FREMONT, Calif., Jan. 16, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The LoRa Alliance®, the global association of companies backing the open LoRaWAN® standard for the Internet of Things (IoT) low power wide area networks (LPWANs), today announced that it will offer several demonstrations at DISTRIBUTECH 2020 that make a compelling case for LoRaWAN's use in metering, utilities, and smart city applications. The LoRa Alliance will exhibit in booth #1761 from January 28-30 and feature solutions running on LoRaWAN technology from member companies Ellenex, MultiTech, Semtech, and Senet. Additionally, Rémi Demerlé, a LoRaWAN Ambassador from Semtech, will present on New Digital Applications with LoRaWAN for Utilities and Smart Cities in Booth #417 at 3:00 pm on Wednesday, January 29.
According to ABI Research, 1.3 billion smart meters will be deployed globally by 2023. Advanced metering systems require complex network design, strong security, and intuitive management. With more than 500 member companies in the LoRa Alliance backing the LoRaWAN standard and with more than 120 LoRaWAN network operators active in more than 140 countries, LoRaWAN is strongly positioned to support metering, utility and smart city applications around the world. LoRaWAN networks support market requirements in these areas with:
- Cloud-based resources to ensure high availability, scalability, and performance
- Ability to cover a larger area with less network infrastructure
- Substantially lower operational cost and capital expense
- Maximum flexibility in fixed and mobile data collection applications
“LoRaWAN brings compelling advantages to the utility market," said Donna Moore, CEO and Chairwoman of the LoRa Alliance. "Deploying LoRaWAN CertifiedCM devices allows utilities to better manage and optimize water, natural gas and electric services, transforms municipal service delivery and improves building efficiencies. Ultimately this helps build a better future, including resource management, sustainability, and improved quality of life.”
LoRaWAN’s versatility makes it very compelling for smart utilities, because the variety of available sensors and applications allow utilities to make their processes much more transparent and less fragmented while accessing greater insight. Because LoRaWAN networks can easily accommodate multiple applications running concurrently, there is less fragmentation and data is more easily integrated, offering rapid return on investment. Finally, dense LoRaWAN networks deployed for utility services can be used for other applications, facilitating new partnership opportunities between utilities and municipalities, which is where the development of smart cities comes to play. Street lighting, garbage collection, smart parking, digital signage, traffic and transportation are a sampling of the types of applications leveraging dedicated LoRaWAN networks to streamline operations and achieve cost savings for organizations and municipalities.
The LoRaWAN standard brings unique added value, features and capabilities to the utility industry to set up actions in scalable private networks, which cannot easily be delivered by other available technologies in the market or are only deliverable with higher setup or operational costs. LoRaWAN solution providers are actively deploying state of the art solutions for pump performance monitoring, pipeline leakage monitoring, SCADA system integration, water resource management and water quality monitoring with quick ROI and reliable performance at scale.
Booth demonstrations include:
- A smart city-themed demonstration from Senet, showcasing several sensors/end devices, including pulse monitors/readers (gas, water, electric), streetlight controllers, smart waste sensors, and smart parking. The demo highlights how public LoRaWAN networks can be leveraged for a multitude of metering and other smart city applications. The demo also showcases Senet's unique and flexible customer engagement models for deploying, expanding and managing LoRaWAN networks based on application-specific requirements.
- A LoRaWAN water management demo from Semtech that shows how a private LoRaWAN network with four smart devices ––Neptune’s ultrasonic smart water meter, Decentlab’s water pressure monitor, STREGA’s smart valve, and Radio Bridge’s water leak sensor. This demo illustrates how the same network infrastructure with the open LoRaWAN standard can be easily be used to connect smart meters and IoT devices for metering data collection and distribution automation, as well as other applications enabling the management of water networks.
- A pole tilt demonstration from MultiTech. By law, utilities have to check all telephone poles, pylons and similar distribution towers approximately every two years to make sure they are not falling or dangerous. As performed today, monitoring pole tilt represents a significant waste of expensive manpower and increases costs. This demo will showcase how it can be monitored remotely with a real time audit trail without costly truck rolls reducing OpEx cost using LoRaWAN.
- Water resource monitoring, gas supply management and water quality control are some of the main challenges for governments and utilities across the globe. Ellenex, with its partner IoT America, will showcase an end-to-end, application-centric and integrable solution for pressure, level, temperature and water quality across a distributed network of assets (pipelines, water and diesel tanks, pumps, bore holes, gas supply systems).
DISTRIBUTECH will take place 28-30 January 2020 in the Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center, San Antonio, TX, 78205. The LoRa Alliance and exhibiting member companies will be in Booth #1761. Media interested in scheduling a briefing can reach out to lora-alliance@kiterocket.com.
About LoRa Alliance
The LoRa Alliance® is an open, nonprofit association that has become one of the largest and fastest-growing alliances in the technology sector since its inception in 2015. Its members closely collaborate and share expertise to develop and promote the LoRaWAN® standard, which is the de facto global standard for secure, carrier-grade IoT LPWAN connectivity. LoRaWAN has the technical flexibility to address a broad range of IoT applications, both static and mobile, and a robust LoRaWAN Certification program to guarantee that devices perform as specified. The LoRaWAN standard has been deployed by more than 120 major mobile network operators globally, and connectivity is available in more than 140 countries, with continual expansion. More information: lora-alliance.org
LoRa Alliance®, LoRaWAN® and LoRaWAN CertifiedCM are registered trademarks.