LTE-M: A Bridge Between NB-IoT and 5G

From smoke detectors in smart homes to shipments in logistics, robots in Industry 4.0, connected systems in production and vehicles on the road: around 30 billion devices are currently interacting in the Internet of Things (IoT) worldwide. The ongoing digitalisation of industrial and commercial enterprises is driving this trend forward: in just five years, up to 75 billion devices, buildings, machines, goods and vehicles are expected to exchange data with each other via the Internet. This is the prediction of market researchers at IHS. This opens up new revenue opportunities and new business models for the economy, but also poses new challenges for infrastructure: 2G (GSM standard) capacities are no longer sufficient for many industrial applications. They will be phased out in several countries in the near future or have already been switched off.

Powerful mobile technologies for the Internet of Things, such as NarrowBand IoT (NB-IoT, also known as CAT-NB1) and LTE-M (Long Term Evolution for Machine Type Communication, CAT-M1), are essential for this rapidly growing network. Both mobile communications standards are so-called Low Power Wide Area Networks (LPWA networks): their radio modules and transmission require little energy, but still score points with their long range. NB-IoT and LTE-M networks are based on 4G (LTE), but are also part of the 5G standard for Massive Machine Type Communications (mMTC).

Low-power machine networks are becoming even more powerful thanks to nuSIM, the integrated SIM (iSIM) designed specifically for the Internet of Things. With nuSIM, the functions of the SIM card are integrated directly into the communication chip. IoT devices with a nuSIM consume less power than those with a separate SIM card and are the right choice for particularly compact applications with long battery life, such as networked parking sensors, smart rubbish bins or cost-efficient trackers.

The 5G mobile communications standard will not only accelerate global machine networking once again. Everything will become smart – in all areas of life and work: from smart homes and smart offices to smart factories, smart production, smart logistics, smart farming and smart cities.

Each IoT solution places specific demands on the network. Here is an overview of the most important facts, advantages and application scenarios for 5G and LPWA standards.

For IoT solutions that only send small amounts of data from time to time, NarrowBand IoT is ideal for IoT projects by companies or cities. Its data rate is limited to a maximum of 250 kilobits per second (download and upload). However, the latency of NB-IoT is too high for critical areas of machine-to-machine (M2M) communication, such as the transmission of important information like real-time data or time-critical alarm messages.

• Advantages: NB-IoT modules are limited to the necessary functions. They bridge large distances with extremely low energy consumption and low costs. NarrowBand IoT offers high building penetration and also transmits reliably from basements, sewers or through thick concrete walls. The modules' batteries last up to ten years, depending on usage. Unlike proprietary wireless technologies such as LoRaWAN or Sigfox, NB-IoT is an internationally and widely available, reliable and future-proof industry standard for IoT connectivity that is also part of the 5G family.
• Availability: nationwide
• Applications for businesses: Smart city solutions such as smart parking (intelligently navigating drivers to available parking spaces), smart waste management (emptying waste containers depending on how full they are) and smart lighting (intelligent city lighting); smart buildings (facility management, digital access control, surveillance and alarm systems); smart metering (automatic reading of meter readings by radio); construction equipment monitoring (localisation and optimised maintenance of machines in factories); smart home/smart office (digital security systems, access control, heating and ventilation systems).

LTE-M is suitable for applications that require slightly higher data throughput and lower latency with good building penetration and low energy consumption of the radio modules. This is where the energy-saving nuSIM also plays to its strengths. LTE-M is based on the LTE-3GPP standard and is therefore 5G-compatible.

• Advantages: Compared to NarrowBand IoT, LTE-M offers higher data rates (up to 350 kbit/s), lower latency and SMS support, while still providing a long range. Other advantages include optimised energy consumption of the modules, good indoor coverage and up to 50 per cent lower module costs compared to conventional radio modules.
• Availability: Telekom already offers nationwide network coverage in Germany and many European countries.
• Applications for businesses: Smart City (air pollution measurement/air quality management), Smart Building (buildings networked with sensors), wearables (fashion or fitness trackers equipped with sensor technology), e-health (electronic health, digitisation of medicine, such as data transmission for remote monitoring of networked pacemakers), white goods monitoring (monitoring of household appliances), smart tracking and smart lighting (for the transmission of large amounts of data, such as permanent status monitoring).

5G mobile communications are 100 times faster than 4G (LTE). Under optimal conditions, the data transfer rate via the new mobile broadband network is up to 20 Gbit/s for downloads and 10 Gbit/s for uploads. This is ideal for all time-critical solutions in the Internet of Things.

• Advantages: Multiple external antennas that simultaneously participate in data transmission enable extremely critical applications to be networked with each other. In this way, 5G ensures that sensors and devices can communicate with each other with high connection reliability and low latency.
• Availability: 5G mobile communications are already available in many places. More than 90 percent of households in Germany now have access to Deutsche Telekom's 5G network. By 2025, Telekom aims to provide 5G coverage to 99 per cent of the population and cover 90 per cent of Germany's territory, enabling commercial and industrial companies in rural areas to use high-speed internet for IoT applications and further digitalisation.
• Applications for businesses: Campus networks (now also as 5G NR standalone networks; e.g. for autonomous robotic vehicles in industry), autonomous driving, e-health (digital health, the digital patient), telemedicine, smart cities, smart grids, smart factories (optimisation of machine running times in production through the analysis of large amounts of data), predictive maintenance (in production), video surveillance (smart video) and streaming, platooning (controlled convoy driving of lorries), smart farming, logistics (intelligent containers, supply chain monitoring).