Japan's Softbank announced plans to roll out a Low Power Wide Area network for IoT services. In the first phase, SoftBank will provide LoRaWAN services by the end of this fiscal year, promising "end-to-end IoT solutions, ranging from device and application support to consulting".
Softbank said the new services target industries in need of low-cost, low-power connections, such as equipment monitoring/control at commercial facilities, buildings, warehouses and other facilities, automated gas and water meter reading, senior citizen and child monitoring, infrastructure monitoring (roads, tunnels, rail tracks, etc.) and logistics and fleet management (cars, trucks and buses). The company is working with Actility, Hon Hai Precision Industry and Semtech Corporation to build its LoRaWAN ecosystem.
The LoRa network comes alongside existing services provided over the operator's 3G/LTE, WiFi and fixed-line networks. Softbank said it later plans to also develop IoT services using the LTE technologies Cat-M1 and NB-IoT.
