Leveraging a femtocell network for premises management or monitoring

• US 9,279,699 B2
• Filed: 10/13/2009
• Issued: 03/08/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 09/16/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AT&T Mobility II LLC (AT&T, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: AT&T Mobility II LLC (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Patini, Joseph
• Primary Examiner(s): LAM, YEE F
• Application Number:
  US12/577,856
• Publication Number:
  US 20110085525A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,338 Days
• Field of Search: 370/329, 455/404.1, 455/423, 455/466, 709/227
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G01D 2204/45 Utility meters networked together within a single building
• CPC Class Codes: G01D 4/002 Remote reading of utility meters
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2825 Reporting to a device located outside the home and the home network access arrangements H04L12/2856; for remote control or remote monitoring of applications H04L67/025; telephonic communication systems adapted for combination with telemetering systems H04M11/002
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2834 Switching of information between an external network and a home network access arrangements H04L12/2856
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/2841 Wireless
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/285 Generic home appliances, e.g. refrigerators
• 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: H04W 84/045 using private Base Stations, e.g. femto Base Stations, home Node B
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/18 Self-organising networks, e.g. ad-hoc networks or sensor networks
• CPC Class Codes: Y02B 90/20 Smart grids as enabling technology in buildings sector smart grids supporting the management or operation of end-user stationary applications in general, or like technologies with no associated climate change mitigation effect Y04S20/00
• CPC Class Codes: Y04S 20/30 Smart metering, e.g. specially adapted for remote reading

Abstract

The disclosed subject matter relates to an architecture that can leverage femtocell network infrastructure in order to facilitate premises management or monitoring. In particular, the architecture can leverage the local presence of a home nodeB (HNB) located at a premises associated with a subscriber in order to aggregate, process and/or distribute various state information that can be collected at the premises.

Claims

1. A femtocell device, comprising:

a memory that stores executable instructions; and

a processor, coupled to the memory, that facilitates execution of the executable instructions to perform operations, comprising;

via network devices of a femtocell network comprising a femtocell network platform device, facilitating two-way communication between the femtocell device of the femtocell network that operates at a premises and a server device of a premises monitoring service that facilitates monitoring relating to the premises, wherein the server device is not a device of a communication network provider entity associated with the femtocell network and the two-way communication comprises first support information for the femtocell device to initiate a first communication with the server device and second support information for the server device to initiate a second communication with the femtocell device via the network devices of the femtocell network, and wherein the second support information comprises identifier data that identifies a subset of femtocell devices, comprising the femtocell device, from among a set of femtocell devices coupled to the femtocell network; and

receiving state information from a sensor, wherein the state information relates to a state of the premises detected by the sensor in accordance with the premises monitoring service and represents a state of an alarm system at the premises, and wherein the state information relates to a reading obtained by the sensor from a utility meter that tracks usage of a resource in connection with the premises.

2. The femtocell device of claim 1, wherein the identifier data comprises information that facilitates locating the femtocell device based on a service area designation associated with the premises monitoring service.

3. The femtocell device of claim 1, wherein the sensor transmits the state information wirelessly.

4. The femtocell device of claim 1, wherein the resource is natural gas, propane, electricity, water, or removed waste.

5. The femtocell device of claim 1, wherein the sensor is coupled to the utility meter.

6. The femtocell device of claim 1, wherein the sensor is an imaging device that receives the state information from the utility meter based on an image of a portion of the utility meter.

7. The femtocell device of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise receiving the state information from the sensor according to a defined interval.

8. The femtocell device of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise receiving a request for the state information from the server device.

9. The femtocell device of claim 1, wherein the operations further comprise transmitting the state information via the network devices of the femtocell network to the server device.

10. The femtocell device of claim 9, wherein the operations further comprise receiving the state information as transmitted by the sensor and transforming the state information to processed state information based on optical character recognition, object recognition, or formatting according to a defined output.

11. The femtocell device of claim 1, wherein the femtocell device is a communication endpoint of the second communication.

12. A server device, comprising:

a processor; and

a memory that stores executable instructions that, when executed by the processor, facilitate performance of operations, comprising;

interfacing to a set of femtocell devices via network devices of a femtocell network platform based on support information that enables the server device that is not a network device of the femtocell network platform to provide unsolicited targeted communication to a femtocell device among the set of femtocell devices, wherein the support information comprises identifier data that identifies a subset of femtocell devices, comprising the femtocell device, from among the set of femtocell devices coupled to the femtocell network platform;

receiving state information from the femtocell device of the set of femtocell devices, wherein the state information is obtained by a sensor at a site and relates to a state of the site associated with a location of the femtocell device and describes a change of a resource amount at the site, and wherein the state information relates to a reading obtained by the sensor from a utility meter that tracks usage of a resource in connection with the site;

storing the state information to a data store in an account record associated with the femtocell device; and

initiating an action relating to the site based on an analysis of the state information.

13. The server device of claim 12, wherein the operations further comprise interfacing to a third party network device associated with a third party provider identity indicative of a utility provider identity, a security provider identity, or an emergency service provider identity.

14. The server device of claim 13, wherein the operations further comprise facilitating access to the account record, setting a threshold associated with the state, or facilitating access to data associated with the state.

15. The server device of claim 14, wherein the operations further comprise comparing the data associated with the state and the threshold and facilitating transmission of a notification to the third party network device or to the femtocell device in response to the comparing.

16. The server device of claim 15, wherein the notification is a short message service message with a uniform resource locator embedded in the short message service message that references additional information.

17. A method, comprising:

interfacing, by a system comprising a processor, to a femtocell device operating at a property;

interfacing, by the system, to a sensor at the property that identifies characteristics associated with the property, wherein the sensor is associated with a monitoring service;

receiving, by the system, state information from the sensor, wherein the state information describes a state of the property identified by the sensor and represents a state associated with an ambient condition at the property, and wherein the state information relates to a reading obtained by the sensor from a utility meter that tracks usage of a resource in connection with the property; and

transmitting, by the system, the state information to a device of the monitoring service by way of network devices of a femtocell network comprising a femtocell network platform device, wherein the device is not a network device of the femtocell network, the state information comprises data to support two-way communication between the device and the femtocell device, and the data to support the two-way communication comprises first data to support the femtocell device initiating a communication with the device and second data to support the device initiating another communication with the femtocell device by way of the network devices and wherein the second data comprises identifier data that identifies a group of femtocell devices, comprising the femtocell device, from among femtocell devices coupled to the femtocell network.

18. The method of claim 17, further comprising:

interfacing the sensor to the utility meter; and

receiving, by the system, the state information from the sensor based on an optical image of a portion of the utility meter, wherein the optical image includes a marking that is determined to authenticate the optical image accurately depicts the portion of the utility meter.

19. The method of claim 17, wherein the second data, to support the device initiating said another communication with the femtocell device, comprises an identifier for the femtocell device that relates to a service area associated with the monitoring service and facilitates location of the femtocell device.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the service area is determined by the monitoring service that is independent of another service area determined by a provider of the femtocell network.