Stephane Richard, Orange CEO, hailed an “Internet of Things revolution”, as the company unveiled a number of new partnerships and innovations around the technology, alongside its new Livebox home gateway device.

The company, which today held its fourth annual Show Hello event in Paris, has made a big splash around IoT in recent years as part of its Essentials 2020 strategic plan, and has also begun to deploy a dedicated LoRa network to support this.

Richard, who hosted the event, said LoRa was proof that the “IoT revolution was already here”, as he revealed plans to densify the network by giving 5,000 “connected lamps” to Orange employees, which are intended to serve as additional network relays.

“We are going to stretch the network to homes, businesses and even basements, simply by connecting this lamp,” he said. “Through this, network expansion is becoming collaborative for the first time.”

The company plans to roll out the LoRa network across the country by the end of this year, passing 17 French cities by mid-2016.

Other highlights at the event included a drive by the company to fuel partnerships for its Datavenue platform, designed for connected objects. Partnerships included in e-health, personalised content and the development of a “catalogue of certified connected objects” with Axa, the French insurance giant.

As part of its Homelive services, Orange said it is offering telemonitoring and energy control applications, as well as connecting objects from a range of partners including Sony and Fitbit.

The latest iteration of the company’s Livebox device will be available by this summer in France, and will feature optimised speeds for ADSL and fibre connections, as well as an ultra HD decoder, extended Wi-Fi capabilities and a 1 terabyte hard disk.

The company is also stepping up its content proposition, unveiling exclusive partner programmes via Netflix and deals for live sport streaming.

In total, Livebox will offer a catalogue of services, with more than 300 titles on demand available in ultra HD.