The ALT1250 narrowband CAT-M1 and NB1 (NB-IoT) chipset. Photo source: Altair Semiconductor. Altair Semiconductor demonstrated on June 13 GNSS functionality integrated in its new ALT1250 narrowband CAT-M1 and NB1 (NB-IoT) chipset. The ALT1250 is said to be the only narrowband cellular internet of things (IoT) chipset in the market today that incorporates GNSS/GPS functionality.
Altair Semiconductor demonstrated on June 13 GNSS functionality integrated in its new ALT1250 narrowband CAT-M1 and NB1 (NB-IoT) chipset. The ALT1250 is said to be the only narrowband cellular internet of things (IoT) chipset in the market today that incorporates GNSS/GPS functionality.
"Location determination is essential in many IoT applications — including asset tracking, vehicle monitoring and wearable devices. Satellite positioning is the most accurate method for doing that," said Eran Eshed, co-founder and VP of Worldwide Sales and Marketing for Altair. "Integrating GNSS functionality in the ALT1250 significantly reduces the overall cost of IoT solutions while offering state of the art, low power satellite positioning capabilities in a miniature package. The market is responding well to it."
In addition to GNSS functionality, the ALT1250’s level of integration eliminates the need for most external components required to design a cellular IoT module, according to the company. Approximately the size of a shirt button and less than 100mm2 in size, an ALT1250 module features support for both Release 13 standards — CAT-M1 and NB1, and includes a wideband RF front-end supporting unlimited combinations of LTE bands within a single hardware design, a multi-layered and hardware-based security framework, an internal application MCU subsystem and packaging that enables standard, low-cost PCB manufacturing.
"We called the ALT1250 a game-changer when we announced it several months ago — integrated GNSS is one of a large set of groundbreaking innovations offered by this chip," added Eshed.
The demonstration of the ALT1250 in action, including the GNSS capability (GPS and GLONASS), was presented at the Sierra Wireless Innovation Summit, being held at the Paris Novotel Tour Eiffel in Paris, France. Altair Semiconductor, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation, is a leading provider of LTE chipsets.
