Sigfox joins project to create satellite/terrestrial IoT network

Sigfox’s low power, wide area radio technology has a growing footprint round the world, via smart city and IoT partnerships with companies like the UK’s Arqiva and Securitas in Spain. Now the French firm’s technology could reach into space, as it joins its most ambitious alliance yet, Project Mustang, a three-year effort to build a hybrid satellite/terrestrial IoT (internet of things) network. The all-French group also contains aerospace firm Airbus, research institute CEA-Leti and engineering business Sysmeca. The idea is to use Sigfox as the terrestrial data link, with satellite backhaul and connections to planes and boats provided by a low-earth orbit (LEO) satellite constellation. In its existing systems, Sigfox uses off-the-shelf equipment in its base stations to keep deployment…