Rockhampton (QLD) is Now Sigfox Ready

The Rockhampton region, the most advanced smart regional centre in north Queensland, is now fully covered with Sigfox LPWAN network, installed, monitored and managed by Thinxtra Australia.

End of December 2015, the Council unanimously endorsed a strategy to better use technology for a smarter city. It started with a free Wi-Fi in designated public spaces, then a number of smart CCTV cameras in known trouble areas, smart billboards, ...and they started releasing more data such as water treatment and traffic information to be better used by citizens.  Sigfox now opens the door for connecting many more things for more granular data, providing more accurate information and thus more potential efficiencies to reduce water leaks, energy consumption, optimising waste collection or parkings' utilisation as examples.

Rockhampton is amongst the first Australian cities to focus on the use of these new technologies to grow the economy and improve liveability of the area. The whole game is to make sure they, at least, retain the current population (ideally make it grow), create more skilled jobs and grow the tourism industry. They are also expected to help grow local business, increase public safety, and the use of underutilised areas.

Thinxtra wanted to make sure Rockhampton was ready for the next phases involving the use of the Internet of Things in a broader scale. As part of our Smart councils Program, the network was fully deployed covering 99% of the population at no cost to the council.

Clearly, the Smart Council Program brings numerous benefits. It improves city services and quality of living as well as boosting local innovation. By enabling councils to trial new solutions risk free, they can experiment with new services and gain real- life experience and understanding of IoT . There is no catch: At worst, councils will learn about IoT opportunities. At best, councils will create efficiencies and benefits for their citizens.

Thinxtra, with the support of the CEFC and its Australian partners, is committed to make it easy and empower all willing councils along their IoT journey.

As a Council, how do you join? Contact us via [email protected] . Request a meeting with our smart-council team to tailor our approach to your IoT strategy. Get access to our Kick off 2018 offers and select up to three IoT trials before end of March 2018. Go to thinxtra.com/smart-council for further information and download presentation.