Australian telco Telstra has approved two modules from Telit for use on its LTE-M and NB-IoT networks.

The ME310G1-WW and ME910G1-WW modules give Australian enterprises, smart cities and other organisations options for leveraging Telstra’s IoT networks.

Based on the Qualcomm 9205 LTE IoT modem, the modules are suitable for compact, low-bandwidth IoT applications that require long battery life, such as medical devices, fitness trackers, industrial sensors, smart meters and smart city sensors.

Compliant with 3GPP release 14, both modules use power saving mode (PSM) and extended discontinuous reception (eDRX) to enable IoT devices to wake up periodically and deliver only small amounts of data necessary before returning to sleep mode. Both also support LTE-M and NB-IoT coverage enhancement features to ensure reliable indoor connectivity.

“Leveraging the Qualcomm 9205 LTE IoT modem to power Telit’s ME310G1-WW and ME910G1-WW will help equip enterprises and cities with low power, compact IoT applications,” said Vieri Vanghi, vice president at Qualcomm. “This collaboration will help optimise IoT devices deep inside buildings while maintaining reliable connectivity, propelling the IoT industry and digital transformation globally.”

The ME310G1-WW provides uplink speeds up to 1Mbit/s and downlinks up to 588kbit/s. At 15 by 18mm, it is said to be the smallest 9205-based module available in Australia, making it suitable for compact applications such as wearable medical and fitness devices.

Both modules support Telit OneEdge, a module-embedded software system with pre-packaged, secure, easy-to-use deployment and management tools. OneEdge simplifies design, deployment and management of IoT products and services.

The ME910G1-WW has pin-to-pin compatibility with other members of Telit’s xE910 family. This heritage enables integrators to port their existing xE910-based designs quickly to the ME910G1-WW to take advantage of Telstra’s LTE-M and NB-IoT networks.

Both support GNSS for precise location, global LTE-M bands and fallback to legacy 2G networks, making them suitable for IoT applications that need seamless connectivity in Australia and throughout the rest of the world.

“With the Telit ME310G1-WW and ME910G1-WW, Australia’s IoT integrators, enterprise IT vendors and their customers now have the industry’s most compact and highest performance solution for leveraging Telstra’s LTE-M and NB-IoT networks,” said Manish Watwani, chief marketing officer at Telit. “These certifications also are the latest examples of how Telit works closely with leading operators such as Telstra to bring new IoT technologies to market quickly.”

Both modules simplify product design with Telit’s AppZone, an embedded application development environment featuring easy-to-use tools and APIs. AppZone allows software developers to leverage the processing resources of the modules to run their application, eliminating the need for an external MCU and reducing the total cost of ownership.