabling the local analytics device to perform one or more operations on behalf of the asset.

2. The computing device of claim 1, wherein the computing device further comprises program instructions stored on the non-transitory computer-readable medium that are executable by the at least one processor to cause the computing device to:

after receiving the asset signature, define a local asset identifier representative of the asset signature; and

transmit, to the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface, at least the local asset identifier, wherein the one or more asset identifiers comprise the local asset identifier.

3. The computing device of claim 2, wherein determining that the asset is associated with the customer account is further based on the local asset identifier.

4. The computing device of claim 1, wherein determining that the asset is associated with the customer account comprises:

based on determining that the asset signature does not correspond to any of the one or more asset identifiers, determining whether a network connection exists between the computing device and the remote computing system.

5. The computing device of claim 4, wherein determining that the asset is associated with the customer account comprises:

if the network connection does not exist, obtaining asset identification information based on one or more inputs via the computing device; and

otherwise, transmitting, to the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface, at least a portion of the asset signature and in response, receiving, from the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface, an additional asset identifier corresponding to the asset signature.

6. The computing device of claim 5, wherein obtaining the asset identification information comprises:

capturing an image comprising the asset identification information; and

extracting from the image the asset identification information.

7. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions stored thereon that are executable to cause a computing device configured to facilitate provisioning a local analytics device to interact with a remote computing system on behalf of an asset coupled to the local analytics device, wherein the computing device comprises at least one wireless network interface configured to (1) communicatively couple the computing device to the remote computing system via a first communication path that includes a wide-area network and (2) communicatively couple the computing device to the local analytics device via a second communication path, wherein the local analytics device is coupled to one or more on-board systems of the asset, and wherein the instructions are executable to cause the computing device to:

in response to transmitting an account credential to the remote computing system, receive, from the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, an asset-management credential and one or more asset identifiers, wherein each asset identifier corresponds to a given asset associated with a customer account;

receive, from the local analytics device via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, an asset signature, wherein the asset signature is indicative of a configuration of the asset;

based on the one or more asset identifiers and the asset signature, determine that the asset is associated with the customer account;

determine that a provisioning permission is associated with the asset-management credential;

based on (1) determining that the asset is associated with the customer account and (2) determining that the provisioning permission is associated with the asset-management credential, transmit, to the local analytics device via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, a data-management credential for enabling the local analytics device to perform one or more operations on behalf of the asset.

8. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 7, wherein the instructions are further executable to cause the computing device to:

after receiving the asset signature, define a local asset identifier representative of the asset signature; and

transmit, to the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, at least the local asset identifier, wherein the one or more asset identifiers comprise the local asset identifier.

9. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 8, wherein determining that the asset is associated with the customer account is further based on the local asset identifier.

10. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 7, wherein determining that the asset is associated with the customer account comprises:

based on determining that the asset signature does not correspond to any of the one or more asset identifiers, determining whether a network connection exists between the computing device and the remote computing system.

11. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 10, wherein determining that the asset is associated with the customer account comprises:

if the network connection does not exist, obtaining asset identification information based on one or more inputs via the computing device; and

otherwise, transmitting, to the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, at least a portion of the asset signature and in response, receiving, from the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, an additional asset identifier corresponding to the asset signature.

12. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 11, wherein obtaining the asset identification information comprises:

capturing an image comprising the asset identification information; and

extracting from the image the asset identification information.

13. An asset-condition monitoring system comprising:

a remote computing system configured to remotely monitor operating conditions of at least one asset;

a computing device comprising at least one wireless network interface that is configured to (1) communicatively couple the computing device to the remote computing system via a first communication path that includes wide-area network and (2) communicatively couple the computing device to a local analytics device via a second communication path, wherein the local analytics device is coupled to one or more on-board systems of a given asset, and wherein the computing device is configured to facilitate provisioning the local analytics device to interact with the remote computing system on behalf of the given asset that is coupled to the local analytics device; and

wherein the remote computing system is configured to;

maintain a plurality of asset-management credentials and a plurality of asset identifiers, wherein each respective asset identifier corresponds to a respective asset associated with a customer account;

based on an account credential, transmit to the computing device an asset-management credential and one or more asset identifiers; and

perform an operation for the given asset in response to receiving a data-management credential from the local analytics device; and

wherein the computing device is configured to;

receive, from the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, the asset-management credential and the one or more asset identifiers;

receive, from the local analytics device via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, an asset signature, wherein the asset signature is indicative of a configuration of the given asset;

based on the one or more asset identifiers and the asset signature, determine that the given asset is associated with the customer account; and

based on (1) determining that the given asset is associated with the customer account and (2) determining that a provisioning permission is associated with the asset-management credential, transmit, to the local analytics device via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, a data-management credential for enabling the local analytics device to perform one or more operations on behalf of the given asset.

14. The asset-condition monitoring system of claim 13, wherein maintaining the plurality of asset identifiers comprises, for a respective asset identifier, associating the respective asset identifier with a respective asset signature that is indicative of a configuration of the respective asset.

15. The asset-condition monitoring system of claim 14, wherein maintaining the plurality of asset identifiers comprises, for a respective asset signature, modifying the respective asset signature based on receiving data indicative of a change to a particular configuration parameter of the respective asset.

16. The asset-condition monitoring system of claim 14, wherein the computing device is further configured to, after receiving the asset signature, define a local asset identifier representative of the asset signature, and wherein maintaining the plurality of asset identifiers comprises:

defining an asset identifier based on receiving the local asset identifier; and

associating the defined asset identifier with the asset signature.

17. The asset-condition monitoring system of claim 13, wherein performing the operation for the given asset comprises:

executing at least one predictive model related to the operation of the given asset based on signal data received from the local analytics device; and

transmitting, to the local analytics device via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, one or more results of the executing.

18. The asset-condition monitoring system of claim 13, wherein determining that the given asset is associated with the customer account comprises:

based on determining that the asset signature does not correspond to any of the one or more asset identifiers, determining whether a network connection exists between the computing device and the remote computing system.

19. The asset-condition monitoring system of claim 18, wherein determining that the given asset is associated with the customer account comprises:

if the network connection does not exist, obtaining asset identification information based on one or more inputs via the computing device; and

otherwise, transmitting, the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, at least a portion of the asset signature and in response, receiving, from the remote computing system via the at least one wireless network interface of the computing device, an additional asset identifier corresponding to the asset signature.

20. The asset-condition monitoring system of claim 13, wherein the asset signature comprises a plurality of asset data compiled in a particular sequence.