IoT clash over 900MHz options

A handful of 800 to 900MHz low-power wide area networks are emerging as low cost alternatives to cellular for connecting what may someday be billions of nodes on the Internet of Things. Representatives from many of the competing options faced off in a panel discussion at the Internet of Things World here.

Participants agreed the new networks are starting to gain significant traction, and standards are still a ways off. The networks are expected to help monitor everything from smart cities to farm fields in applications where sensors need to send only a little data sporadically over a long life time.

"This is a fundamental game changer...the networks and the devices are a fraction of the cost of the typical [cellular] carrier networks," said Will Franks, chairman of the Wireless IoT Forum. "We have a potential technology here to connect billions and billions of devices at a very low cost."

In a keynote here, Samsung showed support for one of the alternatives — Sigfox — as part of the Korean giant's announcement of a new family of IoT modules called Artik. Samsung's Chief Strategy Officer demonstrated how French startup Weenat employs the Artik module and LPWA networks to connect soil monitors and improve water use.

You can read the full article along with a summary of the panel's discussion from our partners at EETimes.