Unabiz deserves credit; the Singapore-based IoT house, owner of the Sigfox technology for a little over 12 months, is doing what most of the IoT community has considered for some years to be a minimal requirement for massive IoT, and brought the tribal elders in the low-power wide-area (LPWA) IoT community together around the table in an attempt to forge a hybrid global IoT platform to drive business and change the world.
Whether it is down to its strategic vision and unshakeable will, or energy and charm, or whether it is just because of the general tumult in the IoT market, Unabiz’s recent achievements to unite the fierce non-cellular LPWA factions – particularly Sigfox and LoRaWAN, the two French-born IoT originals – are notable, especially for a business that still gets called a startup. And it has just announced a deal with Actility, a genuine aristocrat on the LoRaWAN scene.
Paris-headquartered Actility had a hand in the development of the LoRaWAN networking protocol, along with Semtech and IBM – as opposed to the LoRa modulation technology, which was invented by Grenoble-based Cycleo in 2009, and sold to Semtech in 2012. It is a founding member of the LoRa Alliance, and a major LoRaWAN gateway maker, network operator, and platform provider. It also owns the Abeeway tracker brand.
Unabiz’s arrangement with Actility follows similar LPWA data integration deals with The Things Industries in the Netherlands, Senet in the US, and Loriot in Switzerland; all of them are powers in the LoRaWAN space, and most of them were already sympathetic to the idea of crossover with Sigfox and other LPWA standards, including cellular-based IoT technologies NB-IoT and LTE-M. Actility was even in the early running to buy Sigfox.
Under the terms of the new arrangement, Unabiz and Actility have integrated their platforms at two different levels, available separately and together. The first introduces a new connector to link LoRaWAN (and also cellular IoT) networks running on Actility’s ThingPark platform to Unabiz’s UnaConnect platform. It means Unabiz customers, including Sigfox users, can access data flows from LoRaWAN and NB-IoT/LTE-M devices managed in ThingPark.
The second integration brings Sigfox data to LoRaWAN networks and applications via the ThingPark Exchange roaming hub. A statement explained: “This helps to translate Sigfox frames to LoRaWAN frames and vice versa. Any standard LoRaWAN network connected to ThingPark Exchange and IoT applications built for LoRaWAN can now leverage devices powered by Sigfox technology without any special adaptation.”
Olivier Hersent, chief executive at Actility, said: “It is a reality that the market uses a mix of LPWA network technologies. Unabiz and Actility have decided to integrate [their] technologies in multiple ways so any customer may easily utilise either, or a combination of the two, instead of being forced to choose one or do a complex integration on their own. This partnership serves as a resounding affirmation of our shared goal of building massive IoT.”
Henri Bong, co-founder and chief executive at Unabiz, said: “Actility is one of the first LoRaWAN partners to share our vision of convergence. We are pleased to take another step towards our vision of a ‘united LPWAN world’, and to see the integration of our technologies happen so swiftly. We will work closely with Actility to help our partners bring new solutions to the market to help our customers accelerate their adoption of multi-technology projects.”
