Texas asset-tag firm Troverlo is working with Actility and its subsidiary Abeeway to provide a low-cost tracking device that can be read by Abeeway LoRaWan trackers.

The Troverlo host-powered tag is available on ThingPark Market, an IoT B2B marketplace powered by French firm Actility.

The integrated tag lets users gain more value from their Actility gateways and Abeeway tags by tracking assets that may not have been feasible to track due to cost limitations. As a result, this increases the scale and value of existing LoRaWan systems by providing data from dozens of other tags nearby at a fraction of the price.

Troverlo tags use a standard wifi chip to send out a beacon, similar to a wifi access point, that can be picked up by any device looking for a wifi connection. This works seamlessly with Abeeway LoRaWan trackers due to their built-in wifi sniffing capabilities.

The Abeeway tracker sees Troverlo tags and reports back their location and sensor data through the connected LoRaWan gateway and ThinkParkX location engine. Troverlo tags only require a standard off-the-shelf wifi chip to be effective, which means they can come in many form factors from standalone battery powered tags to embedded tags built into equipment or products.

In addition, these low-cost tags are automatically tracked outside of LoRaWan connectivity through Troverlo’s global observation network. This means if a tracked asset leaves the LoRaWan area, it will be tracked anywhere on the globe without any additional connectivity required.

The global observation network consists of connected devices such as cell phones, wifi access points and telematic products. When compared with other connection methods, such as LTE, Troverlo tags can be tracked for one tenth the price, which removes the cost barrier for many tracking applications.

The Troverlo-Abeeway combination can be applied across any Actility implementation. For example, Abeeway gives ranchers the ability to monitor their livestock to identify abnormal behaviour or locations. However, with relatively low margins, not all ranchers can afford to track each animal. Today, ranchers track groups of animals by placing an Abeeway tracker on one animal in the group to reduce costs while maintaining visibility into the group. With the addition of Troverlo tags, ranchers can now track each animal and use the existing Abeeway trackers to backhaul the data.

Abeeway provides logistics providers and their customers visibility into vehicle movement across the supply chain. With the tags, every pallet or product being shipped can be tracked as it moves from the warehouse, to the truck, to the user site. The tags enable Abeeway fleet management to scale into more granular tracking of product movement.

“The Troverlo partnership with Actility enables both companies to solve our customers’ problems with a stronger solution,” said Cody Catalena, CEO of Troverlo. “For Troverlo, our tags now seamlessly integrate into LoRaWan deployments, which increases the value our customers see from additional tracking and sensor data.”

Nicolas Jordan, COO at Actility, added: “Abeeway multi-technology highly configurable and long-battery devices are a perfect match for Troverlo’s offering. Together we will address a large variety of IoT tracking use cases, allowing our customers to benefit from an efficient solution, easy and quick to deploy thanks to the prebuilt integration in between the hardware, the network software and the end application”