Earlier this month, the Altair team was once again thrilled to head to Los Angeles for the second MWC Americas exhibition.
We joined 22,000 participants from more than 100 countries to view and discuss the latest cutting-edge technologies and innovations. Almost 1,000 companies were represented – from global heavyweights to young startups – to demonstrate their offerings and debate the future of mobile technology.
Once again, cellular IoT featured high on the agenda, and Altair’s representatives – along with our colleagues from Sony – held meetings with partners and customers, operators and manufacturers, journalists and analysts. Specifically, we met with a range of OEMs and ODMs servicing a variety of vertical IoT markets, including IoT tracking devices, wearables, connected vehicles and smart meters.
We announced a new small antenna technology with Ethertronics which will allow the design of tiny wearable and IoT devices. Our partner, HERE technologies, announced our integration of HERE’s positioning software on the ALT1250 to enable enhanced security and reduced time-to-market for IoT tracking device designs. Qoitech announced that the second-generation eHealth wearable prototype (jointly developed by Ericsson, Sony Mobile and Altair) is able to increase battery life 5x compared to the first generation prototype demonstrated in February 2018.
Of all the topics discussed in these meetings, the one which caused the most excitement was the announcement of an integrated SIM and how significant it is expected to be in facilitating the deployment of new IoT solutions. This integrated SIM is secured by a hardware secure element and provides the same carrier-grade security of a physical SIM. The ability to securely embed full SIM functionality into highly integrated LTE-M/NB-IoT chipsets will enable smaller, cheaper and more energy-efficient IoT devices.
Among all the potential takeaways from this year’s MWC Americas, one thing seems clear: the value that new LTE innovations such as the integrated SIM are bringing will make the next twelve months an exciting time for the cellular IoT space.