ON World

LPWA Networks Will Connect 250 Million
Industrial and Smart City Devices by 2023

Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) networks enabled by technologies such as Sigfox, LoRa®, LTE-M and NB-IoT will connect hundreds of millions of assets in the industrial, energy/utilities and smart cities sectors, according to Internet of Things (IoT) research firm ON World. 

“Rapid rollout of LPWA networks and accelerating global economies have created growing IoT developer opportunities,” says Mareca Hatler, ON World’s research director.  “Industrial and smart cities are prime targets for IoT developers with hundreds of LPWA applications for connecting stranded assets, improving city IoT services and increasing visibility along the supply chain.”

Unlicensed LPWA IoT network technologies like LoRa and Sigfox have given IoT operators a significant cost advantage.  In addition, licensed LTE-M and NB-IoT networks are rolling out worldwide by mobile LTE operators, many of which also provide LoRaWAN™ networks as an alternative for either public or private network use. 

ON World’s recently published report sets focus on two landscapes:

Industrial, Logistics & Agriculture

In addition to enabling new markets and services, LPWA technologies are disrupting industrial IoT with multi-year battery lifetimes and multi-mile sensors.  Unlicensed LPWA networks using Sigfox, RPMA and LoRaWAN™ are serving a variety of applications for industrial automation including oil and gas exploration and production, pipelines, logistics and agriculture.  In addition, licensed LTE-M networks are gearing up to capture a large slice of the Industrial IoT market with devices that have 5+ battery lifetime, 100 millisecond latency levels and 1 Mbps data rates.

Multi-radio modules are creating new opportunities for industrial IoT developers.  A growing trend is multi-radio modules that include both a LPWA radio such as LoRa or Sigfox as well as short-range radios such as Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) and 802.15.4.  Silicon Labs with Hager Group recently announced a System-on-Chip (SoC) with BLE and Sigfox in one single RF unit.

In 2025, industrial connected wireless sensing, tracking and control devices will approach half a billion up from 35 million in 2016.  LPWA technologies will experience the fastest growth and will make up 1 in 4 of the connections by this time.

ON World’s “Industrial LPWA Set” includes three reports on the LPWA market opportunities, threats and competitive landscape for industrial automation, oil and gas, logistics and agriculture including:

  • Industrial LPWA
  • Oil & Gas LPWA
  • LoRa Market Dynamics

For more information, go to: https://onworld.com/ilpwanset

Smart Cities, Energy and Utilities
LPWA networks are displacing cellular 2G/3G/4G and RF mesh sensor networks for water metering and streetlight monitoring.  In addition, they are enabling new IoT solutions for parking, waste management, smart water networks, geotechnical monitoring, pollution monitoring and bike sharing.

Mobile network operators are seizing the smart city opportunity by adopting the NB-IoT protocol and leveraging their enormous LTE ecosystems. However, NB-IoT is not suitable for many mobile sensing applications and will require new cell tower installations for many operators.

Smart city LPWA connected devices will increase by 12X over the next five years when there will be 141 million connections worldwide.  Cumulative revenues from LPWA enabled equipment and associated services over this period will reach $32 billion.

ON World’s “Smart Cities LPWA Set” includes three reports on the LPWA market opportunities, threats and competitive landscape for smart cities, transportation and smart lighting including:

  • Smart Cities LPWA
  • Transportation LPWA
  • Smart Lighting LPWA

For more information, go to: https://onworld.com/smartcitieslpwaset/

About ON World:
ON World provides business intelligence on Internet of Things markets. Our market research is used by Fortune 1000 companies, investors and IoT developers worldwide.

Media contact:
Mary Purvis
e: purvis at onworld.com
ph: 858-259-2397

*The LoRa® Mark is a trademark of Semtech Corporation or its subsidiaries.
*LoRa Alliance™ and LoRaWAN™ are marks used under license from the LoRa Alliance.

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2/21/2018