Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:
Networking giant Cisco is getting out of the LoRaWAN market for IoT device connectivity, announcing end-of-availability and end-of-life dates for its gateways and associated products, with no planned migration pathway for customers.
Switchzilla made this information public in a notice on its website announcing the end-of-sale and end-of-life dates for Cisco LoRaWAN. The last day customers will be able to order any affected products will be January 1, 2025, with all support ceasing by the end of the decade.
The list includes Cisco's 800 MHz and 900 MHz LoRaWAN Gateways, plus associated products such as omni-directional antennas and software for the Gateways and Interface Modules.
If anyone was in any doubt, the notification spells it out: "Cisco will be exiting the LoRaWAN space. There is no planned migration for Cisco LoRaWAN gateways."
The move will come as a blow for any organizations that have built IoT deployments using LoRaWAN that may have considered Cisco to be a safe and dependable supplier. The networking colossus was pushing new products as recently as last year, when it announced a pluggable interface module (PIM) for the Cisco Catalyst IR1100 Rugged Series Routers with LoRaWAN connectivity.
LoRaWAN is a low power, wide area network specification, specifically designed to connect devices such as sensors over relatively long distances. It is built on LoRa, a form of wireless communication that uses spread spectrum modulation, and makes use of license-free sub-gigahertz industrial, scientific, and medical (ISM) radio bands. The tech is overseen by the LoRa Alliance.
[...] One analyst we spoke to who covers the IoT space said this likely isn't a profitable part of the business as far as Cisco is concerned. Since LoRa has a long range, fewer gateways are required than in Wi-Fi deployments, for example, and there are many vendors making LoRa sensors and hardware, resulting in a competitive market.
[...] "Exiting the LoRaWAN market is probably part of a more focused look at networking, paring away areas where they either weren't dominant, they don't see growth potential or that isn't in line with their overall networking roadmap."
Any Cisco LoRaWAN customers can perhaps take comfort from the fact that the final date to receive applicable service and support as stipulated in active service contracts is December 31, 2029. However, the last date that Cisco Engineering may release a planned maintenance release or software patch is much nearer – December 31, 2026.
(Score: 1, Redundant) by JoeMerchant on Thursday October 10, @02:53PM (6 children)
I often think that I want to do something with LoRa
.. then practicality takes over and I realize that it is a very specific niche tool mostly for high volume distributed systems, and I just don't have a good use case for it.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by janrinok on Thursday October 10, @03:05PM (4 children)
I've used it in several projects. It provides a slow but reasonably reliable communication between 2 sites (in my case my home and 1 remote site about 8 Km apart). In my case I have a packet size of 32 bytes, but it is always fun to see just how much data you can pack into such a small number of bytes. The maximum packet size is 256 bytes.
Since my wife died a few years ago several of my projects are no longer needed as they gave her a way to contact me when I was out of the house. Due to her handicap she could not use a mobile phone but a matrix of large buttons gave her the ability to select an appropriate message and send it to me by a single push.
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by datapharmer on Thursday October 10, @03:27PM
It’s lovely that you made that for her.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday October 10, @03:47PM (2 children)
Yeah, any idea I have had for LoRa ends up being better accomplished using WiFi or 3G infrastructure, I just don't need the low power enough to make the low bandwidth worth the effort.
I might like to put a GPS tracker on our sailboat with some auxiliary channels for battery voltage, cabin temp and humidity, etc. but again there, while the low bandwidth could do the job, 3G has much farther reaching infrastructure and sufficient bandwidth for images when you want them...
My sympathy for you and your passed wife, our son is mostly non verbal (profound autism) and in a group house now. We do FaceTime with him, not for the conversation, but for the simplicity of use and video connection.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Thursday October 10, @05:35PM (1 child)
Of course, I wasn't suggesting that LoraWan was any better than WiFi or 3G. As you say, your use case is very different from mine. Had my wife been able to use the 'phone then I probably would never have been driven to look for a different solution. The sailboat idea sounds interesting but you have got by without it so far and, for you, there are better alternatives.
Thank you for your kind words of condolence, it is over 3 years now and I can manage each day much better now. But, just like your son, they remain a part of your family and life, and thus they will be in your memories forever. Next time you give him a hug, give him an extra one on my behalf please!
I am not interested in knowing who people are or where they live. My interest starts and stops at our servers.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday October 10, @08:41PM
>give him an extra one on my behalf please!
Will do. We visit in person weekly, which seems very unusual in the world of group homes... 😥
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Informative) by Unixnut on Thursday October 10, @08:08PM
It is the common conclusion in most of industry as well. Case in point back in the 2010's SigFox [wikipedia.org] was the new thing in Europe, and I developed one of the first proof-of-concept IoT prototypes for the manufacturing industry.
It worked fine, but the fact of the matter was that after the initial surge of interest a lot of companies figured out they are better off just making use of 3G mini base stations with a VPN backhaul over the internet to achieve similar results while being (a) much cheaper as you don't need bespoke radio HW and (b) higher bandwidth.
Fast forward to present day and mobile signal in Europe is ubiquitous , there are very few areas without any signal what so ever so the major push now is to move to 5G for IoT, and in that world I don't see much of a future for these custom HW/radio/frequency technologies.
(Score: 3, Informative) by GloomMower on Thursday October 10, @03:32PM (1 child)
Anyone use meshtastic?
https://meshtastic.org/ [meshtastic.org]
(Score: 2) by GloomMower on Friday October 11, @06:20PM
Meshtastic uses LoRa guys! not sure why it is offtopic. Can be an alternative to something like LoRaWAN