INTERVIEW: Chip company MediaTek believes its low power wide area (LPWA) module – which it claims is the smallest on the market – will help drive IoT development, corporate VP Jerry Yu (pictured) told Mobile World Live.

In an interview at Mobile World Congress Shanghai, Yu said the company is able to support global bands being used for the NB-IoT flavour of LPWA, but the Asia-Pacific market remained its first priority in the sector.

“NB-IoT is potentially a huge market,” he said, adding: “5G’s base consideration is from a service point of view so there will be a lot of massive machine-type communication through the network. NB-IoT is designed to resolve the [issues of the] machine connecting to the network. It is a very good potential business opportunity.”

MediaTek’s IoT play is currently focused on supplying technology for use in a range of LPWA devices being developed and deployed into the market.

“We focused on low power consumption and the smallest form factor,” he added: “The module [is] 16mm x 18mm squared, I believe it’s the world’s smallest size for the NB-IoT module.”

This, he noted, would support the expected market boom and accelerate IoT development.

To watch the full interview, click here.