Wireless standards body the LoRa Alliance has declared that it has taken a significant step in achieving effortless, low-touch deployment at scale with a set of new specifications.
The open, non-profit organisation works on defining, evolving and promoting the LoRaWAN (long-range wide area network) standard, of which more than 125 million supported devices have been deployed globally in industries including utilities, smart cities, agriculture, buildings and logistics.
The move is designed to enable automated device setup and a new technical document that extends LoRaWAN’s connectivity reach. In particular, new API and QR code specifications are claimed to be able to “drastically” reduce the manual work from device deployment.
Looking at specific functions, the trade body said the two new specifications – TS014 and TS018; and a new technical guidance document, TR016 – “dismantle” one of the biggest practical barriers to internet of things (IoT) deployments. That is, getting a device onto a network quickly, securely and without manual work. It said removing this barrier furthers LoRaWAN’s status as the LPWAN IoT connectivity technology with the highest accessibility and widest adoption.
It added that the capabilities decrease deployment friction and increase coverage compound quickly across networks, making LoRaWAN more scalable and ready for its next wave of growth.
TS014 is designed to eliminate manual data entry and proprietary workarounds by enabling LoRaWAN networks to automatically pull device profiles. TS018 is intended to help make setup errors less likely by encoding the device profile server on a device identification QR code. Used together or on their own, these specs turn device setup from a slow, error-prone manual chore into an automated process that takes seconds.
A third update, TR016, is new technical guidance for developers building products that use LoRaWAN Relay feature. TR016 is intended to give device makers practical guidance to build relay-based products that work reliably and interoperate well. The LoRaWAN Alliance said that relay can now be adopted with more confidence in the places a gateway can’t reach economically.
Such places are typically behind thick walls, underground, inside metal enclosures or in remote spots with no power or backhaul, all without adding cost or complexity to the network.
Putting this into perspective for what it could mean for large-scale deployments, the LoRa Alliance said users should consider a city-wide smart water metering roll-out: tens of thousands of meters, some buried underground or tucked inside utility vaults where a gateway signal can’t reach – historically, onboarding even one new meter type meant manually configuring its device profile for the network.
With the new technology, scanning or bulk-importing each meter’s QR code points the network straight to the right device profile server. Automated, secure access to that meter type’s profile streamlines onboarding for the entire fleet in one step. With TR016, meters in the hardest-to-reach locations can conceivably stay connected via LoRaWAN Relay, without a dedicated gateway for every isolated cluster. The same pattern is said to apply across smart agriculture, smart buildings and logistics – meaning fewer manual steps, fewer coverage gaps and faster time to value.
Commenting on the deployment, C Alliance CEO Alper Yegin said: “Every manual step in provisioning a new device, and every location a gateway can’t economically reach, creates friction that slows IoT deployments from reaching scale. ATS014, TS018 and TR016 solve this. That’s what makes LoRaWAN dependable enough to run the infrastructure the physical world depends on, and to keep growing at the pace it has.”
