From 5G To LPWAN: Making Sense of Industrial Connectivity

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From 5G to LPWAN

Making Sense of Industrial


Connectivity

Mel Beckman
Chief Technology Officer
Beckman Network Engineering
Agenda

• Putting the I in IoT


• The wireless IoT WANscape
• Wireless IoT coverage
• Addressing health concerns
• LPWAN: low power and long range
• NB-IoT: cellular fixed-location clients
• LTE-M: cellular mobile clients
• Getting to 5G New Radio (NR) from LTE
• Summary
Putting the I in IoT
• IoT requires an internet
– Not necessarily the internet
– But a device-interconnecting
network is essential
• Ethernet works, but has high per-device costs
– Cabling and associated installation costs
– On-board PHY layer (magnetics)
– High duty cycles = high power consumption
• Wireless has many advantages
– Simple place-and-enable installation
– No electrical PHY layer, no cable
– Low duty cycle = low power
• LPWAN & 5G provide wireless wide area networks
– Can be private or public
– Can span a campus, a city, a country or the world
The Wireless IoT WANscape
5G
mMTC
PERFORMANCE
(Date-rate and size
of the data)
LTE-Cat-1
< 1Mbps
5G
LTE-Cat-M • Higher cost: $15 chipset, $5/mo. Compatible
• Faster data rates
Up to 375 Kbps • Fully mobile clients
• Includes Voice
• Lower cost: $5 chipset, $1/mo.
NB-IoT • Lower power: 1-5 year battery
10s of Kbps • Delay tolerance

SigFox/LoRaWAN • Lowest cost: $1 chipset, $free/mo.


• Lowest power: 10 year battery life LPWAN
< 10 Kbps • Empty rural solution
Capacity and power
efficiency
Coverage Source: SigFox
The Wireless IoT WANscape
Wireless IoT Urban Range

WiFi
Rural range Satellite
about 4X LoraWAN Is an option
10km NB-IoT
2km
1Mi 10km
Cat-M
1km
The Wireless IoT WANscape
LPWAN and 5G Radio Spectrum

LPWAN< 1 GHz LTE & 5G FR1 <6GHz 5G FR2 24-52 GHz

LoRa NB-IoT mMTC mmWave


WAN & LTE-M

Source: cbinsights.com
The Wireless IoT WANscape
LPWAN and 5G Spectrum Use Cases
Wide Area Cases Local Area Cases

Attributes

-Extremely low latency


High Bands -Ultra-high reliability
24GHz-40GHz -High capacity: packets/sec
-Poor penetration
-Extremely low latency
Mid Bands -Ultra-high reliability
1GHz-6GHz -Moderate capacity: packets/min
-Moderate penetration
-High latency
Low Bands -Minimal reliability
<1GHz -Limited capacity: packets/day
-Good penetration
The Wireless IoT WANscape
The Three Use Case Realms of 5G
mMTC

Massive
Machine Type
Communication URLLC

eMBB
The Wireless IoT WANscape: Tradeoffs
Range
Geographical Power
Coverage, Penetration Consumption

LPWAN

Transmission
Bandwidth
Latency

3G/4G/5G

Number of
Radio Chipset
Base Stations
Radio Costs
Subscription Costs
Source: SigFox
Wireless IoT Coverage – LPWAN
LPWAN Public Operators 2020

Source: LoRa Alliance and SigFox


Wireless IoT Coverage – 5G

5G-Enabled Carriers 2020

Source: Ericsson
Addressing Health Concerns
Addressing Health Concerns

The Electromagnetic Spectrum

AIIIIEEEE
RADIATION!
LPWAN: Low Power and Long Range

• Three Ls of LPWAN:
– Long Range
– Low Data Rate
– Low Power consumption
• Small, infrequent amounts of data over a long distance,
while maintaining multi-year battery life.
• Primarily outbound (from client) transmission, although bi-di is possible.
• Good for applications where cellular coverage isn’t good and WiFi
isn’t available (e.g., weather stations, agriculture, pipelines).
LoRaWAN Deployment Model
LoRa Devices

• Chipsets:
– Sole supplier: Semtech
– Open software architecture
– Select chip on power and features
• Free, non-commercial LoRaWAN network server available
• DIY LoRaWAN using a strategically-located gateway
• Commercial LoRaWAN networks span large geographies
• LoRa Cloud provides geolocation services
• Satellite communications using Low Earth Orbit (LEO) coming online
LPWAN: LoRaWAN Power Factors
Closer to Base Station = Higher Data Rate and Less Energy

Source: Sigfox
LPWAN: LoRaWAN Doesn’t Scale
Not Very Helpful for Public Networks

LoRa packet collision simulation with


1000 devices transmitting randomly within 60 seconds:
1000
Number of failed transmissions
Packet effective rate

800

600

400

200

Source: Sigfox
0
0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800 900 1000
But LoRaWAN Does Satellites
Low-Earth
orbit (500km)= Orbits globe Every day, the
Low latency In 90 minutes entire surface of
Earth is scanned once

Automatic
relay

Satellite
can back up
a local gateway

Antenna
Satellite
points UP
can back up
(50% gain)
a local gateway
NB-IoT: Bandwidth Modes

Guard
Band
LTE LTE LTE Non-LTE Carrier
Resource Blocks Carrier Carrier (e.g., GSM)

NB-IoT
LTE-M: Bandwidth Co-Existence

7X Bandwidth
of NB-IoT

NB-IOT
5G NR LTE-M

1,400 KHz 200 KHz

LTE-M and NB-IoT operate within a 5G NR carrier by


reserving resources for their transmissions.
NB-IoT: Cellular Fixed-Location Devices

$500 WiFi Gateway $30 Gas Leak Detector


(Plug-In AC Powered)

$30 Embedded
Arduino Module
$5 Embedded
Bare Module
LTE-M: Cellular Mobile Clients

$50 GPS Object


$300 GPS Tracker
Vehicle Tracker
$100 Residential
IoT Gateway

$300 Emergency
Two-Way Audio

Both NB-IOT and LTE-M


on same chip
$30 Embedded $5 Embedded
Arduino Module Bare Module
Getting to 5G New Radio (NR) from LTE

5G Design Goals
Getting to 5G New Radio (NR) from LTE
5G Requirements for mMTC
Getting to 5G New Radio (NR) from LTE

-Adopts NB-IOT & LTE-M


Significantly improves -URLCC
performance, scalability, -Private network promised
and efficiency going forward -Unknown battery life
-Costly chipset

-Worldwide coverage in cellphone network


-Guaranteed low latency
-Mobile and voice
-Five-year battery life
-Inexpensive chipset

-Massively adopted as a de facto standard


-Exclusively in unlicensed spectrum
-Private and public network option
LoRaWAN will persist
-Ten-year battery life for >10 years
-Cheapest chipset
Summary

• IoT requires a network


• Three main choices for wireless IoT
• 5G health concerns are unfounded
• Current LPWAN products are ready to roll
• LoRaWAN is the open LPWAN option
• NB-IoT services fixed-location clients
• LTE-M adds mobility and bandwidth
• 5G NR mmWave adds reliability and speed
• Plenty of COTS solutions today
• LPWAN will persist for at least a decade
Thank You!

Mel Beckman
http://www.becknet.com
[email protected]

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