THE GSM Association (GSMA) has established the ‘Mobile IoT Initiative’, a new project that brings together 26 leading operators and solution providers to provide analysis and feedback to assist 3GPP to standardise Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) solutions in licensed spectrum. LPWA networks are designed for machine-to-machine (M2M) applications that have low data rates, long battery lives and that operate unattended for long periods of time. It is an emerging area of the Internet-of-Things (IoT) and represents a huge market opportunity as the IoT scales. Analyst firms including Analysys Mason, Machina Research and Strategy Analytics anticipate that there will be 2.7 billion LPWA connections by 2022.
Accordig to GSMA, the project aims to accelerate the commercial availability of mobile IoT technology by facilitating demonstrations, proofs of concept and trials of a selection of complementary LPWA licensed spectrum technologies. It is expected that initial specifications for LPWA solutions will be completed by the end of 2015, with a first implementation in early 2016 and full commercial solutions following later in the year.
The initiative is backed by key industry players including AT&T, Alcatel-Lucent, Bell Canada, China Mobile, China Telecom, China Unicom, Deutsche Telekom, Ericsson, Etisalat, Huawei, Gemalto, Intel, KDDI, Nokia, NTT DOCOMO, Ooredoo, Orange, Qualcomm Incorporated, Sierra Wireless, Singtel, Telecom Italia, Telefonica, Telenor, Telstra, u-blox and Vodafone.
Alex Sinclair, Acting Director General and Chief Technology Officer, GSMA
The market opportunity for LPWA will be a significant driver in the development of the IoT and it’s essential that the mobile industry address the requirements for LPWA cases early on. The industry is clearly united behind the Mobile IoT Initiative, providing a common vision to accelerate the availability of industry standard solutions, removing market fragmentation and accelerating adoption.
