LoRaWAN customers of New Zealand telco Spark and Australian LoRaWAN network operator the National Narrowband Network Co (NNNCo) will have access to both networks under a LoRaWAN roaming agreement struck between the two companies.
The wholesale arrangement has been enabled with the integration of NNNCo’s enterprise data platform N2N-DL into Spark NZ’s network core. Data from devices will feed into N2N-DL giving Spark NZ customers access to data on a single platform from devices enrolled in either country.
It will enable businesses on both sides of the Tasman to more easily implement services using LoRaWAN without needing to set up operations in the other country.
NNNCo CEO Rob Zagarella said demand for cross-Tasman roaming capabilities was increasing as users started to deploy IoT devices and applications beyond Australia.
Spark IoT lead, Tony Agar, said a Spark customer wanting to deliver services in Australia would be able to do so without the need to set up operations across the Tasman.
“It also means that they can keep visibility and monitor their machinery, assets or infrastructure using their already well-established dashboards and diagnostic tools,” he said.
IoT a key Spark strategy
Spark released a new three year strategy in September flagging the NZ IoT market as one of three future growth markets it would focus on, along with digital health and sport.
Parkable an early customer
New Zealand smart parking company, Parkable, has been named as one of the first customers. It estimated the country’s IoT ‘revenue pool’ at $NZ1b by 2024, saying Spark’s network, products and field services would support growth in high value IoT management and support.
Parkable cofounder and CEO Toby Littin said the agreement would enable it to scale its Parkable offering across the Tasman and simplify back-end processes.
“Using the one platform and having a single place to view and analyse data will mean our customers will get even better parking experiences in the future.”
