Tenancy Model

Overview

TEKTELIC KONA Core Network Server serves many organizations on one LoRaWAN® network. Each organization is a tenant at one of four levels: System, Provider, Customer or Sub-Customer. Your level decides what you can create, what you see, and which subscription plan limits you.

How it works

Four tenant levels

The levels form a tree. Each tenant belongs to exactly one tenant at the level above it.

• System: the top level. It creates Providers.
  • Provider: belongs to the System. It creates Customers.
    • Customer: belongs to one Provider. It creates Sub-Customers.
      • Sub-Customer: belongs to one Customer. It has no levels below it.

Level	Typical organization	Created by
System	TEKTELIC on the hosted service, or your own operations team on premises	Exists with the installation
Provider	A network operator or system integrator that offers LoRaWAN connectivity to its clients	The System level
Customer	A company that runs its own devices, for example a utility, a city or a property manager	Its Provider
Sub-Customer	A department, a site or an end client of the Customer, for example one building of a property manager	Its Customer

The examples show typical setups. KONA Core doesn't restrict which kind of organization uses which level.

On the TEKTELIC-hosted service, TEKTELIC manages the System level. Most organizations start as a Provider or a Customer. On premises, your organization can use the System level and create its own Providers. For hosting options, see What is KONA Core Network Server.

Each level has its own administrator role and user role. A user belongs to exactly one tenant. For what each role can do, see Users, Roles & Permissions.

What each level manages and sees

Each level manages what it owns and the tenants directly below it.

Level	Creates and manages	Sees
System	The level above Providers	System-level administration is outside these guides.
Provider	Customers and their Customer Subscription Plans, gateway models, gateway groups, gateways	Its own entities, the gateways of its Customers, and the users of its Customers
Customer	Sub-Customers, users, gateway groups, gateways, device models, data converters, applications, devices, multicast groups, integrations, alarm rules	Its own entities and its Sub-Customers, including their users and devices
Sub-Customer	Its own users. A Sub-Customer administrator can add applications, devices, device models, data converters and integrations. It also opens Multicast Groups.	Its own applications and devices, and applications assigned by its Customer. No gateways.

A Customer administrator sees these gateway and device pages in the side menu: Gateway groups, Gateways, Gateway logs, Device models, Data converters, Applications, Devices and Multicast Groups. It also sees Users, Sub-Customers, Alarms and User Activity Log. For the menu of every role, see Users, Roles & Permissions.

A tenant doesn't see other tenants at its own level. One Customer doesn't see the gateways, applications or devices of another Customer. A Provider administrator can open and edit entities of its own Customers. This access doesn't extend to Customers of another Provider.

For how each entity relates to the others, see Entity Model.

What is shared between levels

Most entities stay with the tenant that creates them. Some are handed down to the level below:

Entity	Shared how	Who shares it
Gateway model	The Customer selects from the gateway models of its Provider when it adds a gateway. The Customer has no Gateway models page of its own and can't manage those models.	Provider
Gateway group	The Provider assigns a gateway group to a Customer with Assign to customer, and removes it with Unassign from customer. A Customer can also create its own gateway groups.	Provider
Application	The Customer assigns an application to a Sub-Customer with Assign to Sub-Customer. The Customer keeps the application: the Assigned to column of the Applications list shows the Sub-Customer.	Customer
Subscription limits	The Provider Subscription Plan caps the totals of all Customers under the Provider.	System, then Provider

To assign entities from your own system, use Assign gateway group to customer or Assign application to sub customer.

Users aren't shared: each user belongs to one tenant. Within a KONA Core instance, one email address identifies one account.

A Provider can open the users of its Customers and their Sub-Customers. It can't open the applications or devices of those Sub-Customers.

The gateways list has a Public column. With Public selected, a gateway can forward uplinks from devices of all Customers under the same Provider. This includes devices of other Customers when the gateway is assigned to one Customer.

A public gateway doesn't need to be assigned to a Customer to forward that Customer's device uplinks. It may be absent from the Customer's gateways list and still forward those uplinks.

How subscriptions apply per tenant

A subscription plan limits how many entities a tenant can create. The plan type depends on the level:

Level	Plan	Assigned by
System	None	Not applicable
Provider	Provider Subscription Plan	A System administrator
Customer	Customer Subscription Plan	The Customer's Provider
Sub-Customer	None of its own	Not applicable

Limits add up in the hierarchy. The totals a Provider assigns to its Customers can't exceed the Provider Subscription Plan. All resources created by Sub-Customers count against their Customer's subscription plan.

For the plan parameters and what happens when you reach a limit, see Subscription Plans & Limits. To change a plan, see Manage Subscriptions.

tip

Use one Customer per organization that owns devices, and a Sub-Customer per site or end client that needs its own view. A Sub-Customer gives that group access to its applications without access to your gateways.

Related

• Users, Roles & Permissions
• Manage Customers & Sub-Customers
• Entity Model
• Subscription Plans & Limits
• Manage Subscriptions
• Accounts & Trial Access
• To create tenants from your own system, use Save provider, Save customer or Save sub customer.