Reliance Jio Debuts NB-IoT Service For Tata Power-DDL Smart Meters

Reliance Jio has deployed its first commercial Narrow Band-Internet of Things (NB-IoT) service for Tata Power Delhi Distribution (Tata Power-DDL) smart meters. Notably, the discom supplies electricity to North Delhi.

Reliance Jio and IoT

The discom, on Monday, released a statement detailing the development. Incidentally, Tata Power's Delhi arm had already installed 2.3 lakh smart meters around the capital region. Notably, this is the first time where smart meters are installed on NB-IoT. Moreover, the discom added that Reliance Jio provided the NB-IoT service.

Basically, NB-IoT is a low-power, wide-area radio network technology standard. This standard was first developed by 3GPP, the same organization that regulates mobile telephony. Notably, this allows the tech to allow a wide variety of mobile devices and services.

Furthermore, these smart meters use a two-way communication system. Interestingly, the full setup includes the meter, control center equipment, and software applications.

Together, the system can collect and report energy usage information in real-time.

In the statement, Tata Power-DLL said that it achieved “interoperability at Meter Data Management level". What that means is that the discom can collect, work on and analyze data from meters of different makes and techs.

What is Reliance Jio doing in IoT?

Reliance Jio’s pan-India IoT network based on NB-IoT technology is already operational which was launched in partnership with South Korean major Samsung.

Notably, India's largest telco said that it already conducted pilots with various DISCOMs. Furthermore, the telco is integrating its IoT solution with top meter OEMs. Also, Reliance Jio has ties with system integrators ready for the rollout.

Reliance Jio is looking at IoT services as a lucrative and new revenue stream. Although Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea has picked up the pace on their projects as well, it is clear who is leading at the moment.

Earlier, Mukesh Ambani said that the telco was aiming to connect at least a billion connected IoT devices to its Internet of Things (IoT) platform. Incidentally, this will help gain around Rs 20,000 crore annual revenue opportunity per year for the company.