The turning point has arrived: NB-IoT industry is accelerating its release!

The birth of any new technology is always met with both doubts and praises, and NB-IoT is no exception. Since its birth, discussions about NB-IoT have never stopped. After several years of development, data proves that NB-IoT is developing rapidly and doubts are gradually fading.

NB-IoT has the characteristics of large connections, wide coverage, and low power consumption, meeting the needs of more than 70% of IoT scenarios. Against the backdrop of the rapid development of the digital economy, NB-IoT has achieved leapfrog development in the past three years and has been implemented on a large scale in many industries.

At present, NB-IoT has penetrated into more than 40 industries, giving birth to 4 tens-million-level applications including water meters and electricity meters, nearly 10 million-level applications including smart home appliances and door locks, as well as an endless stream of emerging industry applications.

It can be seen that at present, NB-IoT has performed brilliantly and has an optimistic development. Based on its wide application in thousands of industries, NB-IoT is gradually changing the world.

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With 5G selected as the new infrastructure, the industry chain has also started new predictions and discussions on the development of NB-IoT under the background of new infrastructure: What are the application scenarios and trends of NB-IoT under the background of new infrastructure?

Liu Yulin, deputy director of the Information and Communications Development Department of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said that the country's emphasis on new infrastructure has brought major development opportunities to emerging industries such as 5G and the Internet of Things. It is necessary to accelerate the formation of a development pattern in which NB-IoT, 4G, 5G and other technologies will be used to connect various types of Internet of Things.

Entering a stage of explosive growth

Data shows that in January 2020, the number of NB-IoT connections worldwide exceeded 100 million; in February, the number of connections in China also exceeded 100 million. From the perspective of operator distribution, the number of NB-IoT connections of China Telecom and China Mobile has exceeded 40 million, and China Unicom has exceeded 10 million. Currently, 92 commercial networks have been opened worldwide, covering more than 60 countries and regions, and have been applied to more than 50 businesses in more than 40 industries.

"After early accumulation, NB-IoT has ushered in explosive growth." Cao Ming, vice president of Huawei's wireless product line, said frankly: "In particular, 5G continues to give NB-IoT higher performance and stronger vitality. As an important part of 5G technology, NB-IoT will play a greater role in building a world of interconnected everything."

In terms of industry, domestic traditional industries continue to develop rapidly. The number of smart water and smart gas connections is steadily moving towards 20 million, and they are beginning to develop in depth from meter reading to network management and monitoring. 2G IoT head applications are beginning to transform to NB-IoT. POS machines, shared bicycles, vehicle tracking, etc. have completed solution verification, unveiling the curtain of 5G NB-IoT replacing 2G IoT.

In early April this year, Tianyi Telecom announced the results of a tender for 3 million modules, requiring that the modules must support R14. The quotations from most manufacturers were lower than or on par with 2G modules, indicating that NB-IoT modules have begun to have an absolute advantage over 2G IoT in terms of performance and price.

At the same time, the number of Mbol IoT innovation partner members has increased from 1,500 in November last year to 1,700, indicating that the NB-IoT ecosystem is continuing to grow.

China's industry partners have successfully entered overseas markets by leveraging their industry advantages. Domestic NB-IoT module manufacturers have supplied more than 6 million pieces to overseas markets; meter manufacturers have won orders for more than 2 million NB-IoT meters in the Middle East. The demand for 5G NB-IoT chips is growing, with shipments more than doubling in the past six months.

"I believe that with the dual support of new infrastructure closely linked to the development of high-tech and the new Internet of Things characterized by 5G, 5G NB-IoT will further accelerate its progress." Cao Ming said that as more and more companies join the 5G NB-IoT chip ecosystem and leading manufacturers continue to improve their technology, NB-IoT modules have begun to have absolute advantages over 2G Internet of Things in terms of performance and price.

The three major operators are actively deploying

China's three major operators have always been the main force in the development of NB-IoT. At the "5G NB-IoT "Billion" Journey Online Industry Summit", the three companies also shared their respective progress in NB-IoT and announced their deployment plans for NB-IoT in 2020.

Xiao Qing, general manager of China Mobile's IoT Integrated Circuit Innovation Center, said that since China Mobile officially started developing NB-IoT services in October 2018, the number of China Mobile's NB-IoT users has exceeded 43 million by the end of February this year. In 2020, China Mobile will focus on the development of NB-IoT for its IoT business.

In terms of network capabilities, China Mobile has basically achieved maturity, achieving major NB-IoT coverage in 346 cities across the country (covering main roads in townships and above); creating high-quality NB-IoT network services, which can be activated nationwide with just one click; base stations have completed FDD transformation in the 900MHz frequency band and can be soft-activated; the network moves with the industry, coordinating network blind spots across the country, and has rapid deployment capabilities.

Xiao Qing said that China Mobile's work priorities in 2020 are mainly divided into four aspects: First, network security. Increasing NB-IoT network coverage, improving the breadth and depth of NB-IoT through indoor coverage, especially improving cross-provincial network optimization and security.

• First, in terms of ecological construction, the first is to launch the R24 version of NB-IoT. Compared with the existing R23, the R24 version will have a very good user experience in terms of superiority, mobility, and power consumption. At the same time, we will focus on eight industries and carry out in-depth research.
• Second, we will further increase our efforts in industry leadership and push for further reductions in module costs, so that they can quickly approach the price of 2G costs. At the same time, China Mobile will also set up a low-power laboratory to further explore the low-power field.

Fourth, in terms of support capabilities, we will integrate the overall solution of cloud-pipe-end integration, and at the same time upgrade the existing NB-IoT coverage map, so that users can better understand the network coverage of operators, truly build and deploy services on demand, and better meet user experience. At the same time, the positioning capability of NB-IoT will also be implemented.

Chen Jianhua from Tianyi IoT Solutions Department of China Telecom said that China Telecom took the lead in building and operating the world's largest NB-IoT network in 2017, providing software upgrade services for 410,000 base stations across the network. "Currently, China Telecom's NB-IoT overall coverage rate has reached 97.84%, serving the world's largest NB-IoT customer base (nearly 50 million households). The number of China Telecom NB-IoT gas meter users has exceeded 10 million," Chen Jianhua said.

It is reported that China Telecom is actively working on the deployment of NB-IoT R14 version in the future to improve the application experience of large data packets and high-speed mobility. In addition to upgrading the base station software, China Telecom has also carried out NB-IoT network quality and support efficiency improvement through open laboratories, etc. At present, NB-IoT R14 version service testing has been carried out in 5 provinces and 18 cities, and the progress is in a leading position.

China Unicom has developed more than 10 million users in NB-IoT, and is currently promoting the evolution of the 900MHz spectrum and building NB-IoT networks with 8 core city nodes (covering the whole country). Regarding future development, Li Kai, Chief Product Officer of Unicom Internet of Things, said that NB-IoT is a process of building a network on demand, and China Unicom will focus on developing NB-IoT base stations based on meters.

In Li Kai's view, the NB-IoT business model cannot rely solely on connections, but needs to build an ecosystem, create a new business model, and gain new value from IoT connections. To this end, China Unicom will empower traditional industries through platforms, ecosystems, and networks, such as through industry alliances, 5G alliances, and IoT alliances, and work with the industry to develop better NB-IoT applications.

Still facing three challenges

Although the development of mobile Internet of Things represented by NB-IoT has achieved breakthrough results, Liu Yulin, deputy director of the Information Development and Communications Department of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, believes that NB-IoT still faces some challenges:

• First, NB-IoT applications need to be further popularized. Currently, most NB-IoT connections in China are concentrated in a few cities, and are still not widely used across the country. A large number of base stations are in a lightly loaded or no-load state.
• Second, the proportion of advanced mobile technologies used in IoT connections needs to be further improved. Compared with advanced technologies such as NB-IoT, 4G, and 5G, the general utilization efficiency of 2G and 3G technologies is relatively low. However, 2G and 3G connections still account for a large share of existing IoT connections, and their share in new IoT connections is close to 20%. It is also necessary to accelerate the formation of a development pattern in which NB-IoT, 4G, and 5G technologies will take over various types of IoT connections in stages.
• Third, NB-IoT network coverage needs to be further improved. In some areas, the NB-IoT network coverage level cannot fully meet the requirements for carrying 2G connection migration, and the depth of local coverage needs to be strengthened.

At the same time, he made several suggestions for the development of the mobile Internet of Things industry:

• First, accelerate the construction of 5G networks and coordinate and improve the network coverage of NB-IoT. The network is the foundation for the development of the Internet of Things. All basic telecommunications companies should accelerate the deployment of 5G networks, aiming at SA independent networking, accelerate the construction of networks in major cities, and extend coverage to key counties and towns with conditions, laying a good foundation for the development of mobile Internet of Things. In view of the needs of important application scenarios, further improve and optimize the quality of NB-IoT networks, strengthen deep coverage, and strongly support the continued development of various applications.
• Second, we should strengthen the construction of IoT management platforms and open up their capabilities. Telecom companies' connection management platforms should continue to improve and develop with the application management platforms built by vertical industries, and at the same time, they should open up connections. In particular, operators' management platforms should open up their interfaces and capabilities to industry application platforms to help industry customers manage their services more flexibly and conveniently, and maximize the value brought by NB-IoT networks.
• Third, give full play to the supporting role of industry alliances and public service platforms, create a good industrial development environment, carry out mobile Internet of Things development monitoring work, promote and guide NB-IoT applications and industrial development in various places, encourage capable large enterprises and units to build open laboratories, provide research and development, testing, verification, etc. for small and medium-sized enterprises, and give birth to more new Internet of Things applications, new models, and new formats. Establish a mobile Internet of Things resource library, organize excellent application case collection activities, and increase promotion and publicity efforts.