Can global IoT ever be seamless? The power of eSIM, SGP.32 and satellite networks

Brought to you by IoT Now, host Jim Morrish of Transforma Insights talks to Sam Colley from Giesecke+Devrient about the quest for truly global IoT connectivity. They explore how the new SGP.32 eSIM standard is transforming deployments, why MVNOs are finding fresh relevance and how non-terrestrial networks may fill the gaps that cellular never can. From energy grid failures to Scania’s worldwide fleets, find out how enterprises are navigating complexity. Plus, in “What the Tech?”, we reveal brain-stress tattoos and the unintended effects of the UK’s Online Safety Act.

Transcript

[00:00:00] 

Jim Morrish: Hi, and welcome to all of you around the world who are listening into this Trending Tech podcast. My name's Jim Morrish. I'm a co-founder of a company called Transforma Insights. We're a firm of industry analysts focused on all things related to digital transformation and for this episode of the podcast, I'm joined by Sam Colley, who looks after connectivity product strategy with Giesecke+Devrient. Welcome Sam.

Sam Colley: Thanks, Jim. Nice to be here and thanks for having me

Jim Morrish: Excellent. So in this podcast we're going to be focusing on the complexities of deploying and managing global cellular connected IoT solutions, and also I plan to touch on a couple of emerging technologies in the space. The snappily named SGP.32 standard, which generally makes life easier, and also non-terrestrial networks, which generally make things more complicated, but we'll get onto that later. So the Internet of Things has been poised to transform industries across the globe for the past decade or so. Yet the large-scale impacts [00:01:00] and, particularly in industrial sectors remain really in its infancy. Industrial IoTs still faces significant barriers including fragmented connectivity and complex deployment requirements. As digital transformation accelerates and industries seek to modernise operations that potential varieties revolutionise a wide range of sectors, including things like energy, transportation, manufacturing and healthcare. It just becomes increasingly evident, however, realizing this potential requires more than just connected devices. It demands scalable, secure and globally consistent solutions, and of course within that, global connectivity plays a critical role, including cellular connectivity and, increasingly also satellite, underpinned by a range of emerging technologies like eSIM or iSIM and another key element is the availability of a centralised platform for managing devices can unify data tools, technologies and insights from different connectivity systems into a single, what's referred to often as a single pane of glass interface to simplify the management of potentially very [00:02:00] fragmented connectivity landscapes.

So Sam, welcome to the podcast. It's great to have you with us.

Sam Colley: Thanks. Yes.

Jim Morrish: But before we get into the intricacies of global cellular connectivity, let's take a quick look at some serious tech news stories and we'll circle back later on in towards the end of the podcast with some lighter news stories in our 'What's the tech?' segment at the end.

So Sam, what's the serious tech news story that you've found for us? 

Sam Colley: Yeah I think the one that wanted to talk about, because I think it's quite relevant to the conversation we're gonna have today is what happened recently in Spain with the, or Spain and Portugal, with the blackout you know, of the energy grid, and I think, you know, happened, I think back in April, but I think it's just an example of how modern power grids are increasingly complex, and the way to manage that complexity really is automation and therefore IoT, which can really help utility companies kind of, I guess when you read the kind of explanation as to why it happened, it was kind of their lack of ability to respond in real time to the changing scenarios and redistribute energy from say, the traditional energy sources back [00:03:00] into the grid, and, you know, a kind of macro view of what's happening in real time and the ability for, I guess the internet to make decisions about, you know, how to redistribute that power could have prevented the outage from occurring. So I think, you know, it's just a really great example of where IoT fits into, you know, Industrial IoT essentially and really solves some of the problems that we'll only experience more of as climate continues to evolve and power needs change.

Jim Morrish: Yeah, absolutely and it underlines just how dependent we become on the availability of low tech electricity supplies to support our increasingly high tech world. And as you point out, those distribution networks become increasingly dependent on high tech solutions as they pivot from that historical approach of dimensioning supply to match demand to a new paradigm where demand should be better managed to match supply.

So actually I found a story that's quite closely related in fact, highlighting how Europe's electricity systems are being tested by heat waves, as air conditioning use source. So in June this [00:04:00] year, apparently it was the hottest on record in Western Europe with some periods demand up by 7.5% compared to 2024, and in fact 16% in Spain. Meanwhile and particularly helpfully, the hot weather forced some nuclear plants to run slow or close since cooling them becomes a challenge when the weather's hot, and in fact, there are also power outages in Florence and Bergamo in Italy as temperatures hit 40 degrees centigrade and people getting stuck in elevators and shops closing and so on. And at the same time, of course, trout in some parts of Europe have limited the use of hydropower compensate still, I guess at least, there was a lot of solar energy available to compensate, but again, it emphasised the need to manage grid networks in a very integrated way to enable the integration of those renewable sources.

I'm guessing you may have had some similar and related conversations with your energy sector clients and contacts.

Sam Colley: Yeah, I think, you know, our US team in particular works quite closely with the utilities industry and there's been a lot of conversations about, I mean, we come at it from a connectivity perspective, but you [00:05:00] know how connectivity can be even optimised, right? To ensure from a cost perspective even, or even a coverage perspective to ensure that the infrastructure that's put in place to help manage these infrastructures, like you've said, is available when it's needed. 'Cause reliability is, you know, very important, 'cause these things are gonna be mission critical and even goes beyond the electricity grids. I think, you know, our water infrastructure live up in Scotland, and you know, it's been increasingly warm up here and I think now UK's in, I think drought officially and how do we go about managing water supply centrally as opposed to relying on the individuals constantly to manage it for themselves, which is a, a big ask, given the lack of education around what's actually needed. So I think it's really interesting.

Jim Morrish: Absolutely. It's all becoming increasingly critical, and with that, we should get onto the main discussion, I guess, about deploying and managing global cellular IoT solutions. So we focused on utilities and particularly electricity up until now, but can you tell me a little more about how you've seen markets and customer demand for IoT solutions developing in recent years?

Sam Colley: Yeah, from a connectivity perspective, I [00:06:00] think we've seen kind of many trends kind of emerging in recent times that are impacting the way in which enterprises are trying to source their connectivity. Like one, for example, is just that need for flexibility. You know, we're seeing global enterprises with global application deployments. They're increasingly driving the need for more flexibility from providers, you know, working simply with one MNO now is seemingly unlikely to cut it really in order to accommodate all of the possible variables. We've got regulatory variables in many countries, cost variables, and also performance requirements around latency, in particular where we've seen a lot of kind of interest recently, and so all of that we're seeing kind of in these RFPs we're receiving, but then I think you mentioned in your intro the need for all of this to be managed by a single pane of glass. I think that was initially driven by the need for customers to manage multiple providers in order to achieve better coverage or better price, but now really also driven by the evolution of eSIM and I think the opportunities that brings to automate and optimise across both eSIM technology, cellular [00:07:00] technology, or even device management, and combining all of that information that you're receiving in order to make better decisions and even automated decisions. Touched on previously there, just the demand for eSIM. That's a huge shift. We've seen a huge trend, I think. O2 was unfortunately a bit of a letdown, I think, designed to be difficult, I would say, to adopt by the masses. But you know, in the past 12 to 18 months, with a lot of chatter about SGP.32, we've seen a huge demand for eSIM, particularly since the formalisation of that standard and I think that directly ties into the flexibility kind of trend we're seeing. And then coupled with eSIM is this desire as these deployments are getting bigger and more global, the desire for this automation and orchestration capability within a platform as well. I think that along with the eSIM is probably the two biggest shifts we've seen in terms of demand and something that obviously from a product strategy perspective we're having to address as well given, you know, G+D is obviously a provider of eSIM technologies and then has a platform as well. So it's combining the two of those together, and I think the other trend, just one final one, the last point is that for many years, MVNOs I think, have been seen as kind of the lesser type of [00:08:00] provider in IoT. Obviously a bit more flexible for maybe small, medium sized companies, but what we're seeing now with the change in demands is like an increased depreciation of the value proposition a MVNO brings to the fore. Again, that's kind of driven in large part by SGP.32, but you know, an MVNO by design is much better positioned to solve for many of these trends that we just mentioned above. So yeah, I think kind of, I guess in a nutshell, a lot of the trends and changes that I've seen over the last year, year and a half.

Jim Morrish: There's clearly quite a lot going on. It's probably worth just quickly recapping for listeners exactly what SGP.32 is and exactly how it relates to eSIM.

Sam Colley: Yes, so there's been eSIMs that's come before SGP.32, so there's two previous standards that was the SGP.02 and the SGP.22 standards. 22 was focused on consumer devices and SGP.02 for IoT devices. The challenge really with the IoT specification, 02, was that it wasn't particularly interoperable. It was very costly to adopt. You often have to spend lots integrating with different carriers and different platforms, and so what SGP.32 is, is kind of takes the [00:09:00] best of both worlds from 22 and 32 based on the 22 infrastructure and allows for, almost no integration requirements, uh, very low cost to adopt. There is a device requirement in the IPID, which is the provisioning agent that's required on the device to remove the need for human interaction. But companies like G+D have worked to develop a SIM based version of that, so therefore, no device integration needed as well. So then that becomes optional and the speed that which you can adopt to versatile technologies is a lot quicker, so really it is kind of, I wouldn't say it's a silver bullet, but it's kind of the technology that IoT is needed to really try and scale at mass globally and efficiently. So yeah, that's kind of, yeah, maybe not a technical description, but that's kind of my the view of it.. 

Jim Morrish: That's ideal for a conversational description for a podcast. So we're talking about effectively providing new credentials for devices which have cellular connections entirely, remotely, so you can associate with one network or another at your choice remotely. 

Sam Colley: Yes, that's a much better description. Thank you, Jim.

Jim Morrish: It's alright. It's a simple description for a simple [00:10:00] man. But I'm sure this is going to unlock more value in IoT. I mean, when expressed at one level, it's a simple concept, but it does allow for very significant flexibility. So I'm sure this is going to unlock more value somehow. How does that come about?

Sam Colley: Yeah, and I think the value it unlocks is the flexibility and the choice and you know, basically ability to avoid vendor locking , and I think if we look at an example, maybe, you know, the OEM space in general, so both kind of traditional gateway OEMs and also automotive OEMs, I think is where we've seen a lot of engagement given, it can become a device-focused enablement kind of, technology, which then means the whole market can adopt it, and the example there that we talk publicly about is Scania, where, from a connectivity management perspective, they came looking for a single pane of glass, from a platform perspective and we're really looking for features to help them enable and address eSIM more broadly so that they could achieve better costs, better performance and more seamless deployment, I think that's the big thing of their fleets. 'Cause they are a global company. So, you know, demands were [00:11:00] around orchestration, network diagnostics, network analytics, uh, rules engine, multi-carrier MNO support, multi eSIM technology support as well, and I think we kind of sometimes forget that there are a lot of companies still using existing technologies and, you know, how do they manage both of those estates in a single pane of glass as well. SIM app management that can really help, I guess, complement SGPs in general, the eSIM technologies in terms of optimisation and particularly in terms of provisioning, and yeah, then the cost and billing management as well. So I think it really unlocks a lot of value in it. It just unlocks the, I guess it's like freedom to choose, freedom not to be locked in and freedom to provision, as I say, autonomously and reduce the need for human intervention when either things go wrong or simply when a device is deployed, you know, you don't need to be thinking about it, and maybe we can talk a bit about bootstrap as well, and how that plays into it, but it's all very interconnected.

Jim Morrish: Yes. I mean it's clearly extremely beneficial for an OEM. You know, as you mentioned Scania, shipping devices all around the world and wanting to manage those in a homogenous way, but the [00:12:00] same kind of benefits also apply, also impact service providers, solution providers and even end-user enterprises who want all of their devices, I guess, in the same estate and managed, as you mentioned, via a single pane of glass.

Sam Colley: Yeah, exactly, and I think this technology is much more widely adoptable by everyone, and I think, you know, I mentioned the IPA technology. I mean, it is as simple as putting a SIM into your device as long as that device is compatible, which it should be, if it's adhering to standards. Put your sim in the device and then use, I guess, the software to say, okay, if this device lands in France, then give me Profile Y If this device lands in Germany, give me Profile Z, or even if it lands in this country with this device. Specific types of device give me this profile and this plan 'cause maybe you may have two different applications. Often, one high bandwidth, one low bandwidth, and you can use device information to then make better decisions about which connectivity you're provisioning, but the great thing about the technology is that you can use software to pre-program all of that logic and then use bootstrap enabled within the device to ensure that there's a [00:13:00] connection regardless when that device ends up in the field, and it can, based on the information that it receives on that bootstrap, inform the platform and deliver the optimised connectivity for that application. 

Jim Morrish: So a really, very seamless environment is emerging. But just to move on to a different new and emerging technology, there's a lot of talk about non-terrestrial and integrating these into cellular solutions. Is this a significant development or is the increasing talk being driven by the romance of reaching for the stars? 

Sam Colley: Yeah, I think I like NTN like the satellite concept, and I think whilst it's in its early days of deployment and probably hasn't been as quick or as seamless as we'd all initially thought it might be. Think, you know, having to get landing rights, licenses, the regulatory landscape, you know, always likes to make things complicated. There is no way that terrestrial networks will be able to cover all corners of the earth where IoT devices need to connect. I think that's kind of, for me, clear and the current proprietary satellite solutions, I think they serve the market well and there's still a lot of value in them, because of the different types of satellite that can be available, but for kind of mission [00:14:00] critical applications, having a satellite backup, I think is a real potential value add and we've already integrated two and about to be four satellite providers, three based on the standards and one proprietary. But the value in that hybrid approach is really where it will, I think, fly. I wouldn't necessarily say, you know, a 100% satellite. 'cause I think for the next five years, the cost will still be higher than what cellular is today. But for those mission critical applications or S.O.S type scenarios, it really does add value, in my opinion, even restricted to the NB-IoT kind of bandwidth in which we see today. I think longer term for satellites to become like a true incumbent within IoT, from a technology perspective, we will need to see the higher bandwidth kind of satellite technologies become more predominant or more readily available globally. So like a starlink for example, who are currently not doing kind of direct resale or direct enablement of IoT applications and working with MNOs, but I think there's a place for it, um, how it exactly ends up fitting in is still to be seen. I believe this hybrid [00:15:00] approach will be where it really works initially. But I think NTN and TN will always remain very complimentary to say, it's impossible for terrestrial networks to cover everything and I actually think we'll see a lot of MNO interaction with these NTN players, to kind of fill in the gaps within their networks as that technology evolves.

So, yeah, I think there's a lot of value in it. I see the potential and I think it will be realised in some form or another over the next five to 10 years.

Jim Morrish: Absolutely. So we've talked a lot about, well, we've talked a fair amount SGP.32 and eSIM and how that simplifies moving devices around between networks and assigning to right plans and some quite complicated management there. We've talked about multiple providers and satellite providers and different options for satellite providers. So on the one hand, this might be simple and seamless, but it also prevents a very fragmented landscape to manage for an end user or an enterprise or an adopter or an OEM.

So how can those adopters possibly get their arms around all of this and maintain security?

Sam Colley: Yeah, I mean, it's a great question and I think there is a lot coming and it's coming thick and fast at the moment in the space, but, you know, [00:16:00] going back to a comment I made earlier, you know, this is where that value of an MVNO is becoming increasingly kind of appreciated, I think, because yeah, in order for an enterprise to really maximise their ROI on their investment in IoT, they need to be well prepared, but they also don't wanna be investing tons in teams just to manage the administrative burden of developing IoT applications and managing carriers and managing software providers, managing device management platforms, uh, managing eSIM providers because that takes quite a lot. So you've got companies that don't traditionally have these large teams, trying to manage it all and maybe not managing it efficiently or not really understanding where they can extract more value, who I think can look to trusted partners such as G+D who have a centralised platform and have already gone through the effort of integrating all of these different technologies, and different carriers and can relatively easily and quickly, because they already have the teams in place, pivot and onboard additional carriers or additional technologies into that platform in order to simplify the adoption of connectivity and associated kind of functionality and [00:17:00] services for the enterprise whose real focus should be extracting value from the application itself, and I think sometimes it's very easy to get lost and distracted as an enterprise. We've done it and I've seen enterprises do it in trying to manage it all themselves because technically they can, but is there a better solution in allowing or partnering with somebody else to do so? And then obviously having all of that in that single interface is really important.

So I mean, from G+D's perspective, you know, it's been around for 175 years, you know, and have developed the SIM card initially, and also the eSIM, and so pairing this now with its own embedded operating system and its own CMP allows for people to focus on their value creation. I think that full ownership of the stack also just allows for a lot of additional value add. So, yeah, I think my recommendation is that you look to partners to really help you on the journey of extracting the most value possible from your applications.

Jim Morrish: Okay. Thank you. So that, I mean, that's been very informative and insightful in fact. I mean really we're talking about significantly increasing end user and enterprise demands around flexibility and needing relationships with multiple MNOs and latency and performance [00:18:00] requirements, and hence the value of MVNOs and of course the advent of satellites and how that pushes connectivity out into places that cellular can't reach and provides backup you know, enabled by SGP.32. But you know, really underlying the need to manage that in a very joined up way, so that, going back to your Scania example, an OEM like that can just ship their devices around the world and they connect and they work.

Sam Colley: Yep, exactly. 

Jim Morrish: Excellent. Thank you for that. We should probably move on to the promised 'What the tech?' section of this podcast, where we highlight some interesting and or amazing stories from the world of technology. Sam, what new story made you smile or frown recently?

Sam Colley: Yeah, so I saw one about connected non-permanent tattoos that are put on your face to measure brain stress levels, isn't it? Just made me think about how potentially I could do with a permanent one of those just to ensure that I was taking enough naps in the day isn't it? But I think it's funny how far technology has come that something as kind of intricate as a tattoo can be connected now, and I think, obviously not with the cellular modem, but still with [00:19:00] some form of connectivity, and it just kind of fascinated me and also the fact that this could, potentially understand what was happening inside your head being placed on the outside of your heads, but would also potentially enable far less intrusive surgeries or not surgeries, but treatments for certain disorders as well, which was great.

But yeah, it just made me think about how it could be beneficial to my own life really. 

Jim Morrish: Absolutely, and I sympathise with your point about needing to ensure that you get significant downtime, and of course there are many jobs in which you want to make sure that people are not overstressed. It did strike me though, at the other end of the scale, there are folks you might want to ensure are continually engaged and paying the attention that they should and potentially employers might use it in a slightly different way, or, or even it could be maybe built into a rewards system for reluctant students maybe.

But what caught my eye, and it's hard to have missed this if you're based in the UK but to be honest, many listeners out there won't be based in the UK. What caught my eye was the implementation of the UK's Online Safety Act. So it is got a laudable aim of stopping, particularly children being exposed to harmful content [00:20:00] on the internet and to do this stipulates that websites that host potentially harmful content must carry out some kind of age verification.

With one of the suggested approaches being for users to upload a copy of government approved ID to the website in question, and of course, unsurprisingly and has happened in many other parts of the world where similar solutions have been implemented. There's been a resulting surge in the use of VPNs and I think Proton VPN were claiming more than a 1400% surge in signups after regulations came into effect, and as I say, exactly the same thing has happened in other jurisdictions around the world and meanwhile, there are reports of people in the UK I noticed yesterday in fact being asked to provide photo ID before they can get a pizza delivered, which i suspect, 

Sam Colley: Okay.

Jim Morrish: is not a part of the intention. I guess you've seen some similar related stories on that topic as well. It's hard to miss them.

Sam Colley: Yeah, there's a lot of headlines around it at the moment, I suppose. But, it's certainly, I guess with these things it's always a bit of trial and error, right? As you say, the intent there is good and maybe, you know, initially there's clever people who [00:21:00] use VPNs, but probably some less clever or less informed young people as well who won't know how to do that. So hopefully, it will still protect the majority of folks. But I mean, it's great. The technology does always lead to restrictions or whatever always leads to the adoption of technology, which is good in many ways as well and shows that we're still a creative bunch at heart, so.

Jim Morrish: Constant innovation on both sides.

Sam Colley: Yeah. Fair enough.

Jim Morrish: Sam, it's been an extremely interesting discussion, so thank you for joining us. I feel like we could go on talking for a good while yet, but I think we're only out of time, and so unfortunately, we should draw this podcast to a close, I think. 

Please surf over to IoT Now where you can find a report digging into these topics in a little more detail. 

And just to remind us to everyone listening out there that you can subscribe to the Trending Tech podcast know wherever you found us today, and indeed, thanks for joining us and we're delighted to have you listening in as part of the growing audience. We'll be back with another edition of Trending Tech soon, and focusing on another aspect of digital transformation. So thanks again for joining. Bye for now. [00:22:00]