Polte is collaborating with Deutsche Telekom to drive massive IoT location technology. The Texas company has completed initial field trials and will work with DT on pilots across Europe.

Polte is an innovator of C-LoC cloud location over cellular technology. With DT, it will run large-scale customer pilots of the Polte location API.

DT aims to use Polte’s patented technology to boost cellular positioning accuracy and enhance international user experiences with asset tracking. The project is in its commercial validation phase, piloting with several prominent DT IoT customers requiring universal asset visibility.

Polte specialises in 4G and 5G cellular location, providing accurate and secure indoor to outdoor location insights for connected devices globally. It creates global visibility with more accuracy than cell ID simply by leveraging existing cellular networks and cloud computing.

With Polte’s API, users can eliminate the expense and complexity of additional hardware, access points or beacon deployments, allowing for rapid time to RoI. Offloading computational complexity from edge to cloud, Polte stretches the battery life of connected cellular devices while safeguarding the privacy of location data.

DT had previously announced the addition of Polte as a partner in its IoT optimiser ecosystem, designed for companies that want cost-effectively to deploy reliable, battery-powered mobile IoT, from asset tracking to smart city services.

“DT is proud to partner with Polte to explore its pioneering, industry-leading location capabilities with customers requiring universal asset visibility without the need for incremental infrastructure,” said Jens Olejak, head of new access technologies at Deutsche Telekom IoT.

Pilots will begin on Cat-M (LTE-M) and NB-IoT networks in Germany this month, with a phased approach across Europe. Time to commercialisation will depend on the results of this commercial validation phase.

“Polte delivers an order of magnitude higher accuracy over competitive cellular location technologies, such as cell ID,” said Polte CEO Ed Chao. “We look forward to working with DT to extend these benefits in cost, power and security to customers globally, and helping more businesses derive valuable location intelligence indoors and outdoors.”

• Deutsche Telekom IoT has certified the first two products from Würth Elektronik and added them to its IoT Digital Shelf. Here, DT gathers selected products on the market to complete its own portfolio with certified hardware enabling it to offer end-to-end services.

The localisation products recommended by Deutsche Telekom IoT are the Erinome I and II GNSS modules.

The Erinome series exploits all four global navigation satellite systems at maximum speed for localisation and navigation tasks: GPS, Glonass, Galileo and Beidou. Both modules can be operated in low-power mode, which is important for mobile and battery-powered devices. In addition to the usual uart interface, they offer I²C and SPI.

Erinome I (18 by 18 by 6.4mm) is the version with integrated antenna, Erinome II (7 by 7 by 1.6mm) the version without. An active antenna can also be offered, which already meets the IP66 protection class standard.