Following the launch of its first two nano-satellites into the stratosphere in late 2018, Dutch startup​ ​Hiber​ is excited to announce that its connected tech network, bringing low power and low-cost connectivity to remote and developing areas for the first time, is now live.Â
Laurens Groenendijk, Managing Director Commercial, and co-founder at Hiber (and co-founder of JustEat and Treatwell) said:
We are extremely proud to announce that after only three years of hard work, Hiberband is the first network of its kind to become operational on a global scale. We are looking forward to supporting our customers wherever they need to be.
Hiberband!
After only three years of product development, the commercial launch of the fully automated end-to-end service known as ​Hiberband marks the latest step for Hiber, where it will see its first customers trialling the technology. Hiber’s first customers will be trialling the service over the coming months with projects based on 90% of the world that have previously lacked a network.Â
​Unlocking $100bn opportunity
Hiber is ​unlocking a $100bn opportunity for growth in the wider IoT market, and the network​ will ​power projects working hard to improve people’s lives and make a positive impact on the environment. Existing terrestrial networks (like Lora, NB-IoT, or GSM) only work in urban areas, whilst traditional satellites that provide wider coverage are expensive and power-hungry.
Disrupting global connectivity in less than a dollar per month
Hiberband is disrupting global connectivity by empowering individuals and organisations to reliably ​transmit data (text message size)​ from the world’s most hard-to-reach places for less than a dollar per month per device with its state of the end-to-end art service. With over 70 customers already signed up, projects on every continent will benefit from Hiberband.
Any industry operating in remote and developing areas can utilise the network, with early adopters being from government, environment, transport & logistics, agriculture, and mining. A sample of some of the first uses cases to trial the network includes:Â
- Soil Moisture Monitoring ​- Monitoring soil moisture levels on farms helps farmers understand whether their crops need water. The sensors developed by Hiber partner ​Royal Eijkelkamp ​ ensure that farmers make the right irrigation decisions, reducing water waste, and​ increasing crop yields. Hiberband makes this solution globally available.
- Beehive Monitoring​ – Bees have been facing the threat of extinction for more than fifteen years, and Hiberband’s technology will be instrumental in ensuring the successful cultivation and preservation of bee colonies. Bee farmers can monitor the environment inside hives anywhere on the globe using sensors connected via Hiberband, ensuring that the conditions are optimal for bee survival and honey production.
- Crop Monitoring /Post-Harvest ​- Monitoring crops will help farmers across the world reduce food waste and spoiled crops. Centau​r​ Analytics​ has developed an “Internet-of-Crops” platform that monitors the condition of harvests all the way from the farm to the consumer. Hiber enables Centaur to provide customers in the US and globally with updates on crop conditions no matter where they are in the world.
 Sotiris Bantas, CEO at Centaur Analytics, said:
The lack of transparency in the chain is causing about one-third of the crops in the world to be wasted before consumption. Together with Hiber, we are now able to monitor crops after harvest globally effectively – no matter the location.
Hiber will introduce two networks, Hiberband Direct (a modem and antenna that talks directly to Hiber’s satellites) and a gateway solution, Hiberband Via, which can operate on LoRa (a network widely used for IoT connectivity), Bluetooth or WiFi. Hiber launched its first two satellites from sites in Sriharikota, India, and California, the USA, in November and December 2018. It will be launching its third and fourth satellites in Q1 2020, also in Sriharikota, India.
Main image credits: Hiber
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