Explore Cellular IoT with Hologram and Raspberry Pi!

Our friends at Hologram just launched Nova — an open source USB modem for cellular IoT. Paired with Hologram’s Python SDK/CLI and global network, the plug-and-play dongle enables instant connectivity and simple, secure data messaging for single-board computers like the Raspberry Pi family, BeagleBoards, CHIP, and other Debian-based systems.

Designed to make cellular connectivity intuitive and ease the transition from prototype to production, the developer-friendly toolkit supports global 3G with 2G fallback, leveraging the u-blox Sara-U201, and U.S. 4G LTE CAT-M via the u-blox Sara-R404M. The hardware also comes ready to ship with all major certifications, including FCC, PTCRB, CE, and AT&T.

This is where you come in. To celebrate the occasion, we’ve partnered with the Hologram team to bring you our latest cellular gateway contest! From ride share monitoring to ocean tide tracking to remote controlling drones, we want to see what you can accomplish using Nova and the Raspberry Pi Zero W.

To help get you started, we will be giving away 200 specially curated kits consisting of a Nova and Pi Zero W to the best ideas submitted before October 27th. From there, you have until January 5th to create your final project.

Grand prizes — an Apple Watch Series 3— will be awarded to the top two entries in each of the following categories: basic gateways, smart cities, asset tracking, remote controlling, and remote monitoring.

While all qualified submissions must use both the Nova and Pi Zero W, don’t just stop there. We strongly encourage you to use Hologram’s Python SDK, along with additional hardware like the NodeMCU ESP8266, u-blox GPS breakout board, and MCP3008 ADC.

We can already see your wheels turning, so what are you waiting for? Get to work on your exCELLent projects! You can find more details over on the contest page, and delve deeper into the specifics of the Nova in our write-up here. Be sure to check out Hologram’s announcement!