Toronto-based low-power IoT challenger BehrTech has launched a low-cost gateway for ultra narrowband IoT networks under its MYTHINGS brand. The new product, from Germany-based IoT manufacturer WEPTECH, is the first to gain its new MYTHINGS certification, the company said. It said the new unit will make its new MIOTY / TS-UNB technology “more accessible, interoperable, and consumable” in industrial IoT.
BehrTech licenses the MIOTY protocol, a new low-power wide-area (LPWA) entrant in the IoT space that uses the telegram-splitting ultra-narrowband (TS-UNB) technique, developed by the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated (IIS) and specified by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI).
MIOTY is billed as the “first and only” technology to comply with the TS-UNB specification and is presented by BehrTech as a low-throughput tech for “last mile” industrial communications. It goes up against the likes of LoRaWAN, NB-IoT, and Sigfox in the LPWA networking market.
The new AVA gateway from WEPTECH offers bidirectional IoT connectivity based on the MIOTY wireless stack. It comes with BehrTech’s network and device management platform, called MYTHINGS Central, and affords one-click device registration and cloud-based processing and management. It also features an MQTT interface, and cloud connectors for Azure, AWS, and Software AG’s Cumulocity IoT platform.
Wolfgang Thieme, chief technology officer at BehrTech, said: “Between legacy proprietary solutions and costly third-party managed networks, there is strong demand for inexpensive, easy-to-deploy and highly flexible IoT connectivity solutions. Together with WEPTECH, we’re making this powerful new LPWA network technology more accessible, interoperable and consumable for companies worldwide.”
BehrTech claims its MIOTY technology is better than any of the cellular or non-cellular LPWA offerings currently available for industrial applications. It has made comparison with LoRaWAN, specifically, on the grounds its technology is more robust in “real-world industrial environments” with high levels of interference from other systems and devices.
The AVA gateway is available through WEPTECH as an evaluation kit, initially, to test the reliability, range, and scalability of mioty LPWA networks. It supports the 868 MHz and 915 MHz frequency bands, in Europe and North America, and can be connected to the local network via Ethernet.
WEPTECH is a member of the MIOTY Alliance. It works in the industrial IoT and Industry 4.0 sectors with wireless protocols such as wireless M-Bus with Open Metering System (OMS), Thread, NB-IoT and MIOTY.
Wolfgang Esch, the company’s head of sales and marketing, said: “We are happy we could win BehrTech as a partner on the platform side at this early stage. With this collaboration, we are able to give the customer even easier and faster access to this game-changing technology”.
AVA gateway – spec sheet
- Input frequency range (EU): 868 – 870 MHz
- Input frequency range (US): 915 – 917 MHz
- Tx power: 14 dBm
- Sensitivity (EU1): < -135 dBm
- Input Voltage: 5V DC (USB C)
- Typical Input Current (EU1): approx. 900mA
- Typical Input Current (EU2): approx. 1200 mA
- Dimensions: 56 x 90 x 25 mm
- Weight: approx. 0,16 kg
- Temperature range: 0 – 35°C (indoor use only)
- Humidity range: 20 – 80%
