Deutsche Telekom upped its NB-IoT roaming agreements, with the company targeting further partnerships to boost availability of the technology for its enterprise customers.
In an update on its NB-IoT footprint, the company said it had roaming agreements in place covering 20 countries including Spain, Italy, the UK and US. The company also offers roaming using fellow low power wide area (LPWA) IoT standard LTE-M in ten countries including France and Japan.
Deutsche Telekom uses networks run by its affiliates to support IoT applications outside its home market alongside agreements with major operators including Vodafone Group, Orange and Telecom Italia.
The German incumbent added demand had increased domestically and internationally since its NB-IoT network launch in 2019, with connectivity expected to support a wide range of applications in the public and private sector.
Deutsche Telekom’s move comes as some operators have actually moved away from the LPWA network technology. In March last year Japan’s NTT Docomo announced it will shut down its NB-IoT network less than a year after launching the service, as it looked to prioritise resources and turn its focus to sister cellular standard LTE-M.
And two months later US newcomer Dish dropped plans to complete deployment of an NB-IoT network to focus on its 5G network and entrance into the US wireless market. France’s Orange has never been truly convinced, instead building its IoT strategy around LTE-M and non-cellular standard LoRa.