Vodafone Australia announced this week that it has successfully completed the Narrowband Internet of Things (NB-IoT) Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) technology trial on its 4G network at several live sites across central and suburban Melbourne. The operator said that it also achieved extended coverage during tests in suburban Melbourne, with distances of up to 30 kilometres.
Early this year, Vodafone Portugal in partnership with Huawei, and u-blox completed the successful commercial trial of the technology. The trial saw Vodafone and Huawei integrating the technology into the operator’s existing mobile network in Spain. More recently, the Vodafone group opened the world’s first NB-IoT lab in the UK and announced that it will roll out the NB-IoT technology in multiple markets during 2017.
Vodafone Chief Technology Officer, Benoit Hanssen
We’ve been able to achieve significantly greater coverage both in terms of distance and depth, compared to those offered by existing 2G, 3G and 4G technology. Based on our testing in the Melbourne CBD, NB-IoT would be able to penetrate two to three double-brick walls, enabling connectivity of objects in underground carparks and basements.
Executive General Manager of Enterprise Business Stuart Kelly
The opportunities NB-IoT will bring are endless, with enormous potential particularly for industries such as automotive, agricultural, health and utilities. The types of products we could see utilising this technology are gas and water metering, smart bins, alarms and detectors, and parking monitoring.
