IEEE Selects Panasonic Powerline Communications Technology for IoT Standard

The IEEE Standards Association approved Panasonic’s broadband over powerline (BPL) communication technology for the IoT as the IEEE 1901a standard, said the company Monday. Panasonic proposed the technology, said to meet various demands for IoT-related services, in June, and it’s based on its HD-PLC Wavelet orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing technology. IEEE 1901a controls bands according to usage, allowing scalable communications with features to extend communications distances and to select speeds for the diverse communications needs of IoT-related services, said the company. The standard mode communication band can be doubled or quadrupled, allowing a theoretical 500 Mbps communication speed in double mode or a maximum of 1 Gbps in quadruple mode over coaxial cable or dedicated line, it said. The standard mode communication band can be compressed by a factor of two or four to concentrate energy in narrow bands, extending the communication distance up to twice the distance in standard mode with a lower communication speed, it said. The IoT BPL standard was designed for communications in homes but also supports large-scale networks covering social infrastructure such as buildings and factories, Panasonic said.