How Nokia Nurtures the Internet of Things

Jean-Christophe Coiffier explains how Nokia’s Device IoT Excellence Centers support partners, developers and innovators
 
Jean-Christophe Coiffier, Device IoT Excellence Centers Director, Wireless Services, Nokia
The arrival of low power, wide area (LPWA) connectivity has developers across the world brainstorming potential new applications for the Internet of Things (IoT). It is now becoming feasible to use connected sensors to monitor everything from the health of a pet dog to the condition of each blade on a wind turbine. Enterprises will soon be able to deploy tens of thousands of connected sensors capturing detailed data on every aspect of their operations.
But each new concept or application needs to be tested on actual network equipment. That is where Nokia’s global network of open IoT provide value. The Finland-based telecoms equipment maker has established “Nokia Device IoT Excellence Centers” in Murray Hill, New Jersey (home of the renowned Bell Labs) and Irving, Texas, in the US, Paris-Saclay in France and Hangzhou in China. Nokia also plans to establish a fifth open IoT lab in South Korea in 2017.
Jean-Christophe Coiffier, Device IoT Excellence Centers Director, Wireless Services at Nokia, says the labs enable Nokia’s chipset partners, operator customers and independent developers to test prototype IoT products and services on actual Nokia network equipment, including both new LPWA technologies, such as Narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) and LTE-M, and well-established technologies, such as GSM, WCDMA and LTE, in a range of frequencies.  “We have the full set of frequency bands across the labs and the goal is to have all the frequencies available in each lab,” adds Coiffier. “You can perform a proof of concept, test a use case, validate a business case or customer experience in a real environment.”
Keeping pace with standardization
Nokia aims to ensure that all the technologies that are incorporated into the 3GPP standards are available in the labs. “We offer full access to all Nokia technologies, both the current wave and the next wave,” says Coiffier. “The R&D has to be finished, but we can incorporate the technology in the labs even if it is not commercialized yet.” The labs can also be used to test applications that require IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) capabilities, such as eMBMS (enhanced multimedia broadcast multicast services), EVS (enhanced voice services) and RCS (rich communications services). The open labs work closely with Nokia’s Bell Labs research and development, which has won eight Nobel prizes across its 100-year history.
Importantly, the open IoT labs can also be used for systems integration and interoperability testing. In particular, they provide an environment where chipset makers and module suppliers can check that their new products are fully compatible with the network equipment.  The labs can perform certification, run “plugfests” and test IoT platforms. “We can issue reports, which demonstrate compliance, making it easier for developers to access the telecom industry and sell their products,” Coiffier says.
The open IoT labs have private rooms, offices and facilities where a company or an individual can test a prototype IoT innovation on fixed or mobile networks, with their idea and intellectual property protected by non-disclosure agreements (NDAs).  Coiffier stresses you don’t need to be a supplier or customer of Nokia to make use of the open IoT labs.  Additionally, if developers are unable to physically travel to a Nokia premise lab, Nokia has the ability to bring the open labs capability to the developer’s premise via Nokia’s “Lab as a Service” Offer.  With this capability Nokia is able to build satellite / remote labs connected back to one on Nokia’s Lab Centers for subject matter expert support.
Exploring a wide range of applications
The innovations being tested in the open IoT labs are very diverse. “We are working in the public safety area, for military, fire and police, and in the automotive sector with car manufacturers,” Coiffier says. “We are also working on transportation solutions for trains, for planes, for the subway and on industrial, oil and energy applications, as well as in the medical and healthcare sectors to help doctors improve how they interact with patients.” The labs have also run hackathons to help identify and address potential vulnerabilities in various IoT applications, such as the smart home.
As well as running dozens of LPWA pilots with its customers, Nokia has teamed up with individual operators to establish joint IoT labs to develop applications for new LPWA technologies. For example, in July 2015, KT, one of Korea’s leading operators, joined forces with Nokia to set up the country’s first IoT lab, which provides a virtual environment to enable interworking and network verification on Nokia Networks’ LTE infrastructure. The new lab provides IoT-related technical expertise and knowledge to small and medium-sized partner companies.
 
Coiffier says Nokia is now looking at ways to further integrate Nokia’s open IoT testing environment into operators’ own development activities. “Phase two is about supporting customers who want to have the same capability in their own labs,” he explains. “We are aiming to deliver Lab as a Service that will help local operators to develop their own ecosystems.”
Next year should also see significant advances on many other fronts. Coiffier says some of the applications being tested in the labs now will be commercialized in 2017 as the LPWA ecosystem matures and all the links in the value chain are in place. “We need to have the green flag from the entire ecosystem to have commercial products,” he explains. Nokia also plans to introduce 5G technologies into the Open IoT labs once the relevant R&D has been completed and the standards are closer to being finalized.