Background
Tekview Solutions is a four-year old organisation whose roots have grown from years of experience in providing intelligent and remote access power solutions to blue chip companies internationally. Founder and Managing Director Neil McPherson has brought along a wealth of experience within the data centre industry and as such identified a niche market for ‘out of band remote’ power solutions mains-powered equipment. In just a short time, a growing customer base includes major UK brands including Amazon, JC Decaux, Virgin Media, GCHQ and National Grid.
As one of the UK’s latest providers of innovative remote power control solutions Tekview Solutions has responded to the old adage ‘just turn it off and switch it on again’ by developing a brand new SMS-based remote power unit which is now rolling out throughout the UK and across mainland Europe. By utilising GSM networks the Powertxt Duo™ portable unit can manage two pieces of equipment whilst avoiding IP-based connectivity with all of the associated security and cost challenges.
The Challenge
The simplicity of Tekview’s Powertxt Duo™ is based upon the need for equipment to be ‘hard rebooted’ to regain functionality after freezing or ‘Blue Screen’. Whilst new technology aims towards internal soft reboots, the world knows that inevitably users will revert back to switching off and on power supply to regain use. Consequently, Powertxt Duo™ circumvents much of the technical ‘cleverness’ of rebooting by being sited between the main power supply and the equipment and is designed to purely control power. With no IP access, no direct involvement with the equipment software and no need for any use of port connectivity, the power control unit is unobtrusive in every sense as well as being highly secure. That security derives from numerically-based passwords that are recognised by the power unit with several further layers of security. The danger of IP-hacked activity is zero.
The final piece of the Powertxt Duo™ is the GSM connectivity which controls the remote power unit. With a sophisticated management platform ‘EstateView’ that enables users to manage remote power units across multiple locations, each SIM-enabled unit can operate in the lowest of signal areas as GPRS/3G/4G signals are not required. With two-way communication, the unit can respond to requests for reboot as well as notify the equipment owner of power outages – particularly important when uninterruptable power supply (UPS) connected equipment may not communicate their status prior to their own limited power storage running out.
The Solution
To ensure the right connectivity solutions are available to both Tekview Solutions’ end customers and distributors, the organisation has partnered with Europe’s leading M2M Managed Services Provider Wireless Logic to deliver a choice of SIMs and mobile network operators (MNOs) available on a range of one, two or three year contracts. Importantly for Tekview, having access to multiple MNOs with assured support was high on their wish list in provider selection. With over 2 million SIM-enabled devices across their platform, Wireless Logic are well-placed to deliver low-cost connectivity packages that meet the needs of PowerTxt Duo™ users whether for 10 units or 10,000. As part of the Wireless Logic managed solution, all SIMs are controlled across their management platform ‘SIMPro’ – a one-window portal that can view, organise, control and manage billing, across multiple networks, giving user’s complete hands-on management of their entire SIM estates.
The areas of growth for the new Powertxt Duo™ are endless… IT support, digital signage, Data Centres, ATMs, the list goes on and on. For many of these uses, their core raison d’etre is mission critical. Downtime can be costly, as does the despatch of an engineer when really a simple hard boot viaour remote power control will do. Connectivity of course is important, and whilst we empower our users to choose their own connectivity provider, we are delighted to class Wireless Logic as our strategic airtime partner and will promote them at every opportunity to ensure that part of the solution is in safe hands.