5G Advanced offers opportunities for new revenue streams; 3GPP specs for 5G FWA?
A Mobile World Live webinar on 5G-advanced upgrades identified new opportunities for network operator revenue streams, mostly due to improved network efficiencies and reduced costs. 5G Advanced, the next step in 5G evolution, will be specified in 3GPP Release 18 and 19. There is no work on it in ITU-R which is now focused on IMT-2030 (6G).
Egil Gronstad, T-Mobile senior director-technology development and strategy, said 5G Advanced will present opportunities for new revenue streams: 5G IoT will have lower cost and lower power consumption of endpoint devices (Redcap). Another 5G Advanced capability will be Ambient IoT (coming in Rel 19) which has a lot of opportunities via lower cost and no battery required in IoT devices. A bit further out is Integrated sensing and communications -using the network as a radar system to detect objects of interest. Improved spectrum efficiency will be improved using AI/ML for beam management.
Egil said 3GPP should develop specs for fixed wireless access (FWA). He’s disappointed with 3GPP not pursuing 5G FWA. “We haven’t really done anything in the 3GPP specs to specifically address fixed wireless,” he said. Neither has ITU-R WP 5D, which is responsible for developing all ITU-R recommendations for IMT (3G, 4G, 5G, 6G). FWA was not identified as an ITU use case for 5G and that hasn’t changed with 5G Advanced.
References:
https://www.nokia.com/about-us/newsroom/articles/5g-advanced-explained/
ABI Research expects 5G fixed wireless access (FWA) CPE shipments to increase from 10.7 million in 2023 to 36.8 million by 2029 with a CAGR of 22.9 per cent, due in part to increased uptake by businesses.
Larbi Belkhi, an industry analyst at ABI Research, highlighted the US market as a success story for 5G FWA with Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile US on track to hit their targets for connections.
He stated those connections are “achieved by serving customers with a multi-vendor portfolio of CPEs for their varying requirements.”
https://www.mobileworldlive.com/5g/abi-forecasts-surge-in-5g-fwa-cpe-shipments/
The company also noted enterprise FWA announcements have gained traction in 2024, especially in the US market where operators are diversifying their offerings.
ABI cited AT&T adding Askey and Cisco 5G FWA gear to its enterprise offerings as proof of the uptake this year while T-Mobile picked a Cradlepoint 5G router for its business customers.
Belkhi stated the business sector, particularly small-to-medium sized business (SMBs), “is a fast-growing opportunity for FWA, especially in the US”.
“The faster deployment and scalability it offers makes it particularly attractive for SMBs, but they have more nuanced requirements than simply just performance and price, so CPE vendors diversifying offerings to serve this market is key to success,” he explained.
Globally, ABI Research forecast 5G FWA subscriptions to hit 118 million by 2029, around 45 per cent of total users at that point.
https://www.mobileworldlive.com/5g/abi-forecasts-surge-in-5g-fwa-cpe-shipments/