CEFC invests in the IoT

Australian company Thinxtra has a plan to connect millions of devices around the country to the internet — and the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) is committing $10 million to help.

The CEFC’s investment, through the Clean Energy Innovation Fund, forms part of Thinxtra’s $20 million Series B capital raising to deploy Sigfox Low Power Wide Area Network (LPWAN) technology. With the help of the CEFC and other investors, Thinxtra aims to generate Australian and New Zealand Internet of Things (IoT) networks, covering 95% of the population, by year end.

The IoT refers to a network of electronic devices that connect via the internet to collect and exchange data. This technology can replace the large amounts of time and energy currently used to physically monitor and manage such devices, which can often be spread over a wide area. In doing so, it also enables utilities to detect and react to problems in near real time.

So what does this have to do with clean energy? As noted by Minister for the Environment and Energy Josh Frydenberg, LPWAN technology is cheap, produces few emissions and provides long battery life for devices which only need to transmit small amounts of data and require intermittent internet connectivity.

“Australia is a vast country with a scattered population,” said CEFC CEO Ian Learmonth. “A large amount of energy is expended in physically monitoring millions of pallets, waste containers, gas canisters, farm gates, livestock and more. By providing a low-cost solution for tracking and monitoring these assets, we can save a huge amount of emissions.”

Thinxtra’s IoT network could therefore be utilised for a wide range of applications, such as meter readings, quality measurement, GPS location, temperature sensing, vibration monitoring and more. And while there are devices already on the market that enable remote monitoring, tracking and operation over the IoT, many companies deploying connected objects over traditional networks struggle with expensive pricing, high energy consumption and complexity of maintenance.

“Connecting them to existing internet services can be a bit like using a four-lane highway when a footpath would suffice, or hiring a whole bus to send one person to the shops,” said CEFC Investment Development Director Blair Pritchard.

“Thinxtra’s LPWAN technology requires far less power and provides much longer battery life for devices that only require the transmission of small amounts of data and intermittent internet connectivity.”

“Our low-cost, low-power, long-range IoT network is perfect for deploying simple solutions to make cities smarter, buildings more energy efficient, agriculture more sustainable,” elaborated Renald Gallis, VP marketing and ecosystem at Thinxtra. “Industries working with us are seeing efficiency but also gaining deep insights and better service outcomes for their customers. Their supply chain and the risk and governance issues they are challenged by are being solved.”

IoT networks based on Sigfox technology thus have the potential to improve energy efficiency and productivity, while at the same time reducing waste, in business, government and the community. More than 150 local businesses have already partnered with Thinxtra to create operational efficiencies in a wide range of industries, such as:

• smart water meter service companies that enable large water users to detect leaks;
• smart farming service providers with waterproof data communicators that integrate with software and sensors to provide daily data on soil, weather and other environmental monitoring;
• smart logistics solution providers with cold chain monitoring trackers to increase traceability of food and reduce wastage.

“Thinxtra’s IoT network provides the lowest device-to-cloud connectivity, at the lowest level of energy consumption, and is complementary to Bluetooth, RFID, 2G, 3G, 4G and Wi-Fi technologies,” said Thinxtra CEO Loic Barancourt.

“Our network has been designed with IoT in mind. It is open and an extension of the global Sigfox network, based on antennae and base station infrastructure that is independent of existing telco networks.”

Barancourt said the company’s plans are currently on track, with the aim to have 17 million objects connected by the end of 2022 — and 100 million devices by 2025.

Image credit: ©stock.adobe.com/au/Maksim Pasko