Sequans Communications, SA, a leading cellular IoT chip manufacturer, announced that it has received a €10.9 million loan from the French government as part of the France 2030 initiative, which supports the development of technologies deemed strategically important to national interests.
Such funding will be received upfront, followed by three milestone payments over the life of the project. The France 2030 initiative, run by Bpifrance for the country, aims to transform key sectors of the French economy, including the telecommunications sector, and called for projects to accelerate the development of 5G and beyond as “sovereign solutions”.
In its proposal, Sequans outlined plans to create a new generation of large-scale systems. IoT chip supporting 5G NR eRedCap Meets the requirements of the 3GPP standard defined in Release 18 and later (5G New Radio Enhancement Reduction Feature). 5G NR eRedCap is compliant with the latest 5G NR networks and provides cost-effective, low-power, and highly reliable connectivity for industrial, utility, medical, asset tracking, and automotive applications. Supports large-scale IoT applications.
Georges Karam, CEO of Sequans, said:
“We are grateful that our proposal was selected by France 2030, as it strengthens and secures the development of our large-scale IoT low-power 5G product portfolio. In addition to supporting 5G NR eRedCap, this new chip is backward compatible with existing 4G networks, providing a smooth migration path from 4G to modern 5G networks for the next 10 years.”
