The Internet of Things (IoT), powered by machine-to-machine (M2M) connectivity, is already a major industry and is expected to grow to support billions of devices in many diverse user sectors over the coming years.
Long range wireless M2M connectivity has very different characteristics to existing cellular services and to meet these different requirements a number of Low Power Wide Area (LPWA) wireless technologies have emerged to target use cases where long range, extended battery life and very low cost are fundamental necessities and not available in other wireless technologies.
This white paper looks at two competing LPWA approaches – Ultra Narrow Band (UNB) and spread spectrum – comparing the physical layer performance aspects of these wireless technologies. It considers the availability of suitable spectrum and associated regulations, standards development for LPWA and the suitability of UNB and spread spectrum approaches for LPWA use.
The report also employs Real Wireless’ unique modelling technologies to compare the levels of interference between networks based on the two main physical layer architectures.