The partnership is designed “to unlock the potential of IoT for enterprises”, the companies said this morning, by removing the barriers to the adoption of eSIMs – the integrated, built-in version of SIM cards used in mobile devices.
Luc Vidal-Madjar (pictured), head of M2M/IoT business at BICS, said: “Removing the obstacles for eSIM management with IoT devices will lead to far broader adoption of eSIMs in the industry and will finally allow eSIMs to deliver on their long-awaited promise of greater flexibility for IoT connectivity.”
Thales said it has engineered a pioneering eSIM activation solution for IoT devices and added that it is working with BICS as a connectivity provider partner.
They said that, despite the fact eSIMs are growing increasingly common in modern smartphones, enterprises have struggled to adopt them for IoT devices, such as smart meters or smart appliances, due to the level of integration required with mobile operators.
Thales and BICS said they are removing the need for complex integrations with mobile network operators, allowing the eSIM to connect directly to an operator’s remote SIM provisioning platform.
“This approach is proven in the consumer electronics space and is now bringing ease of use to IoT implementation,” said the companies.
Thierry Uguen, head of product portfolio management for IoT at Thales, said: “This new IoT eSIM solution will be a major turning point in the industry. With our IoT connectivity activation service, we have drastically optimised the costs and efforts needed for the mobile industry to manage the SIM profiles on IoT devices.”
He added: “Together, we aim to pioneer an open ecosystem of eSIM for IoT, finally enabling enterprises to unlock the huge potential of eSIMs.”
Vidal-Madjar said: “Unlocking eSIM use in this way will be a critical step in supporting bigger and bolder global IoT deployments. For consumers and enterprises, this will ultimately bring massive IoT closer to becoming a reality. This in turn will mean large numbers of new smart products for end-users and promising new business opportunities such as for industry 4.0, smart metering, smart cities or connected alarm systems.”
