Recently, a representative[1] from Google reiterated the special characteristics (low bandwidth and inexpensive) of IoT applications and the need for a brand new network. Over the past few years, several initiatives have been launched to address the potentially massive, low data and low power requirement segment of the M2M/IoT market; Neul and SigFox are two examples that spring to mind.
It was therefore interesting to hear of a development that has been working its way through the 3GPP standards process. LTE, traditionally associated with high data-rate mobile services, is now being engineered to address M2M/IoT applications. This is not a case of data-intensive video surveillance or digital display applications but the use of LTE in moderate data rate, low cost and long battery life scenarios.