Is eSim a Game-Changer for Utilities and Smart Cities?

we've recently heard a lot about e -sims read about them and even featured them in previous current insights videos but we always struggled to find real examples of iot and smart city use cases in which they were being used so we've interviewed different e -sim vendors to discuss use cases models and if there have been any advances in their deployment in the smart city world but first of all let's recap what is an eSIM an eSIM looks exactly like a regular SIM card but it works differently as it allows its users to change telecom operators remotely without having to work on the device or switch the SIM card and this works well for our customers who want to insert one SIM during manufacturing to the IoT device and ship it then later on to whichever country they wish. And the other thing is that it provides the future-proof angle or insurance that whatever happens in the future, they can swap to another telecom without the need to swap out the physical SIM itself. So an eSIM could be integrated into a single design. You could make a single SKU that could be shipped anywhere in the world and you could use the remote system sim provisioning specification to flexibly control how and when you activate a particular device to a mobile network and really eSIM drives more automation in the process of deploying an iot solution trying to make the access to cellular simpler and how do we do that right it's about making the hard work at the early stages of the supply chain that is working with the chipset maker with the security it vendor to integrate very early stage the technology of sim deep inside the chipset and resolve the complex security management problem early stage so that then you can have you know ready to connect cellular module that people can just pick and choose utility companies will mainly use nbiot or ltem on e -sims but this type of iot connectivity is not always available globally so for to traditional cellular connectivity 2G, 3G or 4G is important. eSIMs can connect sensors, meters, monitoring solutions. Our customer use cases are ranging from fleet management, to micro mobility, to utility, to agriculture, to different sectors. In the utility field we have a lot of like water meters, some examples where our connectivity is used in a utility. field is that it's a water management company Aquify in Sweden actually is using our connectivity solution and also in Spain there is a company monitoring the water pumps and it's called the electric motors and it's part of the analog devices group. We have built our own connectivity management platform so that enables to control the sim and e -sim meaning that the customer can log into the portal or use the apis to switch the sims on and off set data limits see all of the session that the sim has had and also they can swap between different telecoms using the same platform being able to make the e -sim card switch from one telco to another means local operators need to be able to support eSIMs, which leads to the obvious question of cost. There is no cost differences at all. So actually the unit price of the SIM is the same as compared to the regular SIM. And it all comes down to what kind of telecom package you start using on the eSIM. So the main blocker isn't about the cost. more like finding the right partner. The cost of the card itself is the same but for eSIM vendors to make a profit there needs to be a margin. Business model is that they get eSIM from us and whichever telecom they use from our portfolio then they pay for those connectivity like megabytes, gigabytes they consume to us and the business model is that we have a little margin. It seems like eSIMs are bound to play a key role in scaling IoT for smart cities. With eSIMs, every IoT device of a vendor will contain the same hardware and SIM combination independently of the project and location where it will be deployed. This will enable standardised production of IoT sensors in the smart city industry, which will help scale volumes by making production, planning, and deployment easier and optimizing costs and delivery times some approaches still in the mobile industry are very much around trying to lock customers in so they create solutions with the illusion of some freedom where you can switch between networks and on paper that's true but then in practice when customers go to do that they're presented with a massive project to actually execute any carrier swap and and maybe integrate a number of platforms together as usual in the smart city sector adopting any innovation depends on the level of cooperation between industry players according to mert it used to be more complicated to get telcos to join eastern portfolios but now more and more are partnering up with them let's see if those partnerships will be enough to address the needs of global iot and smart city solution vendors