Pricing strategies of IoT wide area network service providers with complementary services included

• Published in: Journal of network and computer applications 2019-12, Vol.147, p.102426, Article 102426
• Main Authors: Asghari, Masoud, Yousefi, Saleh, Niyato, Dusit
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Complementary services; Game theory; IoT network providers; Optimization; Pricing mechanism
• ISSN: 1084-8045; 1095-8592
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jnca.2019.102426

Low Power Wide Area Networks (LPWAN) such as SigFox and NB-IoT are becoming the popular radio communication technologies for Internet of Thing (IoT). Generally, IoT network providers offer LPWAN subscription plans which include basic connectivity as well as complementary services such as localization, edge/Fog computing and multicasting for IoT devices. In this paper, we study pricing in such networking environment in which two types of service plans are considered, i.e., basic connectivity plan and enhanced service plan which includes complementary services in addition to the basic connectivity. We develop an analytical framework composed of optimization and non-cooperative game models applicable to the scenarios with monopolistic and duopolistic IoT network providers. The algorithms to reach the optimal and equilibrium pricing strategies of the IoT network providers are developed with reasonable complexity. The proposed models assist the IoT network providers to make decisions for the inclusion of complementary services in their service plans and pricing. The performance evaluation shows that the proposed service plan strategy can improve profit of the IoT network providers and utility of the IoT devices.