State-of-the-art Gateways

Multi-packet-forwarder support

ThingPark's Long Range Relay (LRR) packet forwarder, 100% of code supported by Actility, with industrial SLAs.
Semtech's Basics Station packet forwarder.

Multi-vendor support

Multi-OS support

Secure connection to LNS core network

[LRR]: Both IPSec tunneling and TLS options between LRRs and ThingPark core network, offering secure authentication (reliable PKI with asymmetric cryptography) and data encryption. Additionally, LRR supports two parallel georedundant LNS connections, simultaneously active and monitored.
[Basics Station]: This packet forwarder only supports TLS.

Downlink transmission (LRR-specific features)

Provide reliable transmission status of each downlink frame to Application Servers, with associated transmission failure cause (duty cycle issue, LBT, RF modem busy...etc.).
Native retry mechanisms in case of failure (e.g. on RX2 for class A, next pingslot for class B, ASAP for class C).

Complete set of RF features

Listen before Talk (LBT)
Antenna Diversity, supporting two receiving antennas to boost diversity (essentially relevant for macro gateways using Semtech's V2 reference design).
Multi-board base stations, used for tri-sector configurations and/or extended capacity to support > 16 RF channels.

Remote RF spectrum scan

RF noise measurements by the base station to assist RF channel planning and optimize radio performance.
[LRR only]: Measurement results are easily accessible via ThingPark's Spectrum Analysis tool.

Real-Time buffering capabilities

Buffering capabilities to prevent packet loss in case of temporary backhaul disconnection between the BS and the core network.
[LRR only]: Buffered/queued uplink packets are explicitly flagged "Late" when sent to the core network.
[LRR only]: Graceful dequeue after connection reestablishment to avoid flooding core network.

Backhaul redundancy and interface failover (universally supported for all gateway models)

Natively supported by LRR, not applicable to Basics Station:
Definition of Primary/Secondary backhaul interfaces among the following connectivity options: ethernet, cellular (3G/4G), WiFi, satellite.
Automatic switchover to secondary interface once primary interface fails, then failback once primary interface comes back.

Efficient backhaul data usage (natively supported by LRR, not applicable to Semtech's Basics Station)

Optimized use of backhaul traffic between LRR and core network to minimize signaling overhead and limit cellular/satellite data consumption:
Use of efficient binary encoding of application data.
Configurable signaling overhead (keep-alive, ICMP messages, periodicity of radio/WAN/system reports).
3 different bandwidth profiles (configurable from LRR console): no-constraint, limited, very-limited.
Basics Station uses JSON data encoding, which is not efficient from data consumption standpoint for cellular and satellite backhaul use-cases. ThingPark LRR uses an efficient binary encoding protocol, making it significantly more compact and bandwidth-efficient.

LoRaWAN® packet filtering at base station level

To optimize backhaul data consumption (especially for cellular/satellite types of connectivity), both LRR and Basics Station packet forwarders support filtering of LoRaWAN® packets by their NwkID. Accordingly, only authorized uplink packets are forwarded to the Network Server.

Reporting of Base Station statistics (natively supported by LRR, not applicable to Semtech's Basics Station)

Periodic reporting of BS statistics:
Radio statistics: packets in CRC-Error... etc.
Backhaul statistics: latency, bitrate, traffic volume, interface status, cellular heath metrics...
System statistics: RAM, CPU, file system, GPS status...
BS location derived by the local GPS receiver.

Support and Maintenance tools (natively supported by LRR, not applicable to Semtech's Basics Station)

Secure remote access to BS (Reverse SSH, SFTP).
Remote administrative commands: start/stop the radio, restart the packet forwarder, reboot the gateway...
Remote software upgrade (supported also by Basics Station's CUPS protocol).
Safe update of BS configuration with automatic rollback.
BS defense mechanisms (watchdog, auto-reboot...).
Local LRR console GUI (also known as SUPLOG).
Backup & restore of LRR configuration from ThingPark GUI.