Citizen radio is used for backhaul of LoRaWAN gateway traffic
Industrial IoT gateway company AMIT Wireless, and IoT connectivity company, Actility, have partnered to facilitate deployment of CBRS (Citizens Broadband Radio Service) IoT use cases for backhauling LoRaWAN gateway traffic.
CBRS was launched in the USA in 2020 by the FCC as a dynamic sharing system in the 3550 to 3700MHz band. Also known as the innovation band, this frequency band will allow for the expansion of coverage and capacity of operators’ LTE services as well as the implementation of new mobile uses (e.g., 5G and IoT). The band is currently also used by the US Navy, the Department of Defence and satellite communication service providers.
AMIT and Actility have agreed co-operation and mutual promotion of the AMIT Wireless CBRS products as a backhaul for LoRaWAN gateways using Actility’s ThingPark IoT platform, opening up a range of use cases to allow the deployment of private cellular network in CBRS bands.
One of the main challenges for IIoT LoRaWAN deployments in rural or remote areas is backhaul connectivity. Private cellular networks are privately owned, customisable cellular networks comprised of various components such as radio hardware and network orchestration software. These networks can significantly enhance connectivity and address the limitations of traditional Wi-Fi networks in industrial IoT deployments in remote areas. Public cellular networks, in contrast, provide limited control over service quality and risk data security, explained Actility. The solution, said AMIT and Actility is for the AMIT Wireless CBRS LTE devices to carry the backhaul traffic of LoRaWAN gateways.
The FCC’s decision to allocate more spectrum for business use, enterprises can now construct and operate their own private LTE or 5G networks, tailored to their needs, said Actility.
The Actility ThingPark Market presents a trial kit to demonstrate the capabilities of private LTE CBRS networks. The kit is characterised by the ability to enable roaming over CBRS and public networks using a single ThingPark global SIM card, as a result of global agreements with public network operators.
This kit illustrates a typical CBRS use case, providing backhaul for LoRaWAN gateways in rural or industrial networks, which traditionally rely on public SIMs, Ethernet or satellite connectivity. The kit can also be used to explore other CBRS use cases. Combined with AMIT Wireless CBRS gateways, it extends more possibilities by cellular connections and is also claimed to make users’ deployment easy, secure and reliable.
