Actility, the industry leader in Low Power Wide Area Networks (LPWAN) has announced support for 3GPP LTE-M and NB-IoT technology within the ThingPark IoT software suite, allowing service providers to seamlessly deploy and manage networks combining LoRaWAN and NB-IoT LPWA using a single OSS/BSS, device management solution and data exposure interface. Visitors to Actility’s booth at MWC 2017 can see the seamlessly integrated dual-technology network in action, delivering data from LoRaWAN and 3GPP connected sensors through the same platform to a cloud host.
The solution is available within Actility’s ThingPark IoT platform and key features include: unified device management with single layer provisioning for LoRaWAN and 3GPP IoT devices and automated SIM provisioning; integrated OSS/BSS offering unified connectivity management services and unified LPWA billing; traffic shaping and policy management; and data exposure through a single API, including metadata. The result is a seamlessly integrated LPWA network powered by ThingPark, offering features such as service activation and role management, IoT offer creation and subscriber management, and order management.
At a time when device ARPU is decreasing rapidly, the large number of transactions is increasing IT cost, OSS/BSS costs and MME/HSS licensing fees are dominating the business case, and expensive EPC upgrades are killing the early MTC revenue. The ThingPark EPC connector comes as a game changer, as it will enable integrated networks, allowing operators to monetize existing R8-R11 networks and evolve towards future R13 deployments.
