Wireless sensors for Industry 4.0 - wireless communication and wireless powering

Wireless sensors play an increasingly important role in the context of implementation of Industry 4.0. Wireless factory automation is an application area with demanding availability and reliability requirements. Complementary, standardization is essential for wireless communication and is already in progress. However, wireless solutions remain insufficient as long as there is no contactless power transfer for mobile devices available as well. This paper presents some results of an ongoing research project on sensor systems for real time process control and condition monitoring. We focus on wireless communication and on contactless energy transmission by proposing the joint application of respective techniques that provides the required properties.