The LoRaWAN standard experienced its strongest year ever in terms of adoption, deployments and expanded capabilities; capped off 2021 with formal acceptance as a standard by ITU-T.
The LoRa Alliance® today issued its 2021 End of Year Report*, a comprehensive look at its activities and achievements in 2021.
The report highlights the alliance’s accomplishments that drove massive scaling over the past year.
“2021 saw many critical achievements that advanced the standard and LoRaWAN’s standing as the leading LPWAN technology,” said Donna Moore, CEO and chairwoman of the LoRa Alliance. “The industry at large has recognized the value of LoRaWAN and its benefits: an open standard, business model flexibility, support from a large and diverse ecosystem that drives innovation, vendor choice, network coverage worldwide, and the backing of a strong certification program to ensure the interoperability and consistency needed for scale.”
“Our commitment to a multi-RAN strategy further demonstrates the advantages of using open standards. Finally, our members have experienced growth across a huge range of vertical markets where LoRaWAN’s low power and long range are a critical differentiator.”
Several market factors drove LoRaWAN’s rapid scaling over the past year:
- Accepted as an international standard by an independent SDO
- Recognition of the importance of LoRaWAN’s network model flexibility, which offers public, private and hybrid network options, ensures long-term viability and fit-for-purpose networking to serve the needs of a diverse and growing market
- LoRaWAN coverage grew exponentially, becoming ubiquitous in 2021 with LoRaWAN networks operational in almost every country
- Significant growth in deployments of scale that demonstrated that LoRaWAN is critically important to the digital transformation of all businesses
- Strong increase in membership, with the alliance adding nearly 100 new members in 2021, and the pace of membership growth in early 2022 is already increasing
Additionally, the LoRa Alliance led several efforts to make LoRaWAN easier to develop and deploy, to enhance its certification program and to foster collaboration among members. Key achievements over the past year include:
- Simplified volume deployments by enhancing the LoRaWAN standard and publishing a series of best practice guidelines
- Launched the Connect Initiative, which led to multiple network operators deploying roaming-capable platforms and entering into commercial agreements, further accelerating the expansion of LoRaWAN roaming
- Increased multi-RAN capabilities through new collaborations with GS1 and OMS that built on earlier efforts with Bluetooth, RFID, Wi-Fi and others to expand market opportunities
- Expanded the ecosystem and secured membership of key market leaders to advance the technology and strengthen opportunities for collaboration and development of end-to-end solutions
- Increased LoRaWAN end-device certifications and market leadership with the most certified end-devices of any LPWAN
- LoRa Alliance members receive support in driving their business, including the introduction of LoRaWAN RFP & Tenders Connect for access to global LPWAN bids and link to third-party marketplaces for product purchase
- Increased the visibility of LoRa Alliance members’ services and products with enhancements to the LoRaWAN Showcase and created a new Resource Library on the alliance website to support the ongoing needs of the LPWAN market
- Expanded the LoRa Alliance NetID program to make it more accessible to members and non-members alike, increasing LoRaWAN’s reach
“It is clear the world stage is set for significant, rapid market acceleration of LoRaWAN in the coming year. As we look ahead to the rest of 2022, I’m very excited that we will have the opportunity to bring the LoRaWAN community together at the LoRaWAN World Expo in Paris this summer to experience the technology’s global impact,” said Moore.
