Back in 2013, Helium’s initial mission was to build a network to easily connect devices to the internet. We are excited to say that we are a step closer to achieving our mission with the introduction of the Helium Gateway — the lean, green mining machine.

What is the Helium Gateway?

At the heart of the decentralized machine network is a new gateway that allows devices, machines and things to connect from miles away on very little power for a fraction of the cost. The Gateway mines Helium tokens by validating that other gateways are providing legitimate wireless connectivity.

Unlike mining operations with high energy consumption and a complex setup process, the Helium Gateway is a turnkey consumer miner. It is open, easy, efficient and fair:

Open — Gateway hardware design, firmware and software will be open sourced with no hidden royalties or fees.

— Gateway hardware design, firmware and software will be open sourced with no hidden royalties or fees. Easy — Just plug in power and connect to your internet.

— Just plug in power and connect to your internet. Efficient — By using radio waves instead of power-hungry computations, the Helium Gateway consumes minimal amounts of power (as much as an LED light bulb).

— By using radio waves instead of power-hungry computations, the Helium Gateway consumes minimal amounts of power (as much as an LED light bulb). Fair — Everyone has an equal opportunity to mine, no pooling needed. Learn more about our consensus algorithm in Rahul’s blog.

Why is this game-changing?

The real power of Helium is its decentralization — it’s built and owned by you! As gateway owners, you will be rewarded when the gateway mines and you can set the cost for machines to pay in exchange for connectivity. Over time, as the network coverage increases across many cities and countries, new classes of devices, applications, and machines will appear to leverage the network and pay tokens to gateways for access and transmission to the internet. Imagine improving the tracking of life-saving medications to communities that need it most. Making communities safer and smarter with intelligent infrastructure that knows you and responds to you in real-time with no delays. Never losing the things most important to you ever again.

You are the Network

To achieve the network build-out, we need communities and individuals like you to help build the network by becoming gateway hosts. Anyone can become a host by putting a Helium Gateway in your home, office, and around your cities. As a gateway host, you will not only be providing wireless hotspots for tomorrow’s low-powered devices, but you will be on the cutting-edge of hosting the world’s first consumer crypto miner.

In the next few weeks, we’ll be selecting top US locations for network launch. You can participate by signing up on our Helium Gateway Waitlist and indicating where you would like to deploy gateways. We anticipate Helium Gateways to be available by Q4 of 2018 and we will be sharing updates with the community in the coming weeks.

We’re excited for you to join the movement as we work towards achieving our mission of building a decentralized machine network that can change the world.