LGU+ Begins Selling NB-IoT Services

LG U+ launched NB-IoT commercially at the beginning of July 2017 to enable a connectivity solution to their customers that offers wide coverage, long battery life and low cost devices with the continued security of their existing LTE network. The NB-IoT network has been enabled with partners Huawei, Nokia, Samsung and Ericsson, and is now available nationwide in South Korea on the 850 MHz band.

The new networks are supporting a range of use cases, including smart metering for Telemetry and utility applications, such as electricity and gas monitoring. LG U+ forecast that their NB-IoT network will both replace existing technologies and be used for entirely new use cases. The operator anticipates launches of new use cases by the end of 2017, such as gas metering and devices that track people and objects.

Now that the NB-IoT network of LG U+ is commercially available across South Korea, the operator is offering the service to customers on a pre-paid basis for both the connectivity and device. The service will be provided for optional contracted periods and various other tariff plans are currently being considered.

Next steps

Moving forward, LG U+ see exciting opportunities in securing mass connectivity for smart metering, the monitoring of public utility services such as water and gas meters, Geo-IoT devices for asset and logistic tracking, and Industrial IoT for maintenance services and beyond.

In order to further accelerate the growth of the Mobile IoT ecosystem, LG U+ will seek to make consistent alliances with a wide range of partners, from devices manufactures to module and chipset manufactures to customers who offer value added IoT services.

The operator currently has a partnership with KT Corporation and will use this relationship to grow the ecosystem by running joint open IoT labs. LG U+’s primary objective for 2017 and 2018 will be to become the business leader of Mobile IoT in South Korea.