Intel unveils its Joule chip module for the Internet of Things

Joule is the latest product in Intel’s family of all-in-one chip modules for the Internet of Things.

Intel CEO Brian Krzanich showed off the new Joule module during a keynote speech at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco. The module is a follow-up to Edison, the prior IoT module introduced in 2014.

The Joule technology is a tiny computer on a small module. It can fit in a wide variety of products, from robotics to augmented reality glasses.

“You get computing, extensive memory, and the ability to use human-like senses with the Intel RealSense technology,” Krzanich said. “Joule will let you seamlessly transition from prototype to scale.”

Aircraft maker Airbus is testing Intel Joule-powered augmented reality safety glasses from French company PivotHead in a factory. The glasses can show a technician where to place a rivet in a plane’s fuselage. If the technician places the wrong rivet in a hole, then the glasses will signal an error alert that the technician can see.

The Intel Joule platform will enable developers to go to production with a new device at a fraction of the time and development cost prior devices incurred. The platform is a high-performance system-on-module (SOM) in a tiny, low-power package, making it ideal for computer vision, robotics, drones, industrial IoT, VR, AR, micro-servers, and other applications that require high-end edge computing.

Intel Joule is available in two models — 570x and 550x. The Intel Joule 570x developer kit is available for sale at the 2016 Intel Developer Conference in San Francisco, and will begin shipping in September through Intel reseller partners.

“All in all, Intel needed to make the case that they can drive future growth for developers without abandoning what got them to the show,” said Patrick Moorhead, analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy. “Brian Krzanich took a different route from what they had done in the past, which was to put IoT and datacenter into the foreground and PCs into the background. This year, Intel started with PCs and how they are relevant in new use cases like AR, VR, what Intel coined as ‘merged reality,’ which is essentially VR+AR,  video transcoding, and gaming. Brian then followed up with IoT with drones, robots, cameras, and industrial IoT use cases. I think more than any other time I have seen the ‘new Intel’ under BK’s leadership, they found the right balance of new and old.”