New IoT Networks are Coming to the US

Tweet

The Internet of Things is upon us. It’s big and growing rapidly. Both Cisco and Ericsson have predicted that there will be 50 billion devices connected by 2020. Of these, Gartner estimates that 26 billion will be things other than smartphones, computers, and tablets.

What are these new connected devices? Many will be fixed-location, sensor-based devices sending less than 1,000 bytes of data a day. Another consultancy, Strategy Analytics estimates that sensor-based devices will account for approximately five billion device connections by 2022, and that roughly 50 percent of these will come from new companies.

These sensor-based applications have some specific new requirements, notably: Battery operated for 7- 10 years, extremely low cost modem hardware, network fees need to be less that $1 per month, send less than 1,000 bytes of data a day, indoor units will need good building penetration, outdoor units will need exceptional range, and security will be a major issue.

Existing cellular networks, especially 4G-LTE networks today, cannot meet these requirements. Here’s why:

• Cellular networks (after GPRS or 2G data services) are “always on.” The networks are architected so that the remote receiver is always listening to the network for calls and this drains battery life. IoT networks need to be stateless. This means they only wake up when they need to send something. Stateless networks ensure long battery life.

• 4G-LTE power requirements are ten times more for transmit (120mA vs. 12mA) and 1000 times more for standby (2 milliamps vs. 2micro amps) than new emerging networks.

• The overhead inherent in TCP/IP and 4G-LTE is very inefficient for small payloads.

• Cellular hardware is too expensive and monthly service costs are typically much higher than new networks.

So who and what are these new networks that are competing for these new customers?

There are several new protocols being deployed in the unlicensed 900 and 868 MHz bands, known as the ISM bands in the U.S. The top two from a technology and momentum standpoint are Sigfox which is a French UNB (ultra-narrowband) network and LoRa, a unique modulation which is being deployed by a number of operators around the world.

These two, while different in how they operate, achieve their long range through the same way, slowing down the data rate. Lower the rate, longer the range. With a 300-1,200 baud network, you can achieve ranges of up to 10-15 kilometers for outdoor applications. Obviously with these very slow speeds they are not a good fit for video applications, but for alarm panels and utility meters, these speeds are fine.

Sigfox’s Ultra Narrowband allows for very large number of radios to transmit in a very limited bandwidth. LoRa uses more bandwidth and “spreads” the signal. The advantage here is that it can operate more effectively in noisy environments. Sigfox’ signals must be significantly above the noise floor; LoRa’s signals can be well below the noise floor. For noisy, crowded