From Chaos to Clarity; A Clear Future for LPWA is Developing

Over the last two years, the LPWA market has evolved from a chaotic rivalry between 15 wireless formats into a clear market with winners and losers.

In their latest report, Mobile Experts lays out the two major market areas that are emerging: LoRa and NB-IoT.

Principal Analyst Joe Madden commented:

“The most important distinction between different LPWA formats is not the technology. The business model has emerged as the most important way to segment the market.”

“RF performance aside, some enterprises insist on control over their own networks. This is extremely beneficial to LoRa, along with a few other unlicensed technologies. LTE-M and NB-IoT benefit from basic choice to use an operator-based network. For customers that are willing to use a widespread network, the superior link budget of NB-IoT comes into play.”

“A few years ago, people began latching on to the idea of an interconnected society, referring to it as the ‘Internet of Everything’ in which a single network allows very diverse sensors and devices to interact with each other. In fact, we don’t see that happening. Many smart applications have emerged, but they are using different networks, because customers are making independent decisions on network technology and devices—meaning the markets are growing more vertically instead of horizontally,” commented Principal Analyst Joe Madden.