Airtel has announced its partnership with Secure Meters for deploying Narrow Band (NB-IoT) services that will power 1.3 million homes in Bihar through a smart meter solution. This deployment will be India’s first NB-IoT solution on a narrow band with a fall-back option that will work on 2G and 4G and ensure real-time connectivity and uninterrupted transfer of critical data.
NB-IoT is a low-power, wide-area radio network technology developed by 3GPP that enables a wide variety of IoT devices and services, including smart meters.
Ajay Chitkara, director and CEO, Airtel Business, said, “IoT is one of the fastest-growing business segments for Airtel Business. This venture into NB-IoT strengthens our credentials as the largest cellular IoT player in the country and places us firmly as a partner of choice for Discoms looking to invest in smart meters. We look forward to being an active player in India’s energy transition.”
Ananya Singhal, joint MD, Secure Meters, added, “We are thrilled to have partnered with Airtel for the implementation of NB-IoT services in our smart meter rollout in North Bihar. Their expertise, professionalism and dedication to providing top-notch services ensured we learnt together and had a successful launch. With Airtel’s support, we were able to seamlessly connect and monitor our meters, resulting in greater efficiency and cost savings for Secure and for our customers in North Bihar. We thank Bihar Discom management and staff for enabling us to work together. We highly recommend Airtel to anyone looking to implement NB-IoT services in their IoT solutions and look forward to a growing partnership.”
Airtel’s NB-IoT platform is future-ready and is scalable to 5G. Airtel’s NB-IoT proposition also includes its advanced IoT platform, “The Airtel IoT Hub,” which has been customized to suit the needs of Advance Metering Infrastructure Service Providers (AMISPs). Its Enterprise-grade Feasibility Tool helps AMISPs plan their meter deployments better. Other functionalities include customer life cycle management and advanced analytics tools like diagnostics, live sessions check and real-time data usage, among others.
Airtel’s network is ready for pan-India NB-IoT deployment. It is designed for superior coverage to address the specific needs of the IoT market.
