Vodafone has doubled the number of its NB-IoT network sites in the UK to cover 98 percent of the country’s geography.
The operator has invested heavily in deploying NB-IoT sites to meet growing demand from customers across the country.
“We have invested in NB-IoT because we want to offer our customers the right tools for the right job, in a way which is affordable and accessible for every customer,” says Anne Sheehan, Business Director at Vodafone UK.
NB-IoT provides a number of benefits over cellular networks including low-power consumption to extend the lifetime of devices, improved coverage, reduced cost, lower maintenance requirements, and supporting more scalable and versatile deployments.
A number of high-profile companies are already using Vodafone’s NB-IoT network, including SES Water and United Utilities to detect leaks in underground pipes and other infrastructure.
“This is a network which has been designed for low-bandwidth devices, allowing for coverage that goes beyond 4G, and devices where battery life could be extended to as long as ten years,” Sheehan added.
“In IoT, customers might want to use our 4G network for real-time, data-intensive analytics, while others might need a connectivity solution for non-time sensitive use cases, such as environmental monitoring.”
The company says that it is setting increased demand across industries for a network that can support use cases such as industrial and commercial metering, water monitoring, asset tracking, and smart city applications.
| What applications could be suitable for NB- IoT | |
| Use case | Why use the NB-IoT network? |
| Gas metering | Battery life, non-continuous data throughput and propagation |
| Alarms and event detectors | Battery life and very low data throughput on check and trigger |
| Parking monitoring | Battery life, low install cost and low/non-continuous data throughput |
| Smoke and fire alarms | Battery life and ability to test device periodically |
| Environmental Monitoring | Battery life and network coverage |
| Smart Bins | Battery life and network coverage |
| Water metering | Battery life, non-continuous data throughput and propagation |
| Liquid and pressurised fuels | Battery life |
Vodafone claims that its NB-IoT network exceeds 98 percent geographical coverage for use cases where a lower signal (-128dBm) is sufficient. For use cases requiring a stronger signal (-118dBm), Vodafone’s network covers 87 percent of the UK.
(Image Credit: Vodafone)
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