Smart meter company Bluecurrent racked up 1 million IoT connections on Spark New Zealand’s LTE-M network after upgrading 70 per cent of its electricity meters to use modems.

Bluecurrent provides smart electricity and gas meter data services across New Zealand and Australia. The company also has more than 70,000 meters running on Spark’s IoT network.

In a statement, the companies explained smart meters enable real-time access to energy usage data to improve operational efficiencies, and can provide energy distributors with insights to optimise network investments and support customers during outages. 

Bluecurrent CEO Neil Williams noted the move to 4G modems extended the life of its hardware and delivered “more certainty over our long-term communication technology roadmap”.

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Spark IoT lead Michele Wong added the “potential for IoT in New Zealand across multiple sectors is immense”, catering to “a wide range of business cases, turning data into real insights that make a tangible difference to business outcomes”. 

In October, the operator revealed it had more than 1.5 million total IoT connections.

It completed a nationwide rollout of an IoT network using LTE-M technology in 2019.