How to select the right Low Power Wide Area Network technology

The world of ‘Internet of Things’ and its uses across industries are expanding drastically. It is transforming the way human and devices interact with each other, creating market opportunities and enabling change across industries.

Continuous enhancements in various technologies make it very difficult for the user to select the best technology for their specific needs. In this blog, Priyanka Purbe of Volansys discourses few Low Power Wide Area Network technologies based on various parameters.

Some broad parameters to opt, the best protocol for long-range communications are following:

Type of Industry application
Easy access to technology & hardware availability
RF band of operation
Data rate
Security concerns
Availability of technology support
Power consumption

LoRA

LoRa stands for Long Range Radio and it is a wireless protocol specifically designed for long-range, low-power communications. It mainly targets M2M and IoT networks and developed by Semtech. This technology will enable public or multi-tenant networks to connect the number of applications running on the same network.

LoRa Alliance was formed to standardise LPWAN (Low Power Wide Area Networks) for IoT and is a non-profit association that features membership from the number of key market shareholders such as Cisco, Actility, MicroChip, IBM, STMicro, Semtech, Orange Mobile and many more. This alliance is key to providing interoperability among multiple nationwide networks.

LoRa devices offer features such as long-range, low power consumption, and secure data transmission for IoT applications. These technologies provide greater range than cellular networks and can be used by public, private or hybrid networks. It can easily plug into existing infrastructure and enables low-cost battery-operated IoT applications.

Applications for LoRa wireless technology include smart metering, inventory tracking, vending machine data and monitoring, automotive industry, and utility applications. These technologies are widely deployed and incorporated with many systems, even the small maker-style computers like Arduino have LoRa options. Accordingly, it is very easy to develop LoRa applications for both large scale manufacture or more specialist applications.

Following are various technical parameter for LoRa:

SigFox

SigFox is a French global network operator, currently deployed in 19 countries, covering 1.2 million km². It operates at 868 or 915 MHz and transmits very small amounts of data very slowly (300 b/s) using binary phase shift keying (BPSK). It can achieve long-range coverage and has general characteristics that make it well suited for any IoT application requiring only small amounts of data.

SigFox sets up antennas on towers (like a cell phone company) and receives data transmissions from devices (like parking sensors or water meters). These transmissions use frequencies that are unlicensed, 915 MHz ISM band in the US; same frequency a cordless phone use.

This technology is suitable for any application which needs to send small, infrequent bursts of data. Things like basic alarm systems, location monitoring, and simple metering are examples of one-way systems. The signal is sent a few times to “ensure”, the message goes across with some limitations, such as shorter battery life for battery-powered applications, and lack of ability to ensure the message is received by the tower.

Following are various technical parameters for SigFox:

LTE-M

LTE-M is a low-power wide-area network (LPWAN) radio technology standard developed by […]

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