Orange unveils plans for Internet of Things network

Orange has unveiled detailed plans for the rollout of a low-power narrowband Long Range (LoRa) network to enable the Internet of Things in France.

The network will be rolled out step by step across France, beginning in 17 cities in the first quarter of 2016: Angers, Avignon, Bordeaux, Douai and Lens, Grenoble, Lille, Lyon, Marseille, Montpellier, Nantes, Nice, Paris, Rennes, Rouen, Toulon, Toulouse and Strasbourg.

Orange said is continuing standardisation work on future cellular networks, optimised for the Internet of Things, which will be operational in 2017. Orange and Ericsson plan to perform the first usage trial of 2G/4G networks for IoT applications by the end of this year. The technical tests will focus primarily on coverage in areas such as basements and on sensor life.

Unveiling a raft of Internet of Things initiatives, Orange reiterated that it plans to invest €600 million in the Internet of Things between now and 2020, with am ambition to have a presence across the whole value chain.

In other Internet of Things news, Spanish telco Telefónica’s R&D department has announced the first ‘smart dress’ prototype, an item of clothing that can capture information that can be analysed to predict the wearer’s emotional state.

The ‘Environment Dress’ collects data, including temperature, infra-red and ultraviolet radiation, carbon monoxide and noise, then determines what environmental and behavioural patterns the wearer is experiencing. The dress then alerts the wearer of “the potentially elevated presence of external agents”, according to Telefónica. Future developments include geolocation and sharing of data, a mobile application that will allow earers to manage and personalise lights, alarm systems and other parameters and, further down the line, the ability to indicate how the user is feeling at any given moment through machine learning.