The UK telco urges the industry to focus on rapid NB-IoT trials
U.K.-based telecommunications group Vodafone plans to roll out narrowband “Internet of Things” technology across multiple markets in 2017, noted Erik Brenneis, director of Vodafone’s “Internet of Things” group, in a post to the company’s blog. The executive said the industry now needs to focus on rapid trials and help customers quickly and easily add NB-IoT to their products.
Brenneis said the technology would enable more low-cost devices to be connected to the Internet, creating “new market segments where nothing is connected today because, frankly, it is too expensive.”
“In [the] future, manufacturers will be able to create connected devices that wholesale for just a few dollars by using NB-IoT,” Brenneis added.
Vodafone and Huawei recently opened a U.K. lab to develop NB-IoT technologies. “The open lab in Newbury, United Kingdom, is the first of several planned across the globe. They will provide developers with software development kits, live test networks, and an end-to-end connectivity model, including service support and device management, accessible through Vodafone’s Application Programming Interfaces,” Brenneis said.
The executive also said Vodafone is currently using “4G” to connect devices that need to transmit and receive a lot of data quickly, like cars or video cameras; the telco’s 2G networks are connecting devices that only require low levels of data transfer, like smart meters.
“However, there is still a group of devices which require a simpler, lower-cost network technology. That is where low-power wide-area networks will fit in to provide functions from sensor monitoring to asset tracking,” he said.
