Vodafone’s NB-IoT network is to be used to automate fire safety procedures in large buildings so that they meet all safety regulations in real time.

Safecility, which develops and installs automated emergency lighting, and Sensori Facilities Management, have partnered to launch the world’s first commercial Narrowband Internet of Things wireless emergency lighting system for businesses to streamline building management procedures.

Safecility, established in 2017, has developed an application that automatically tests critical fire safety systems and streams data over Vodafone’s NB-IoT network, where compliance is tracked from onsite sensors.

Lighting is legally required to be tested at least four times per year, a primarily manual task, with a large number of buildings not achieving compliance due to the scale of resources required. Sensori says it can make use of Vodafone’s low power wide area network to automate test and track all of the emergency lighting for client companies such as Astellas, Amazon and Dropbox.

Vodafone IoT country manager Marc Daly said: “Safecility’s product uses a completely bespoke NB-IoT solution to support significant advancements in building safety, while also helping companies and organisations to streamline their building management processes.

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“NB-IoT is specifically designed for connecting devices with low power and low bandwidth requirements, whilst providing increased penetration, allowing low cost devices to be rolled out at scale. We’re delighted to have supported Safecility in the creation of this global solution.”

Safecility chief executive Cian O’Flaherty (pictured) added: “We’re delighted to see the Safecility system installed and available for commercial use through our partnership with Sensori FM. Without Vodafone’s investment in NB-IoT and 5G, we would not have been able to accelerate our solution so quickly. We were also able to take part in the 5G Accelerator Programme in UCD Nova, which allowed us to use their testing facilities.”