Indian telco Tata Communications has become the latest major telco to jump on the LoRaWAN bandwagon, announcing plans for an India wide LoRaWAN network following successful trials in Mumbai and Delhi.
Last month, France’s largest mobile operator, Orange announced plans for a nationwide LoRaWAN network and Telstra is dipping its toe in the water with plans for short-term trial network in Melbourne to support its forthcoming IoT Challenge.
LoRaWAN technology pioneer Semtech Corporation says it has been selected by Tata Comms to deploy the network in key cities. “[LoRaWAN] was successfully trialled in Mumbai and Delhi and will now be rolled out nationwide, with full coverage planned to start in Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore,” Semtech said. “The trials should help bolster the smooth deployment of IoT applications in India.”
Semtech’s release quoted Tri Pham, chief strategy officer, Tata Communications, saying: “We see a massive need for a new smart network to enable intelligent solutions for a variety of M2M applications to facilitate a simpler and smarter way of life and at a lower cost of ownership. These trials are just the beginning, we intend to deploy this network across India and invite customers with IoT projects to test it, along with us, end-to-end.”
Semtech said that it and its partners in the LoRa Alliance ecosystem had provided LoRaWAN-certified transceivers, modules, and other products and services and that, by following the LoRaWAN standard, Tata Communications would be able provide interoperability between its network and standardised applications designed to propel adoption and growth of the network.
Semtech CEO, Mohan Maheswaran, said Tata Comms had chosen LoRaWAN after extensive testing of all available LPWAN technologies.
According to Semtech, LoRaWAN can support communications in deep water and up to 50 metres underground. “The LPWAN network [is] suitable for use in metro stations, car parks and other smart city and smart building applications. The network signal is extremely strong, penetrating up to seven walls inside buildings.” In rural areas the technology is effective over distances up to 25kms, according to Semtech.
