Dr Ken SAKAMURA – Founder, INIAD (Tokyo University, Information Networking for Innovation and Design), Professor Emeritus, the University of Tokyo, Leader of TRON Project – has been one of the inventors of the « Internet of Things » as a vision, well ahead of other visions such as Ubiquitous Computing (Mark WEISER, 1991), Ambient Intelligence (Philips/Oxygen Alliance and the European Commission’s Information Society Technologies Advisory Group, 1999), Cyber-Physical Systems (Helen Gill, National Science Foundation, 2006), and so forth.

Dr SAKAMURA is not very well known in Europe, but it must be reminded and stressed that he played a major role in the design and implementation of the IoT strategy in EU Framework Research Programmes 6 and 7. What Europe has achieved over the last 15 years and still does today in IoT owes a lot to Dr SAKAMURA’s vision and significant contribution to cooperative endeavors.

Dr SAKAMURA has kindly accepted to answer questions from IoT Council member Gérald SANTUCCI to celebrate the 40th anniversary of TRON Project. It is an honor and a privilege for IoT Council to share here his visionary insights into the origins, development and deployment of the Internet of things and to point out his conviction that « Internet of things » and « artificial intelligence » are interdependent by necessity.

It should be noted that the TRON OS Family and the TRON Smart House have been recognized recently as IEEE Milestones.

We should also muse over what Dr SAKAMURA says about the need to overcome, transcend and synergize cultural differences: « I have learned the importance of sharing/building common knowledge at the start of the EU-Japan project. The cultural difference, the difference of used terminologies in different countries, etc. need to be overcome. For this purpose, a somewhat relatively long initial phase when the common vocabulary and shared understanding of ideas are nurtured is very important. It may feel slow at the beginning, but it is a necessary step. »

Read the interview:

Answers to “INTERVIEW QUESTIONS, by Gerald Santucci for IoT Council”

Dr. Ken SAKAMURA

Founder, INIAD (Toyo University, Information Networking for Innovation and Design)

Professor Emeritus, The University of Tokyo

Leader, TRON Project

QUESTION 1:

Last year, 2024, marked the 40th anniversary of TRON Project which started its activities in 1984, based on the philosophy of “Open Architecture.”

Could you please tell us what have been its biggest achievements over four decades, particularly the impact of Real-time Operating Systems (RTOS) for IoT nodes? 

ANSWER 1:

The project started to create an RTOS for emerging 16-bit microprocessors to be embedded in industrial machinery and consumer electronics for control purposes. It began in 1984 and has been going on for 40 years. But its vision was much wider. We wanted to design and create the appropriate future computer architecture that would take advantage of the 16-bit and 32-bit microcontrollers for embedded systems in the 1990s and beyond.

As part of the effort, we obviously needed a small RTOS for microprocessors and that was the first major output from TRON Project.

I will focus my answer to this question on the RTOS.

The first version of the RTOS from TRON Project was called ITRON (Industrial TRON), and it was a specification of a small memory footprint RTOS for then emerging 16-bit microprocessors.

The RTOS offerings from companies that conform to the ITRON specification became very popular in Japan and basically became a de facto standard in the Japanese computer industry for embedded computer systems applications.

The specification was made available as well as a sample implementation.

The RTOS has evolved and there have been versions called ITRON, micro-ITRON, T-Kernel and µT-Kernel over the years.

Standardization

After ITRON specification became a de facto standard for embedded computers in Japan, we made the newer member of the TRON RTOS family, μT-Kernel (read micro T-Kernel), which is an IEEE Standard today. That standardization took place in 2018. The standard is called “IEEE Standard for a Real-Time Operating System (RTOS) for Small-Scale Embedded Systems” and is based on the μT-Kernel 2.0 specification.

Open Nature

The source code of the newer members of the TRON RTOS family are available on the TRON Project website. They have been downloaded by many parties around the world so far.

Design Wins

There have been many products in the market that are using the members of the TRON RTOS family.

TRON Forum has tried to keep track, but since it initially let people use the TRON RTOS family without formal requirement for reporting the usage, the forum simply doesn’t know how many units are used worldwide. But it is sure that the number of products that use the TRON RTOS family is very large. 

Note: see [1], [2] and [3] for details.

QUESTION 2:

When we first met in 2007, I immediately thought that TRON Project fitted perfectly to realize the “open Internet of Things” (IoT), i.e. an IoT based on open source, open data and open API, and hence was free from constraints of organizations and applications.

To what extent has this goal been achieved in the (i) international collaboration, (ii) academia-industry cooperation, and (iii) standardization?

ANSWER 2:

International Collaboration

I noticed that there is another question regarding City Platform as a Services: integrated and open (CPaaS.io), an EU-Japan collaboration project, so I will focus my answer to this question on other regional activities.

Aside from Europe, we have worked with partners in the following countries/regions to promote the technologies coming out of TRON Project for the last 20 years or so.

• United States
• Singapore
• Taiwan
• Malaysia
• China, and
• Indonesia
• India

We have also visited Australia and other countries for technology transfer purposes.

Academia-Industry Cooperation 

We have encouraged the members of TRON Project to tackle leading-edge technological development. The University of Tokyo and Toyo University where I have worked have been collaborating with many partners in the industry to explore the future computer systems for various applications. 

Lately, smart building and smart city projects have emerged, and we work with real estate developers and a former government-run housing agency to explore the house of the future. (see [4])

Also, we have established a consortium for the open data application of public transportation operators and this consortium has been joined by the transportation operators, IT industry partners, and government agency observers. (see [5])

This consortium was created after a series of open data contests held in cooperation with the Tokyo Metropolitan government and public transportation operators in the Tokyo area.

TRON Project since inception has enjoyed the participation of many computer chip makers in the project to help produce the specification of the ITRON specification OS.

I think the Academia-Industry Cooperation has worked very well in TRON Project so far, and I would like to see it grow in the future as well.

Standardization

As part of our open approach, we published the specifications from the TRON Project website (and in print before that). 

We have also tried hard to turn the specifications into international standards.

Our achievement in this area is twofold.

One is the standardization of IEEE Standard 2050-2018, “IEEE Standard for a Real-Time Operating System (RTOS) for Small-Scale Embedded Systems” in 2018, which is based on the μT-Kernel 2.0 specification.

The second is the ITU-T standardization of the so-called “ucode” identification system, which is used to identify objects (furthermore, places and concepts) using unique numbers.

A series of so-called Recommendations (standards in ITU-T parlance) have been formally adopted from the proposal we have pushed from YRP Ubiquitous Networking Laboratory.

‘ucode’, a number, is used to identify tangible objects and non-tangible objects that are not covered by existing ISO and other standards, and is very important in the IoT environment where many objects created by the users are distributed in our surroundings.

QUESTION 3:

Some 15 years ago you launched a famous trial in Tokyo’s Ginza shopping district. You had developed a system using RFID and other auto-identification technologies to provide sightseers and shoppers with information and directions for sites and retailers of interest, and to inform individuals with disabilities about accessibility options.

Your system employed many different types of automatic-ID tags embedded in posters throughout Ginza’s pedestrian walkways. This was clearly for me a mark of your commitment and dedication to making the IoT something good for humanity and the planet.

What have been the results of this unique experience, and how the lessons learnt have been later introduced in the work of YRP Ubiquitous Networking Laboratory (YRP UNL)?

ANSWER 3:

The readers are referred to some booklets that were written circa 2010 that describe the state of the art back then. They cover many experiments and the technologies behind them. (see [6])

I would like to note, for the Ginza experiments and other experiments, we had already developed a hand-held terminal, called Ubiquitous Communicator (UC) to execute the experiments. UC may be called a precursor of today’s smartphone. UC is described in the booklets I have mentioned. We were ahead of the world in applications that would become popular when smartphones would be available to the masses in the 2010s.

Simple applications we developed in the early 2000s were emulated and have become popular, and I shall say that they are the norm.

During the development of these experiments that used RFID tags and other types of tags, the need for an identification system to identify objects in the IoT environment became very acute, and the ucode identification system was developed.

ucode identification system was proposed as a series of standard drafts including a scheme of how the code shall be used typically, and it has been adopted as ITU-T Recommendations. Subsequently, ucode version 2 has been proposed to fit the computing environment of clouds of today and has been used in Japanese applications and beyond.

As for the support for individuals with disabilities, TRON Project has addressed accessibility issues from the early days.

We expected the computer architecture of the future (as viewed in the early 1980s) to permeate society and be used by EVERYBODY. So, computers must be used by people with disabilities, too.

TRON Project has hosted an annual symposium called Enableware symposium for many years and has discussed a variety of ways to make computer systems support people with disabilities. It has discussed Human-Interface issues for people with disabilities, for example.

I have learned that the EU is very advanced in terms of the design of computer systems that pay attention to universal access. So, I think we will welcome input from EU researchers in this area.

QUESTION 4:

In 2016-2018 YRP UNL contributed to an EU-funded project̶CPaaS.io̶which aimed at establishing common smart city platforms for deployment in smart city use cases.

The resulting “City Platform as a Service” (CPaaS) provides a smart city data infrastructure that can support many regional and even global applications.

What has been your personal experience from this EU-Japan collaborative research and development (R&D) on open smart city platforms?

ANSWER 4:

Right now, Smart Building, and Smart City are hot research and application topics. Toyo University, where I have a position now works with real estate developers and housing corporation to design and create future housings. (see [4])

Personally, I have learned the importance of sharing/building common knowledge at the start of the EU-Japan project. The cultural difference, the difference of used terminologies in different countries, etc. need to be overcome. For this purpose, a somewhat relatively long initial phase when the common vocabulary and shared understanding of ideas are nurtured is very important. It may feel slow at the beginning, but it is a necessary step.

I have learned this valuable lesson from CPaaS.io.

QUESTION 5:

In January 2023, you received the “IEEE Masaru Ibuka Consumer Technology Award,” and the “TRON Real-Time Operating System (RTOS) Family” was recognized as an IEEE Milestone in May 2023.

These are all indications of the high regard in which TRON Project efforts which you led over 40 years are today considered by the world IoT community.

How do you see the mid- to long-term future of the IoT and, more specifically, the role that TRON Project can still play in IoT development and deployment?

ANSWER 5:

Let me explain the respective award and milestone recognition first.

“IEEE Masaru Ibuka Consumer Technology Award” has been named after one of the founders of SONY Group Corporation, Dr. Masaru Ibuka. 

It was established in 1987 and has been awarded since 1989 to those who have made excellent contributions in the consumer electronics field.

The past recipients include the following names with whom I am sure you are familiar.

• 2021 STEVE WOZNIAK, “For pioneering the design of consumer-friendly personal computers.”
• 2020 EBEN UPTON, CEO, Raspberry Pi, “For creating an inexpensive single-board computer and surrounding ecosystem for education and consumer applications.”
• 2018 LINUS BENEDICT TORVALDS, “For his leadership of the development and proliferation of Linux.”

I received this award sponsored by Sony Group Corporation because IEEE recognized my contribution to consumer electronics by way of the TRON RTOS family. The citation of my award reads as follows.: “For leadership in creating open and free operating systems for embedded computers used in consumer electronics.”

So basically, it recognized TRON Project, of which I have been the leader since 1984, and the TRON RTOS family that has been used extensively in the embedded computer system market, especially consumer electronics sector. (see [7] for details.)

The IEEE Milestone is not given to me personally. The IEEE Milestones in Electrical Engineering and Computing program honors significant technical achievements in all areas associated with IEEE. It is a program of the IEEE History Committee, administered through the IEEE History Center. Milestones recognize technological innovation and excellence for the benefit of humanity found in unique products, services, seminal papers and patents.  Each milestone recognizes an achievement that occurred at least twenty-five years ago and had at least regional impact.

“TRON Real-time Operating System (RTOS) Family, 1984” is the official title of the IEEE Milestone given to the TRON RTOS family. The milestone has recognized the contribution of the TRON RTOS family has made since 1984 to the present day.

The Milestone citation reads as follows.: In 1984, a computer architecture project team at the University of Tokyo began designing The Real-time Operating system Nucleus (TRON) OS family and helping external partners commercialize it. Specifications and sample source code were provided openly and freely, facilitating innovations by developers and users. The TRON RTOS family copies have been adopted worldwide in billions of embedded computer devices, including aerospace and industrial equipment, automotive systems, and home electronics. (see [1] for details.)

To answer your questions regarding goals, in the short term, TRON Project will be active promoting the current projects in smart buildings, and smart city area. Updating the TRON RTOS family so that it will be a good fit in this age of cloud computing is one of the short-term goals. I see the role of TRON Project as coordinator of the research activities. We hope that TRON Project can be a conduit to coordinate the research activities in these aspects of research activities. 

The long-term goal is hard to describe.

Back in the 1980s, we predicted how the computer systems in the future would be like and how they should be built for the benefit of ordinary users including the people with disabilities. Such visions guided the initial research direction of TRON Project.

Since then, the general computing environment has evolved very much. Cloud computing was not imagined back then. But the introduction of the cloud and widely available ubiquitous network connectivity has changed the role of IoT computing edge node significantly.

Thanks to the ubiquitous fast network connection, many computing tasks that were done on the edge node can be carried out in the cloud today, instead.

The balance of the computing power between the clouds and the edge nodes will change over time, and we need to strike the balance every step of the way.

The division of labor of AI application between the clouds and edge nodes will be affected by the general computing trend, for example.

TRON Project will again stop to think about what the computer systems will be like in the next 10-20 years and how they should be designed so that everyone can enjoy the benefit. Then we will try to propose the design and implement such systems with partners.

QUESTION６:

It was announced in late June 2024 that there is another IEEE Milestone bestowed on another TRON Project achievement: TRON Intelligent House. 

Can you tell us about it and the impact it has on today’s research?

ANSWER 6: 

The Milestone itself is called “The Pioneering TRON Intelligent House, 1989.”

TRON Intelligent House was a smart house built in 1989.

The citation of the Milestone reads as follows:

The first TRON Intelligent House was based on the concept of a Highly Functionally Distributed System (HFDS) as proposed in 1987. Built in Tokyo in 1989 using about 1,000 networked computers to implement Internet of Things (IoT), its advanced human-machine interface (HMI) provided “ubiquitous computing” before that term was coined in 1991. Feedback by TRON’s residents helped mature HFDS design, showing how to live in an IoT environment.

TRON Intelligent House was built in Tokyo in 1989. It had about 1,000 computers, and many sensors and actuators in a 333 square meter space. It was built by a group called TRON Intelligent House Study Group, consisting of 18 member companies, which understood the concept of Highly Functionally Distributed System (HFDS), essentially today’s IoT.

I proposed the concept of HFDS in the 1980s, and had a paper written in English published on it in 1987 [8]. This HFDS concept was the true pioneer of today’s IoT vision. It preceded the birth of the phrase “ubiquitous computing” coined by Marc Weiser in the 1990s.

What is HFDS?

In the vision of HFDS, many objects in our surroundings are embedded with computers. They are called intelligent objects. They talk to a local network (and with outside if such a connection is available), and to other intelligent objects to offer coordinated activities together. Intelligence can be in the Intelligent objects themselves or in the servers accessed via networks. Therefore, various functions become distributed in our surroundings, thus Highly Functionally Distributed System. 

HFDS is essentially today’s notion of the IoT.

The old figure in [9] is shown here.

Of course, today, the Intelligent Object Network in a building or house is connected to the Internet. 

In the TRON Intelligent House, computers were hidden as much as possible to create a friendly atmosphere. People lived in the house so that we could obtain valuable feedback about the computer-controlled living environment. There have been many off-the-shelf housing components developed later from the prototype created for the TRON Intelligent House. The TRON Intelligent House had an impact on smart house R&D in Japan and elsewhere.

We held the Milestone plaque dedication ceremony in November 2024. The plaque is now displayed next to the plaque of “TRON Real-time Operating System Family, 1984.”

I am very proud that both the top-down approach and bottom-up approach of TRON Project have been recognized by IEEE Milestones.

Top-down approach is the gathering of the application requirements and using them to guide the basic research. TRON Intelligent House was a big application project to hammer out the requirements of HFDS, i.e., IoT environment.

The bottom-up approach is creating RTOS for microprocessors as an infrastructure.

Thus, we have created the TRON RTOS family.

It is not often a project receives two IEEE Milestones in a row.

QUESTION 7:

Can you tell me more about the subsequent development related to smart houses and buildings, and cities in the years that followed?

ANSWER 7: 

Of course, in the wake of the TRON Intelligent House in 1989, newer TRON Intelligent House projects followed over the years.

These past projects were explained based on the contemporary views in the appendix of references [9]. 

But let me explain them in historical order.

TRON INTELLIGENT HOUSE had a direct lineage version 2 in Japan called TOYOTA PAPI, which was built in 2004, explained in Appendix I of [9], and version 3 called Taipei u-home in Taipei, Taiwan was built in 2009, explained in Appendix II of [9]). 

PAPI was explained in Appendix I of the IEEE Milestone Proposal [9]. Here I will show more photos of PAPI.

Taipei u-home Version 3 of the TRON Intelligent House was in Taipei. 

It is called TLDC u-home. TLDC stands for Taiwan Land Development Corporation.  It was built in 2009 and was shown to the public. 

It is also explained in Appendix II of [9]. 

There were more smart house and building activities in Taiwan: Projects in Hualien (花蓮). New IoT houses were designed with the cooperation with Arup Group Limited (ARUP) and Bjarke Ingels Group.

QUESTION 8:

Obviously, the IEEE Milestone proposal could not touch the details of recent R&D activities much.

Can you possibly explain more recent R&D projects?

ANSWER 8:

Let us explain the work done with UR and Haseko. 

UR stands for Urban Renaissance Agency.

It is a semi-governmental organization originally established in 1955 as Japan Housing Corporation to address urban and housing agendas in Japan. 

UR has led large-scale urban development and housing projects as such.

There are a number of large condominiums built by UR near where Faculty of Information Networking for Innovation And Design (INIAD), Toyo University is located. I have held a position at Toyo University since 2017. The land in which the faculty campus is located was owned by UR before the university purchased it from UR.

So, we had contact with UR, and we started projects in steps.

The projects with UR proceeded with a prototype project first and a project to build a livable house. The prototype project was called Open Smart UR Startup Model (2019), and the later livable house project is called Open Smart Monitoring Housing (2022). 

Open Smart UR Startup Model (2019)

UR rebuilt the Akabanedai housing complex built by its former self, Japan Housing Corporation, and we were consulted to create future housing there, which led to the Open Smart UR Project. In 2019, we created a concept room as a “start-up model,” in the so-called Star House, a historical building remaining today.

This was a research prototype for demonstration, and it was not meant for someone living in it for prolonged time.

We converted a 44 square meter Japanese-style room into a single room and designed a living space with 44 sensors and computers to measure the changes of various environmental factors.

Open Smart UR Living Monitoring Housing (2022)

In 2022, UR asked us to build something that people could live in, and we created an experimental dwelling called “Living Monitoring Housing.”

It is only 39 square meters because it uses the space of an old so-called “apartment complex” dwelling. In the past, people slept on futons in tatami mat rooms, and in the morning, they would fold the futon and stow it away and bring out a tea table to eat their meals. So, people used to be able to get by with this small space, but now beds are the norm, so it is impossible.

We therefore re-designed the entire room in a modern style, incorporating robotic furniture.

Various appliances and furniture can be controlled by computers. When you say, “OK Google, good night,” a Tatami bed moves out to the living room side. When you say, “Alexa, good morning,” the bed is put away, the curtains open, and so on. Not only Google, but also Amazon Alexa and other devices based on open API can be connected.

IoT + AI Smart Housing (2023)

Recently (in 2023), we built an AI Smart House in an apartment building called “Sustaina Branche Hongyotoku” by Haseko Corporation.

Here, too, the living space is not very large, so we built a TV stand that moves with robotic furniture, so that when people move, the TV follows them toward where they are.

Smart houses are equipped with many sensors and cameras to monitor the environment, but they are designed to be discreet and neatly hidden.

Designed as a residential experimental house in Haseko Corporation’s “Sustaina Branche Hongyotoku.”

QUESTION 9:

You obviously did research on smart buildings as an extension of smart houses naturally. Can you explain a bit about it?

ANSWER 9:

There were earlier intelligent (office) building designs.

Smart Building

The design of the TRON Intelligent Building, commissioned by a construction company, Hazama Corporation (at that time), in the 1980s attracted so much attention that it was later imitated by a famous overseas architect. The concept was to have a semi-outdoor garden office on the top floor, with lots of greenery planted inside, and semi-outdoor terraces in slit-like areas.

On a more realistic note, I did many concept designs for offices in the TRON Intelligent Building. For example, from that time on, I said, “There will be robots moving around the office carrying things.”

We developed a prototype autonomous driving tea-feeding robot in 1991, but many smaller, more compact, autonomous transport robots are now in practical use.

Let me explain a few IoT-enabled Campus buildings.

So-called IoT campus buildings or simply IoT campus buildings were built in 2014 and 2017 in Japan (Appendix VII of [9] explains only the one in 2017), and the latest research goes on which inherits the knowledge of the first TRON Intelligent House and the later projects.

Daiwa Ubiquitous Computing Research Building (2014)

The Daiwa Ubiquitous Computing Research Building, built at the University of Tokyo in 2014, is an extension of this PAPI.

I was a vice dean of the Interfaculty Initiative in Information Studies (III) of the University of Tokyo, and the building was donated to the study of the IoT or ubiquitous computing by Daiwa Industry.

Sensors and actuators are left bare without a ceiling to facilitate their replacement in research.

Around the time of PAPI (2004), we built our own UC terminal and used it as a human-machine interface.

By 2014, smartphones and tablet devices were becoming popular, and the user interface to control the facilities using these devices became important, so we elaborated on graphic design.

The idea of using personal devices such as smartphones to control equipment around us is now commonplace, but it was not so widespread until around 2010.

QUESTION 10: 

You had this very innovative campus building called INIAD HUB-1 in the last several years.

Can you give us an overview of it?

ANSWER 10: 

Yes.

INIAD stands for Information Networking for Innovation And Design.

INIAD is a new faculty created in 2017, and the campus and the building were also newly developed. I designed the concept and building and constructed the curriculum.

The exterior of the building was designed by Kengo Kuma, as was the case with the University of Tokyo.

I served there as the first dean until March 2024.

The main school building of INIAD is called the “INIAD HUB-1.” It was built in 2015.

INIAD aims to develop human resources who can contribute to today’s ever-evolving society by providing education that fosters basic computer science skills, mathematical knowledge that is fundamental to data science and AI, and the ability to communicate with people from different fields of expertise and cultural backgrounds.

We have applied what we did at Daiwa Ubiquitous Computing Research Building on the campus of the University of Tokyo to INIAD HUB-1.

We created a library without paper books, since paper-less operation is pushed at INIAD. About a hundred thousand electronic books are available there.

At INIAD, computers, projectors, and digital signage are everywhere. So, when someone asks, “How do I get to that place?” you can display a sign saying, “This way.”

Most of the classrooms are small classrooms. I designed all of the classroom furniture, and we can customize what is mass-produced.

Because of the COVID-19 outbreak, we incorporated partitions inside rooms, so that we can hold video conference in the partitioned space.

When you approach an elevator, the elevator control screen appears on your smartphone, and by operating it there, you can call the elevator car and go to the floor of your choice.

The INIAD HUB-1 is equipped with a number of what are called sensor cameras, which allow for dynamic recognition – knowing who is doing what and where in the building

In these studies, some people have pointed out that privacy may not be protected, but this is not a public space, but a quasi-public̶and not a completely common̶space. For example, in London, there are many surveillance cameras installed, and because they are open data, anyone can see them. But when you install such cameras in our surroundings, you need to obtain agreements of the parties involved on the rules for their deployment.

The INIAD IoT Test Hub, a hands-on training facility, has LED displays on the floor, and the students operate self-driving robot cars on the roads shown on the displays.

Cooperation with Neighboring Communities

INIAD is located in Akabanedai, Kita city Tokyo, next to a UR housing complex, and as part of its activities to enliven the city of Akabane, INIAD also supports computer education by inviting many people from the UR housing complex and their children.  

QUESTION 11:

Smart city R&D activities are everywhere.

Can you explain a bit about the early activities with which you have been involved?

ANSWER 11:

TRON smart city concept was created around 1989-1990, commissioned mainly by construction companies who asked us to make an impact on their planning.

The designs were created for reference as conceptual design, and they were not actually modeled and built. However, this kind of design allowed us to experiment with the future and nurture ideas for the actual buildings and houses we would build later.  

These were old research projects. Of course, today, the INIAD HUB-1 and other buildings, and houses I have designed will be important elements of smart cities in the future.

List of references

[1]  For the history of TRON Project, I would like the readers to refer to the following page for the details. Section 3 of the following page explains TRON Project briefly.
https://www.tron.org/ieee-milestone/

[2]  The interested readers might want to visit the TRON Project website and explore its various aspects in full
https://www.tron.org/tron-project/

[3]  The thirty years’ anniversary site might give the readers a perspective we had 10 years ago of TRON Project.
https://30th.tron.org/en/tronproject.html

[4]  Open Smart UR concept page (in Japanese)
https://www.ur-net.go.jp/rd_portal/OpenSmartUR/ur2030/index.html

[5]  ODPT: https://www.odpt.org/en/

[6]  More on Ubiquitous ID Technology
https://www.tron.org/more-on-uid/

[7]  Ken Sakamura, TRON Forum Chair is the recipient of the 2023 IEEE Masaru Ibuka Consumer Technology Award.
https://www.tron.org/blog/2022/11/ken-sakamura-tron-forum-chair-is-the-recipient-of-2023-ieee-masaru-ibuka-consumer-technology-award/

[8]  Ken Sakamura: “The Objectives of TRON Project: Open-Architecture Computer Systems,” Proceedings of the Third TRON Project Symposium, Springer Verlag, pp. 3-16., 1987.

[9]  IEEE Milestone proposal: The Pioneering TRON Intelligent House, 1989
https://ieeemilestones.ethw.org/Milestone-Proposal:TRON_Intelligent_House