KT

KT pilots NB-IoT to improve the safety of mountain and water sports

In South Korea, KT is piloting the use of NB-IoT to connect safety jackets and safety tents.  The jacket can monitor a hiker’s health information, for example, and send the data to a mountain rescue centre in the event of an accident or illness. The safety tent is equipped with sensors that can detect human bodies and smoke and can send an alert in the case of attempted theft and or fire.

For the pilot, which began in September 2016, KT and Daejeon Metropolitan City have connected six safety jackets and a safety tent using NB-IoT. Nokia has upgraded a base station to support NB-IoT, while Intel is supplying the NB-IoT chipsets. Kolon Industries has developed the smart jackets and smart tent.

The pilot is designed to explore whether NB-IoT is efficient and reliable enough to deliver the key information required to respond to accidents in regions that lack sufficient coverage from the existing cellular network. KT is assessing the coverage extension and power consumption delivered by NB-IoT compared to conventional LTE. For this use case, it is particularly important that the connected device has sufficient power to relay information until the casualties can be rescued.

Key learnings

KT believes NB-IoT, which requires a straightforward upgrade to the existing network, will support low cost devices, wide area coverage, low-power consumption and high carrier-class network security. The pilot has demonstrated that NB-IoT technology can provide up to 7X wider coverage compared to conventional LTE and enable service in areas not reached by the existing LTE network.

Although KT integrated the IoT control platform with the network control platform for the pilot, it believes it would be beneficial to have a standardized architecture for the business platform, which can support a range of service scenarios. For commercial services, KT wants to use an loT control platform that is tightly coupled with its own existing platforms, residing in an in-house facility, yet is flexible enough to be able to communicate effectively with third-party service providers or business customers’ platforms.

Next-steps

KT is planning to launch a commercial nationwide NB-IoT network by June 2017. It is now deploying the necessary IT and network infrastructure, while developing reference cases and the associated business model. The operator believes there will be strong demand for the connected safety equipment, as mountain and water sports are becoming increasingly popular in South Korea. KT is also looking to use low power wide area connectivity to support smart metering, tracking and monitoring services.