Netmore adds Kinéis satellite layer to LoRaWAN network across 18 countries

Netmore Group and European satellite operator Kinéis have formed an international partnership that adds satellite connectivity directly to Netmore’s massive Internet of Things offering across the 18 countries where its network currently operates. The architecture combines Netmore’s terrestrial LoRaWAN footprint with Kinéis’ 25-satellite low Earth orbit constellation and delivers both paths through Netmore’s ThingPark platform, allowing supported devices to move from ground networks to satellite connectivity without manual intervention when terrestrial coverage becomes unavailable. Financial terms, minimum revenue commitments and customer-volume guarantees were not disclosed, making the immediate commercial value impossible to quantify. The more important development is architectural: industrial Internet of Things customers can now obtain terrestrial and satellite service through one operating layer instead of building separate connectivity systems around remote assets.

The partnership was announced on September 3 and is already positioned as deployable rather than a future trial. Kinéis said compatible hybrid products already exist for asset tracking, water and infrastructure monitoring and wildfire detection, reducing the need for customers to wait for a new generation of hardware before using the combined network. Netmore has also expanded its broader platform substantially through acquisitions, including its January acquisition of Actility, giving it control of the ThingPark ecosystem now being used to orchestrate the satellite integration.

Why does combining LoRaWAN with satellites solve a different problem from ordinary mobile broadband?

Massive Internet of Things deployments are usually optimized for small amounts of data, long battery life and very low operating cost rather than high-speed internet access. A water meter, environmental sensor or shipping container may transmit only a small packet periodically, making conventional cellular broadband unnecessarily expensive or power intensive for many applications.

LoRaWAN addresses that problem effectively where terrestrial gateways exist. The weakness appears when a device moves outside coverage or when infrastructure is installed in remote areas where building and maintaining ground gateways becomes uneconomic.

Kinéis fills that gap through satellites. A supported device can use Netmore’s terrestrial network where it exists and switch to the satellite layer elsewhere, allowing the customer to retain connectivity without building ground infrastructure across every rural, maritime or remote operating location.

That changes the economics for use cases such as logistics, agriculture, pipelines, water systems and environmental monitoring. A shipping asset can spend part of its journey around cities with strong terrestrial coverage and another part in remote territory. Designing separate tracking architectures for each environment creates operational complexity, while automatic fallback allows one device and platform to manage both.

This is not a replacement for high-bandwidth cellular or broadband satellite systems such as Starlink. The value proposition is almost the opposite: very small, energy-efficient messages from enormous numbers of devices that may need to operate for years with minimal maintenance.

What does Kinéis’ 25-satellite constellation add to Netmore’s existing 18-country footprint?

Netmore’s terrestrial reach gives customers low-cost connectivity where LoRaWAN infrastructure is already present. Kinéis adds a global orbital layer capable of receiving messages beyond those terrestrial coverage boundaries. The combined proposition therefore expands effective geographic reach far beyond the 18 countries without requiring Netmore to deploy physical gateways across every uncovered area.

Kinéis describes its network as a sovereign European constellation dedicated to Internet of Things connectivity and Automatic Identification System services. The 25 satellites provide the space layer, while Netmore becomes the commercial and operational interface through which customers access that capability.

This distribution arrangement can be valuable to Kinéis because satellite operators face a customer-acquisition challenge after constructing the constellation. Owning satellites does not automatically create millions of connected endpoints. Partnerships with terrestrial network operators can place satellite capacity inside existing enterprise relationships and applications.

Netmore gains the inverse advantage. It can expand coverage without financing its own satellite fleet, giving customers a broader service while concentrating its capital on network operations, platforms and vertical solutions.

The economics therefore resemble wholesale infrastructure integration. Each company contributes the asset that would be expensive for the other to replicate, while ThingPark attempts to make the underlying network transition largely invisible to users.

Why could utilities and infrastructure operators care more about service continuity than bandwidth?

A water utility does not need streaming video from every meter. It needs reliable readings and alerts from equipment that can be distributed across thousands of square kilometres. Similarly, an environmental-monitoring device may spend most of its life transmitting tiny amounts of information until an abnormal reading creates an urgent need for communication.

This makes coverage continuity economically valuable even when bandwidth remains low. Kinéis and Netmore identify use cases including remote monitoring, predictive maintenance, leakage detection, wildfire monitoring and asset tracking. Compatible products cited by the companies include Sentiv for water and infrastructure monitoring, Dryad’s Silvanet environmental system and tracking products from Track Value and Beepings.

The wildfire example demonstrates the logic particularly well. Sensors are often placed in forests precisely because those locations lack dense communications infrastructure. A terrestrial-only network can require additional gateways and backhaul, while a satellite connection can provide another path when conventional coverage is unavailable.

The same principle applies to infrastructure failures. Severe weather, wildfire or other disasters can damage terrestrial communications at exactly the moment monitoring becomes most important. A satellite fallback adds network diversity because it does not depend on the same local physical infrastructure.

Service continuity can therefore matter more than data speed for these markets. The commercial question is whether customers value that resilience enough to pay for hybrid connectivity across large device fleets.

How large is the hybrid satellite and terrestrial IoT opportunity and how cautious should the market forecasts be?

Kinéis cited third-party research estimating the global hybrid terrestrial-satellite cellular IoT connectivity market at $8.6 billion in 2025 and projecting it could reach $89.4 billion by 2034, implying annual growth close to 30%. Those figures come from market-research estimates referenced in the partnership announcement rather than audited industry revenue data, so they should be treated as an indication of expected direction rather than a guaranteed market outcome.

The underlying growth drivers are credible. More industrial equipment is becoming connected, companies want visibility across global supply chains, utilities are deploying smart meters and satellite-launch economics have made specialized low Earth orbit constellations more practical.

The harder question is monetization. Massive IoT is attractive partly because individual connections can be inexpensive, meaning operators may need millions of devices to generate substantial network revenue. Satellite capacity also adds another infrastructure cost that has to remain low enough for customers to justify using it on devices designed around very low lifetime communications budgets.

Competition is expanding simultaneously. Cellular standards are adding non-terrestrial functionality, dedicated satellite IoT companies are launching constellations and terrestrial operators are extending LPWAN coverage. Customers will therefore have several ways to solve remote connectivity rather than depending on one hybrid architecture.

Netmore and Kinéis can differentiate through existing commercial availability. The companies say hybrid devices and platform integration are ready now, reducing the time between partnership announcement and customer deployment. The more meaningful future metric will be the number of active satellite-enabled devices rather than theoretical addressable market forecasts.

Why does integrating the service into ThingPark matter more than simply reselling satellite capacity?

Connectivity fragmentation creates operational problems at scale. An enterprise with millions of devices does not want separate portals, billing systems, device identities and support processes every time an asset crosses a network boundary.

ThingPark is intended to provide the common platform layer. Devices can communicate through terrestrial LoRaWAN and move to Kinéis satellite service when needed while the customer continues managing connectivity through Netmore’s environment. The switch is designed to occur automatically rather than requiring an operator to intervene manually.

That orchestration layer can become more valuable as Netmore adds additional connectivity technologies. The company has already combined cellular and LoRaWAN access through other partnerships and expanded ThingPark through its acquisition of Actility. Satellite therefore becomes another network option inside a broader connectivity platform rather than a completely separate product.

This can also improve switching costs. Once an enterprise manages devices, policies, data flows and application integrations through one platform, changing connectivity providers involves more than swapping a SIM card or radio contract.

The risk is that customers prefer open multi-provider orchestration rather than becoming dependent on another aggregated platform. Netmore needs ThingPark to simplify complexity without recreating the vendor lock-in industrial customers increasingly try to avoid.

What would turn the Netmore-Kinéis partnership from a strong technology story into a measurable business?

The first proof point is customer scale. Neither company disclosed an anchor contract, committed device count or minimum revenue obligation alongside the partnership. Naming large deployments across utilities, infrastructure or logistics would provide evidence that customers value hybrid connectivity beyond technical demonstrations.

The second is device economics. Customers need hardware that remains inexpensive and power efficient enough for massive deployments while adding satellite capability. Kinéis says several compatible commercial products already exist, which lowers initial barriers, but broader adoption will depend on a larger device ecosystem.

Third, the companies need evidence that automatic handoff works reliably in field operations. Hybrid connectivity sounds straightforward conceptually, but devices must discover networks, preserve battery life and transmit successfully under widely varying environmental conditions.

Standards could help. Both companies participate in the LoRa Alliance, and planned satellite discovery enhancements are intended to standardize how commercial devices identify and connect with satellite constellations. Broader standards can increase the number of compatible devices and reduce dependence on proprietary implementations.

The September partnership therefore solves a genuine infrastructure problem without yet disclosing the economics. Netmore has terrestrial reach and enterprise relationships, while Kinéis has a 25-satellite network capable of reaching places terrestrial LoRaWAN cannot.

The opportunity becomes financially compelling only when that technical complementarity produces millions of paid hybrid connections.