Date: 02/10/2009

Radiocrafts and Sierra Wireless jointly launches gateway for smart meters

Radiocrafts and Sierra Wireless jointly announced the launch of a GSM/GPRS/EDGE gateway for smart metering which embeds a Wireless M-Bus radio, compliant with OMS, in a compact form factor.

This gateway is based on Sierra Wireless' Fastrack Supreme, a programmable application hosting platform with cellular modem capabilities and an open-standard interface for adding supplementary I/O connectivity and features in the form of expansion cards. Radiocrafts has developed a unique expansion card for smart metering which adds Wireless M-Bus or ZigBee to the GSM/GPRS/EDGE modem.

The Fastrack Supreme features a powerful central processing unit with an ARM9 32 bit, 26-104 MHz core, programmable via any combination of AT commands, C/C++ and Lua. It supports Sierra Wireless' Intelligent Device Services which enable the remote monitoring and upgrade of meters in the field.

Wireless M-Bus is used for the data transfer between the meters and the data concentrator/MUC. The communication from the MUC to the back-end system is based on IP standards.

Hallvard Moholdt, Technical Solutions Manager at Radiocrafts, commented: "We are happy to work with the dedicated team from Sierra Wireless on a solution which secures both companies' customers the first OMS enabled gateways. OMS represents an important step towards the harmonisation of future smart metering solutions, to the benefit of utilities and consumers alike."

Pierre Piver, Vice President Embedded and OEM Sales at Sierra Wireless, added: "We are delighted to see how innovative companies like Radiocrafts are taking advantage of the creative opportunities offered by the Fastrack Supreme. We are proud to be able to offer the smart metering community the very first OMS compliant gateway on the market."

A Radio Test Gateway firmware is available free of charge for developers.