LTE-M
LTE-M, which includes eMTC, is a type of low power wide area network radio technology standard developed by 3GPP to enable a wide range of cellular devices and services. The specification for eMTC was frozen in 3GPP Release 13, in June 2016. Other 3GPP IoT technologies include NB-IoT and EC-GSM-IoT.
The advantage of LTE-M over NB-IoT is its comparatively higher data rate, mobility, and voice over the network, but it requires more bandwidth, is more costly, and cannot be put into guard band frequency band for now.. In March 2019, the Global Mobile Suppliers Association reported that over 100 operators had deployed/launched either NB-IoT or LTE-M networks.3GPP Narrowband Cellular Standards
Deployments
As of March 2019 the Global Mobile Suppliers Association had identified:
- 60 operators in 35 countries investing in LTE-M networks
- 34 of those operators in 24 countries had deployed/launched their networks
