Ligado Networks announced a partnership with Sony Semiconductor Israel to develop chipsets for Ligado’s 5G mobile satellite network – a move identified as a significant milestone for Ligado.
Ligado spent years defending its plans to use L-band spectrum because GPS users said it would interfere with their communications. Last year, the FCC denied a petition by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) that would have further delayed Ligado’s use of the spectrum.
Now, Ligado says hooking up with Sony brings it one step closer to providing standalone satellite and combined satellite and terrestrial connections to enterprise customers.
Ligado’s 3GPP standards-based 5G satellite IoT network will support “tens of millions” of mobile devices powering machine-to-machine communications in the transportation, agriculture, utilities and energy sectors, the company said.
“As a leader in developing IoT standards for mobile satellite networks, we are excited to work with Sony to advance new capabilities and serve the growing market for 5G mobile satellite connectivity anywhere in the U.S. and across North America,” said Ligado CTO Sachin Chhibber in a statement. “This satellite capability will also support our 5G mobile private network solution by enabling ubiquitous coverage and reliability, which are essential for critical infrastructure enterprises as they modernize operations.”
Sony will build on its cellular IoT design efforts and standards coordination to adapt 5G IoT technology and manufacture IoT chipsets that are compatible with Ligado’s L-band MSS spectrum, which 3GPP has standardized as Band 255 for non-terrestrial networks.
Ligado reiterated its plans to deploy a 5G satellite IoT network to support mainstream devices using low-cost chipsets for both satellite and terrestrial connectivity. The satellite offering adds extended coverage and network redundancy to the company’s planned 5G mobile private network solution.
Some of the applications they’re talking about serving are wide-area vehicle diagnostics, environmental monitoring, smart metering and critical messaging “anywhere in North America.”
Ligado and Sony plan to complete their work in several phases, with the goal of conducting initial technology trials by the end of this year.