Reliance Jio Blankets India with Inexpensive 4G Service; Where are the Profits?
India has the second largest number of Internet users in the world- second only to China. But only in the last two years has India moved to true broadband wireless service. Mukesh Ambani, head of Reliance Industries, one of India’s largest conglomerates, has shelled out $35 billion of the company’s money to blanket the South Asian nation with its first all-4G network. By offering free calls and data for pennies, the telecom latecomer has upended the industry, setting off a cheap internet tsunami that is opening the market of 1.3 billion people to global tech and retailing titans.
The unknown factor: Can Reliance reap profits itself after unleashing a cutthroat price war? Analysts say the company’s ultimate plan, after connecting the masses, is to use the platform to sell content, financial services and advertising. It could also recoup its massive investment in the years to come by charging for high-speed broadband to consumers’ homes and connections for various businesses, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Sidebar: Reliance Jio gaining ground on incumbents via price war
Business Standard says that according to revenue figures of the industry for the April-June quarter, Jio has become the second biggest wireless network operator by revenues, overtaking Vodafone.
In fact, both Vodafone and Idea reported a revenue decline of 7 per cent and 5.2 per cent respectively in the reported quarter. Airtel though managed to increase its adjusted gross revenue (AGR) by 1 per cent, thanks to income from national long distance (NLD) services.
According to a report by JP Morgan, Reliance Jio keeps flourishing in a continually stressed industry, which is why the industry may continue to be in stress.
Meanwhile, zeebiz.com reports “Reliance Jio impact: 15,000 people lost jobs, just 3 companies left in 2 years.” Apart from declining financial health of incumbents, there have been massive job losses owing to mergers and sector consolidation. Experts estimate the number of job losses to be around 12,000-15,000 in the last two years, with a major shedding from Vodafone and Idea Cellular duo.
Reliance Jio has been gaining subscribers and revenue market share at a rapid pace. But for the incumbents, including Bharti Airtel, Vodafone India, Idea Cellular, there has been declining average revenue per user (Arpu) and margins with high debt levels. Together, the telecom industry has a cumulative debt of Rs 3.6 lakh crore.
Analysts from Jefferies say that the competitive intensity will remain high as Jio and Bharti focus on subscriber additions. “We expect increased competitive intensity in the postpaid and feature phone segments. The market share is expected to stabilise in the next 12 months. Post that, there will be a gradual Arpu recovery due to customer willingness to pay higher.”
“The next battleground is the 500 million non-LTE subscriber base, which would include 400 million 2G subscribers. Half of the 2G subscribers are low-value subscribers with monthly spend of Rs 50-80. Content and advertising will emerge as key pillars to increase average revenue per user and profitability for the sector in the medium term,” according to Deutsche Bank Research.
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Mr. Ambani’s project has the potential to give India the largest—and most diverse—connected population in the world, with low-cost access to data helping to level the playing field between rich and poor.
It also could revolutionize retail. Mr. Ambani’s success or failure could affect Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Facebook Inc.’s WhatsApp, which have poured resources into developing products for the Indian market, and Walmart Inc. and Amazon.com Inc., which have invested billions here on logistics for online shoppers. To profit, they all need people connected to the internet.
Underserved Population
India has more internet users than the U.S., but a low percentage of the country is online. Slow download speeds are a drag on building subscribers.
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Mr. Ambani wasn’t available to comment, according to a Reliance spokesman. The company “has unleashed huge data potential in the country,” the spokesman said. “Digital life will no longer be the privilege of the affluent few.”
There are 390 million internet users in India, according to Bain & Co., but the penetration rate is still only 28%, compared with 88% in the U.S. The country’s e-commerce market is expected to be worth $33 billion this year, three times what it was in 2015, but less than 3% of India’s overall retail market, according to research firm eMarketer.
Companies are after customers like 59-year-old potato farmer Govind Singh Panwar. His home in the Himalayan foothills is built of mud and stone, and his village has no paved roads or indoor plumbing. Still, broadband internet has arrived.
“I bought our first fridge” online, Mr. Panwar said. “It’s a rare thing in a village.” He got online last year with Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd., Mr. Ambani’s telecom company, which built a tower nearby that beams his phone nearly unlimited 4G data for about $2.10 a month.
Jio, which means “to live” in Hindi, has signed up 215 million subscribers since it went live in 2016, making it India’s No. 4 mobile provider, after Bharti Airtel Ltd., with 345 million, Vodafone Group PLC and Idea Cellular Ltd.
Mr. Ambani’s foray started in 2010, when he bought a company that had just acquired a pan-India 4G license. That was a risky move at a time when fewer than one in 10 Indians were online. Airtel and Vodafone were still focused on rolling out 3G services, and few Indians owned 4G-capable smartphones.
Fourth generation, or 4G-LTE networks provide significantly faster speeds than 3G, enabling more content like streaming video and music. They also provide the steadier connections important for online shopping, which can be difficult on patchy networks. 4G networks are common in the U.S., Europe and East Asia.
Mr. Ambani, now 61 and worth more than $48 billion, had just finished building what some have dubbed the world’s most expensive home, a 27-story mansion on a hill with views of the Arabian Sea. It was packed with bling—helipad, home theater, gym, garden, pool—but the internet connection was bad.
When his daughter came home from Yale University during a break, she struggled to submit her course work online. “Dad, the internet in our house sucks,” she complained, according to a story Mr. Ambani later recounted at an event.
At the time, India’s telecom industry executives and analysts agreed there was need for more speed, but they doubted enough people would be willing to pay for it. Indians then were spending only about $2 a month on their cellphones, the vast majority of that on voice calls.
Subscribers in India typically use prepaid plans without contracts, making it easy to switch carriers by swapping in a new SIM card from a competitor. One adversary that has thrown in the towel: Reliance Communications Ltd., formerly part of the Reliance empire but taken separate by Mr. Ambani’s brother, Anil Ambani, after a family dispute. The company, under pricing pressure from Jio, closed its mobile business in late 2017.
The price war has cut industry wide revenue per user—now averaging $1.53 a month, compared with about $2.50 in 2016. Jio beats the average, at $1.89 a month, but the number has been falling since its launch.
The result has been a data binge. Jio transmitted more data in the first year of its operation than any carrier ever world-wide, according to research firm Strategy Analytics. India last year surpassed the U.S. in the number of apps downloaded from the Google Play store, according to mobile-app analytics firm App Annie. Monthly data traffic in India per user has jumped 570% in the two years since Jio launched, according to Morgan Stanley .
When Jio realized it was reaching the consumers who could afford the data but not the 4G-enabled smartphones, it built a new type of “smart” feature phone that worked on 4G and had some smartphone features. Consumers could own a JioPhone for a $23 security deposit—refundable if they return the phone. It launched in September 2017 and has overtaken Samsung Electronics Co. to capture 47% of the feature phone market, according to research firm Counterpoint.
Companies such as Amazon.com are depending on the new pool of users. Amazon has tweaked its model in India by introducing services like cash on delivery, in which customers can pay with cash when items arrive at their door, since few people have credit cards. The retailer has also deployed swarms of delivery men on motorbikes, so they can negotiate chaotic city traffic.
Google, which has been effectively shut out of China since 2010, has been rolling out new features to cater to users in India, testing products that might also work in other emerging markets, such as Indonesia. It launched a version of its YouTube app, called YouTube Go, designed to work on inexpensive smartphones. It created a mobile payment app for India, called Tez, that works without a credit or debit card. It is also working to make many of its services work with local languages.
At a July investors’ meeting, Mr. Ambani made his ambitions clear. “Even after serving the needs of our 215 plus million customers, the capacity utilization of the Jio network is less than 20%,” he said. “We are determined to connect everyone and everything, everywhere.”
Ericsson partners with Juniper, ECI for 5G transport equipment & will buy CENX
Ericsson has selected Juniper and ECI Telecom to provide 5G transport network gear, citing their expertise with optical and packet networks.
Alignment between the radio, core and transport layers of the network has never been more critical to meet the requirements of 5G use cases such as enhanced mobile broadband, fixed-wireless access, and massive and critical IoT. In this environment transport needs to keep pace with the rapid radio and architectural evolution in 5G networks.
With its focus on transport between radio and core functions, Ericsson delivers transport portfolios specifically for backhaul and fronthaul. Ubiquitous transport solutions for both 4G and 5G are gaining strong momentum with service providers and Ericsson’s flagship mobile backhaul product – Router 6000 – empowers close to 60 operators. More than 110 operators also use Ericsson’s 5G-ready microwave technology, MINI-LINK solutions.
Ercsson will use Juniper’s edge and core packet transport technologies (the MX and PTX series platforms) to support connectivity between radio cell sites and an operator’s core network. Ericsson will continue to offer its own Router 6000 and microwave products as packet backhaul options for 5G transport network deployments and will sell Juniper’s SRX Series Services Gateway network security system. “With Juniper there is no overlap and a good fit,” says Nishant Batra, Ericsson’s global head of network products.
ECI Telecom Ltd. will provide optical transport gear for the metro market for service providers as well as so-called “critical infrastructure” customers of Ericsson.
Ericsson notes that the Juniper and ECI platforms are “fully interoperable with Ericsson’s transport portfolio and will be managed by the same Ericsson management and orchestration solution. This will simplify the overall management and control of 5G across the radio, transport and core network.” It adds that the “management and orchestration solution will also provide integrated software-defined networking (SDN) control for Ericsson, Juniper and ECI nodes, enabling automated network control for applications such as network slicing and traffic optimization, to ensure the best possible user experience.”
“The partnerships help us strengthen areas where we are not building organically,” says Batra. “Instead of making a blanket commitment to be in IP, we have segmented into radio near, core and edge, and it’s the radio-near part we’ll address with our own products.”
Fredrik Jejdling, Executive Vice President and Head of Business Area Networks at Ericsson, says: “Our radio expertise and knowledge in network architecture, end-user applications and standardization work put us in an excellent position to understand the requirements 5G places on transport. By combining our leading transport portfolio with best-in-class partners, we will boost our transport offering and create the critical building blocks of next-generation transport networks that benefit our customers.”
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Separately, Ericsson will acquire service assurance firm CENX, saying the company’s closed-loop automation work will be a boon to Ericsson’s virtualization plans.
Mats Karlsson, Head of Solution Area OSS, Ericsson, says: “Dynamic orchestration is crucial in 5G-ready virtualized networks. By bringing CENX into Ericsson, we can continue to build upon the strong competitive advantage we have started as partners. I look forward to meeting and welcoming our new colleagues into Ericsson.”
Closed-loop automation ensures Ericsson can offer its service provider customers an orchestration solution that is optimised for 5G use cases like network slicing, taking full advantage of Ericsson’s distributed cloud offering. Ericsson’s global sales and delivery presence – along with its strong R&D – will also create economies of scale in the CENX portfolio and help Ericsson to offer in-house solutions for OSS automation and assurance.
Ed Kennedy CEO, CENX says: “Ericsson has been a great partner – and for us to take the step to fully join Ericsson gives us the best possible worldwide platform to realize CENX’s ultimate goal – autonomous networking for all. Our closed-loop service assurance automation capability complements Ericsson’s existing portfolio very well. We look forward to seeing our joint capability add great value to the transformation of both Ericsson and its customers.”
CENX, founded in 2009, is headquartered in Jersey City, New Jersey. The company achieved significant year-over-year revenue growth in the fiscal year that ended December 31, 2017. CENX employs 185 people.
HKT & Huawei Open Digital Transformation Practice Center in Hong Kong; Indoor 5G Whitepaper
Hong Kong network operator HKT and China IT powerhouse Huawei jointly inaugurated the Digital Transformation Practice Center (DTPC) yesterday in Hong Kong. The DTPC will share the experience and practices of HKT gained during its digital transformation journey, and help guide the digitalization process of other carriers in their development of digital transformation, HKT said.
The DTPC will provide on-site sharing of HKT’s experience and practices gained in its successful digital transformation journey.
At the DTPC, a project team will assess different transformational scenarios through the five stages of digital transformation: Envisioning, Ideating, Prototyping, Realizing and Scaling. The goal is to realize digital transformation in a more agile and low-cost manner. By connecting to Huawei Cloud Open Labs, visitors can also experience on-the-spot the transformed services.
“We are glad to cooperate with Huawei to carry out the digital transformation project. During the process, we have encountered many challenges in terms of user experience, business processes, business support systems and network infrastructure,” HKT head of strategic wireless technology and core networks Dr Henry Wong said. “Thanks to the joint team, the company has launched new services through the transformed cloud platform and gained a lot of valuable experience in the process. We hope to share our digital transformation experience with the industry around the world through the DTPC,” Wong added.
The digital transformation practice facility aims to offer consultancy from half a day or a full day to chief executives, through to several weeks with specialist staff, said Derry Li, Huawei’s vice president of consulting and systems integration. “The center will support the construction of solutions. We will uncover user pain points,” Li said. The process will include prototyping of front-end and back-end solutions, he added.
By the end of this year, the facility will also advise on other technologies such as internet of things (IoT), the executive said. Li also said that Huawei and Hong Kong Telecom plan to extend the scope of the new facility to include 5G services in the first half of 2019.
HKT had previously worked with Huawei to carry out the end-to-end digital business transformation project, covering service and operation transformation as well as infrastructure cloudification for the realization of customer-centric “ROADS” (Real-time, On-demand, All-online, DIY, Social) experience.
During his keynote presentation at the opening of the event, Huawei’s board Chairman Liang Hua said that a full digitalization process can take at least 18 months to get through the toughest period of the implementation.
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Separately, HKT, Global mobile Suppliers Association (GSA), and Huawei have jointly issued Indoor 5G Networks White Paper which explains the complexity of indoor 5G network deployment. It discusses 5G indoor service network requirements, the evolution of existing network, and challenges in target network deployment, and recommends appropriate construction strategies.
The white paper points out that more than 80% of service usage on 4G mobile networks occurs indoors. The industry predicts that a greater number of mobile services will take place indoors as 5G spurs service diversity and extends business boundaries. As a result, says the white paper, indoor mobile networks in the 5G era will become essential to operators’ competitiveness.
The white paper discusses key requirements and performance indicators for indoor 5G target networks based on the features of the three major types of 5G services (enhanced mobile broadband, ultra-reliable low-latency communication and massive machine-type communication). The specific requirements of augmented reality (AR), VR, high-definition (HD) video, telemedicine, and smart manufacturing are elaborated.
References:
https://www.huawei.com/en/press-events/news/2018/9/hkt-huaei-practice-center
https://www.huawei.com/en/press-events/news/2018/2/Huawei-HKT-Digital-Transformation-Practice-Center
https://www.huawei.com/en/press-events/news/2018/9/indoor-5g-networks-whitepaper
Juniper Research: Japan & South Korea lead in 5G; NTT Docomo most promising 5G operator
Mobile carriers in Japan and South Korea are way ahead of wireless telcos in US and China in near future “5G deployments, according a new study from Juniper Research. In its new report, 5G Market Strategies: Consumer & Enterprise Opportunities & Forecasts 2018-2025, the research firm ranked NTT Docomo, SK Telecom, LG U+, KTand SoftBank as the world’s top five “most promising 5G network operators.”
Comment: What’s so interesting about Juniper’s ranking is that there is no standard for 5G radio access network/radio interface technologies and there won’t be till the end of 2020 when IMT 2020 will be completed.
Japan’s NTT Docomo topped the list as No. 1, overtaking the top spot from SKT, which was the leader in the same study last year. SKT slipped into second place in 2018.
Following the top 5 players are AT&T and China Mobile, which were in the top five spots last year.
The research firm said it assessed over 50 global operators for the study and evaluated them based on results of 5G testing and trials, the extent and range of partnerships in the ecosystem and the level of technology innovation.
Japan, South Korea will account for 43% of 5G connections in 2019:
Japan and South Korea have established themselves as clear leaders in the development of 5G, says Juniper Research. In a white paper, Operators Need to Secure 5G ROI ~ Here’s How, accompanying the study, the research firm predicts that 43% of global 5G connections in 2019 will be in Japan and South Korea.
Juniper Research also forecasts that first commercial 5G network launches are expected in 2019 and that the first networks with 5G services will be in the Far East, China and North America. These regions are expected to account for all of the predicted 1.05 million 5G active connections by the end of 2019.
However, the research cautioned that operators faced significant challenges both to deploy and most effectively configure 5G networks. It claimed that the need to deploy dense small cell networks, operators would need far greater access to sites to upgrade and share equipment. Furthermore, it urged operators to invest in virtualized networks to enable both more efficient traffic management and improve security in the network perimeter.
“Over the past 2 years, operators and network vendors have been actively trialing their 5G solutions, including antennas, core networks and beam forming. Since 3GPP standards have been finalized for 5G NRs (3GPP spec New Radios) many of these trials have focused on interoperability between devices and 5G networks,” the research firm said.
“As a result, leading operators are now aiming for a launch date in 2019. Indeed, many operators have begun rolling out antennas and backhaul infrastructure to provide a 5G service. Initial 5G coverage will be in urban areas.”
220M 5G broadband connections forecast by 2025:
The research firm also forecasts that 5G based fixed wireless broadband (there is no such thing as it’s not even a use case for IMT2020!) will be among the first services to launch over 5G (e.g. Verizon’s proprietary spec). Its suitability as a last mile solution will drive adoption to over 220 million connections by 2025. However, the challenge for operators will be to demonstrate tangible benefits, to enterprises and consumers, over existing fiber-based solutions, warns Juniper Research author Sam Baker.
“Operators must carefully consider pricing strategies for 5G broadband,” Baker said. “Pricing must address both the anticipated large traffic generated, whilst remaining price competitive against incumbent broadband suppliers.”
He also cautions that operators faced significant challenges both to deploy and most effectively configure 5G networks.
“With the need to deploy dense small cell networks, operators would need far greater access to sites to upgrade and share equipment. Furthermore, we would urge operators to invest in virtualized networks to enable both more efficient traffic management and improve security in the network perimeter.”
Current Market Status:
5G, the next iteration of wireless cellular technologies, is currently reaching its final stages of development and commercialization by MNOs and industry stakeholders. Previous iterations of technologies (3G and 4G) were developed with a consumer-oriented focus. However, 5G will have further-reaching impacts, enabling a large number of use cases in IoT (Internet of Things) sectors such as healthcare, automotive industries, smart cities and mobile broadband. 5G networks will deliver high-bandwidth and low latency that support services such as UHD (Ultra High Definition) video streaming.
Juniper Research anticipates that the first commercial network launches will occur in 2019; the first networks to provide 5G services will be located in Far East & China and North America. Meanwhile, network operators in Europe have mostly adopted a ‘wait-and-see’ approach, closely following the progress of operators in these 2 regions.
Over the past 2 years, operators and network vendors have been actively trialing their 5G solutions, including antennas, core networks and beam forming. Since 3GPP Release 15 specs have been finalized for 5G NRs (New Radios) many of these trials have focused on interoperability between devices and 5G networks.
As a result, leading operators are now aiming for a launch date in 2019. Indeed, many operators have begun rolling out antennas and backhaul infrastructure to provide a 5G service. Initial 5G coverage will be in urban areas.
Operator Monetization Strategies for 5G:
As noted in our previous edition, ARPU (Average Revenue per User) has been considered the benchmark metric for measuring operator success in terms of billed revenue. The new services discussed in the previous sections are expected to be heavily dependent on a favorable operator service model.
There is both a need and a desire to solve the ARPU problem that network operators are facing; carriers are considering different service scenarios that they could deploy to garner payback from their network licence investments. However, the challenge here is that as 5G expected to drive a number of connected devices, systems and sensor networks, is ARPU going to be the right factor for measuring 5G? For example, consider M2M verticals:
References:
https://www.juniperresearch.com/press/press-releases/5g-market-strategies-tbc
Huawei introduces 5G-ready (7nm process) mobile chipset: Kirin 980 and Mali-G76
Huawei on Friday unveiled the world’s first “5G solution-ready” commercial 7nm (nanometre) chipset–the Kirin 980, which is believed to be the most powerful smartphone SoC (system-on-a-chip) equipped with Artificial Intelligence (AI) capabilities. The company has now proven itself as a leader in telecom/network equipment, smart phones and now ultra large scale integrated circuits/System on a Chip (SoC).
“It looks smaller than my nail, but it is the most powerful and intelligent SoC chipset for smartphones introduced so far,” Huawei Consumer Business Group CEO Richard Yu said while unveiling the chipset to a packed audience at the IFA 2018 in Berlin. Yu confirmed that the first smartphone to be powered by the Kirin 980 chipset will be Huwaei’s Mate 20 series which is expected to be launched next month.
Based on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturer Company’s (TSMC) 7nm semiconductor process, Kirin 980 delivers 20 per cent improved SoC performance and 40 per cent more efficiency, said Huawei which surpassed Apple to become the second-largest global smartphone seller behind Samsung in the second quarter of this year.
“The Kirin 980 will be used in smartphones and tablets. Huawei will launch 5G device powered by Kirin 980 next year,” Benjamin Wang, Deputy General Manager, Wireless Chipset Business Unit, Huawei Consumer Business Group, told reporters.
“Last year, we showed the world the potential of on-device AI with the Kirin 970 and this year, we’ve designed an all-round powerhouse that not only features outstanding AI capabilities, but also brings cutting-edge raw performance to consumers,” Yu told the gathering, adding that the new SoC is equipped with dual NPU (Neural Processing Unit).
“The Kirin 980 is the ultimate engine to power the next-generation productivity and entertainment applications,” Yu added.
The TSMC 7nm process technology enables Kirin 980 to pack 6.9 billion transistors within a “1 square cm die size”, up by 1.6 times from the previous generation.
The Kirin 980 is also the first SoC to embed Cortex-A76 cores, which are 75 per cent more powerful and 58 per cent more efficient compared to their previous generation.
In an octa-core configuration, the CPU in Kirin 980 is comprised of two high-performance Cortex-A76 cores; two high-efficiency Cortex-A76 cores; and two extreme efficiency Cortex-A55 cores, the company said. Running at higher clock speeds compared to the prior generation, Kirin 980 enables quicker app launch times, better multi-tasking and a generally smoother user experience, Huawei added.
As graphics in mobile games have become more and more sophisticated in recent years, Huawei has integrated the Mali-G76 GPU (graphics processing unit) into the Kirin 980 to deliver improved gaming experiences.
Debuting with the Kirin 980 chip, Mali-G76 offers 46 per cent greater graphics processing power at 178 per cent improved power efficiency over the previous generation, according to Huawei. Mali-G76 utilizes AI to intelligently identify gaming workloads and adjust resource allocation for optimal gaming performance.
Kirin 980 supports common AI frameworks such as Caffee, Tensorflow and Tensorflow Lite, and provides a suite of tools that simplifies the difficulty of engineering on-device AI, allowing developers to easily tap into the leading processing power of the dual NPU.
Kirin 980 adopts a new pipeline dedicated to processing video captures, allowing the camera module to shoot videos with 33 percent shorter delay, Huawei informed.
Huawei also launched at IFA 2018 AI Cube, its home speaker with 4G router and built-in Alexa that can perform several tasks such turning on the TV or playing music. The company also introduced new colors and “genuine Italian leather variants of its Huawei P20 Pro phones.
In addition, Yu also introduced the Huawei Locator powered by Internet of Things (IoT) technology that can help people easily locate their belongings, be it their luggage or pets.
IoT for Smart Cities: LoRa with Semtech Silicon as a leading LPWAN
Various wireless LANs and WANs are necessary to linking all the Internet of Things (IoT) devices that will give rise to smart cities. Some of those wireless networks include: Bluetooth Low Energy, ZigBee, Wi‑Fi and cellular technologies are all established, but low power wide area (LPWA) networking technologies, such as Sigfox, LoRa, LTE-M and NB-IoT are emerging as IoT disruptors.
According to analyst ON World, there could be as many as 2.6 billion connected, wireless IoT devices for smart cities, with LPWA networks suitable for 60% of those connections.
LPWA networks are increasingly used outdoors in parking, utilities, pollution monitoring and other applications that require wireless communication via always-on nodes in a network.
“Different wireless protocols have different benefits, but where the use case is moving sensor data or small amounts of data, LoRa is designed specifically for that,” says Dave Armour, strategic marketing manager for wireless products at Semtech. The company licenses the proprietary LoRa technology and is a founder member of the LoRa Alliance.
LoRa is based on a transceiver design and uses an unlicensed spectrum, allowing users the option to deploy their own gateways or have their own devices communicate with third party networks, explains Samir Hennaoui, product manager, LPWA at Murata Europe. “Some cities have deployed networks based on LoRa that are free to access and service providers have appeared that rent access to their gateways,” he says.
A spread-spectrum modulation scheme supports data rates from 300bit/s to 50kbit/s to overcome the problem of interference in the shared RF band.
Sigfox, a low-cost, wide area M2M technology developed in 2010 by a French company of the same name, probably has the largest market share for LPWA networks today. Data rates for this technology are 10bit/s to 1kbit/s.
The main differences between the two are range – Sigfox uses narrowband transmission to achieve up to 50km and LoRa has a range of up to 30km – and that LoRa is bi-directional, whereas Sigfox is not.
“Range depends on a number of things,” concedes Armour. With gateways on top of buildings, the range is more than with a gateway inside the building. “In big open areas we are getting tens of kilometres range typically,” he says, “for sending messages from the sensor back to the gateway in the cloud and also getting updates from the cloud back down to the sensor.
“Most technology allows you to send messages back to the network, but LoRa also enables you to receive messages from the network,” says Armour. This, he adds, is a key characteristic, as LoRa will be deployed in devices that are expected to be in long term use, for example parking sensors or occupancy sensors that can be updated over the air (OTA) rather than needing to be physically removed for updates.
The same OTA functionality can be used for security, which Armour describes as a moving target. A multi‑level AES encryption is the default in the protocol. “Encrypted data is sent from the sensor and goes on to the network encrypted. It is only when its gets to the end-user, who has registered the device, that they can unlock the data and decrypt it,” he explains.
“LoRa is designed specifically for moving sensor data, or small amounts of data,” says Armour. “It can do that over a very long range and at exceptionally low power. The consumption depends on the use case, but some of the sensors can run on coin cell batteries for over 10 years,” he says. “The great thing with sensors is that we can install a large number on a gateway in a building and all the data goes easily back into the cloud where you can start to make use of it,” says Armour.
Sensors can be used to adjust heating and lighting according to the number of tenants in a building, or to adjust the billing in multi-occupancy buildings. LoRa is also used for location services, to track goods, using the two-way communications capability.
“LoRa allows you to locate devices reasonably accurately at low power. If your data starts coming from a location that makes no sense to you, that may be because someone is spoofing, or the device has been stolen or moved,” Armour added.
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LoRa Silicon and IP from Semtech (licensed to other companies, e.g. Microchip):
Semtech, the only supplier of LoRa silicon intellectual property, has announced its next generation of LoRa chipsets, with reduced receiver current and high power option to extend the sensors’ battery life. The SX1262 (the +22dBm option), the SX1261 (+15dBm) and the SX1268 (+22dBm, China frequency bands) are claimed to extend the battery life of LoRa-based sensors by up to 30%.
The chipsets have a footprint of 4x4mm, which is 45% less than the earlier device and they can be configured to meet application requirements using the LoRaWAN open standard. Frequency coverage is 150MHz to 960MHz and a spreading factor of SF5 supports dense networks. The chipsets also support FSK modulation, making them compatible with legacy protocols.
IHS Markit & Cignal AI: Global Optical Equipment Market Down but EMEA Up
By Heidi Adams, senior research director, transport networks, IHS Markit
Highlights
- In the second quarter of 2018 (Q2 2018), global optical network hardware revenue totaled $3.5 billion, decreasing 7 percent on a year-over-year basis.
- The global Q2 2018 optical equipment market net of China was down 3 percent year over year. China itself declined 17 percent year over year.
- Wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) revenue totaled $3.3 billion in Q2 2018, up 9 percent quarter over quarter, but down 6 percent from a year ago.
- Huawei remained the overall optical equipment market leader in Q2 2018, increasing its market share to a new high of 36 percent. Ciena moved into the number-two position, and Nokia dropped to third.
Our analysis
The optical equipment market continued to struggle in Q2 2018 due to the following factors:
- Lower spending in China; ZTE shuttered major operations for most of the quarter
- A big drop in submarine line terminal equipment (SLTE) spending
- A slowdown in long-haul spending by tier-1 operators in North America
Even a healthy internet content provider (ICP) segment has not been enough to offset the spending declines of the major operators in North America. Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) remained flat year over year. The Caribbean and Latin America (CALA) saw sequential growth, but the region continued its overall year-over-year downward trend of diminishing network infrastructure investment. Meanwhile, in Asia Pacific, India remains very strong for optical spending and Japan is emerging as an area of renewed investment.
The WDM equipment segment increased sequentially but declined on a year-over-year basis – as did the metro and long-haul WDM sub segments. IHS Markit continues to view the metro WDM sub segment as the main growth vector for the market through at least 2022. Subsea-related optical equipment investment continues to be project driven and highly variable, with second quarter SLTE at half the level seen in the same period last year.
Looking ahead, IHS Markit forecasts a positive optical equipment market compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 4 percent from 2017 through 2022.
Optical Network Hardware Market Tracker – Q2 2018
This report tracks the global market for metro and long-haul WDM and SONET/SDH equipment and SONET/SDH and WDM ports. It provides market size, market share, forecasts through 2022, analysis and trends.
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Cignal AI Reports 2Q18 EMEA Optical Spending Offset Weakness in North America
by Andrew Schmitt, Founder – Cignal AI
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AT&T Fiber Now Reaches 2 Million Business Customer Locations; $120M invested in Iowa networks
AT&T Increases Lead as the Largest U.S.-Based Provider of Fiber for Business Services:
AT&T continues to invest in aggressively expanding our national fiber footprint. There are more than 450,000 U.S. business buildings lit with AT&T fiber, and we’re adding thousands more each month.
Within those buildings, AT&T now enables high-speed fiber connections to more than 2 million U.S. business customer locations. And if you count businesses near our fiber network, that number quadruples. Nationwide, more than 8 million business customer locations are on or within 1,000 feet of our fiber.1
“As the largest provider of fiber for business services in the U.S., we have unparalleled ability to help businesses transform. Our growing fiber network is the foundation for the future,” said Roman Pacewicz, chief product officer, AT&T Business. “With companies using more data, applications and services in the cloud than ever before, high-speed, ever-present connectivity has never been more paramount.”
AT&T offers business customers of all sizes – from small businesses to the largest enterprises –high-speed connectivity solutions on our fiber network:
- AT&T Business Fiber provides businesses speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second (Gbps). It has the bandwidth needed to support data-intensive services like video conferencing, collaboration, cloud services and more.
- AT&T Dedicated Internet customers have an internet connection that provides dedicated throughput and consistent performance. It allows for symmetrical speeds of up to 1 terabit per second (Tbps).
- AT&T Switched Ethernet Service℠ provides multi-site companies a simple, scalable and affordable Ethernet Virtual Private Network (VPN) solution. AT&T Switched Ethernet Services with Network on Demand is software-defined and allows enterprises to scale bandwidth up and down in near real time through a portal.
- AT&T Dedicated Ethernet provides customers with a low latency, dedicated connection to move critical information at speeds up to 100Gbps. Ideal for quickly moving data to backup facilities or data centers.
These services and more are all possible with fiber – the key differentiator in a high-speed world and a necessary building block for 5G.
What Customers Are Saying
“Fiber has been a godsend. Before AT&T fiber, the office and retail center I own lacked reliable and fast internet connectivity. It was impacting my ability to attract new tenants and keep quality existing tenants,” said Shane Glass, property owner and manager, Three Flags Center. “AT&T was able to get fiber into all 6 of our buildings. In the 8 months since, we have been 100% leased. More importantly, my tenants are very satisfied with both the reliability and blazing speeds AT&T fiber provides.”
“Blooming Potential works with children with Autism and other developmental and behavioral concerns. Due to the nature of our applied behavior analysis and speech therapy services, each therapist documents their sessions using an app on a tablet,” said Tiffany Rigal, owner, Blooming Potential. “With so much of our record-keeping being digital, we need fast and dependable technology. And that’s what we get with AT&T Dedicated Internet on AT&T fiber. We can worry less about our technology and remain focused on helping each child succeed.”
AT&T Partner Solutions
We make it easy for business customers to sign up for fiber on their terms. In addition to our direct sales channels, customers can purchase through solution providers in the AT&T Alliance Channel™, AT&T Partner Exchange® and ACC Business.
We strive to make it virtually seamless for solution providers to sell fiber services to businesses. We now share data with online resources like FiberLocator, a network planning and connectivity tool. These resources show which buildings are fiber lit through a quick address search, and they offer an API solution that providers can integrate into their platforms.
For more information on AT&T Business Fiber, please go to att.com/businessfiber.
1The 2 million U.S. business customer locations, which AT&T provides high-speed fiber connections, is included within the 8 million U.S. business customer locations on or within 1,000 feet of our fiber.
About AT&T Communications
We help family, friends and neighbors connect in meaningful ways every day. From the first phone call 140+ years ago to mobile video streaming, we innovate to improve lives. We have the nation’s largest and most reliable network and the nation’s best network for video streaming.** We’re building FirstNetjust for first responders and creating next-generation mobile 5G. With DIRECTV and DIRECTV NOW, we deliver entertainment people love to talk about. Our smart, highly secure solutions serve over 3 million global businesses – nearly all of the Fortune 1000. And worldwide, our spirit of service drives employees to give back to their communities.
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AT&T Invests Nearly $120 Million Over 3-Year Period to Boost Local Networks in Iowa:
Separately, AT&T has invested nearly $120 million in our Iowa wireless and wired networks during 2015-2017. These investments boost reliability, coverage, speed and overall performance for residents and businesses. They also improve critical services that support public safety and first responders.
In 2017 we made more than 365 network enhancements across Iowa, including new cell sites, the addition of network capacity and network upgrades.
“Whether it’s streamlined rules to simplify and speed the deployment of wireless facilities or being one of the first states in the nation to opt-in to the FirstNet broadband network for first responders, Iowahas aggressively embraced policy to encourage continuous investment in mobile broadband infrastructure across the state,” said Gov. Kim Reynolds. “Today’s policies will pave the way for 5G mobile services in the years ahead and position Iowa for a prosperous economic future.”
Since the formation of the FirstNet public-private partnership a little over a year ago, governors from all 50 states, 5 territories and D.C. recognized the value of FirstNet, joining in its mission to strengthen and modernize public safety’s communications capabilities.
FirstNet is a new nationwide communications platform dedicated to America’s public safety community. As we build, deploy and evolve FirstNet, we will build upon our current and planned investments in Iowa to help ensure public safety’s network delivers the coverage and cutting-edge capabilities first responders expect – today and for decades to come.
For the 4th year in a row, AT&T earned the top spot in the telecommunications industry on FORTUNE’s Most Admired Companies list in 2018. We also placed No. 49 among the 50 most admired companies across all industries.
We were ranked first or second in all 9 attributes used to compile the list, including innovation, people management, quality of management, long-term investment value, quality of products/services and global competitiveness.
To learn more about AT&T coverage in Iowa, or anywhere in the U.S., visit the AT&T Coverage Viewer. For updates on the AT&T wireless network, please visit the AT&T network news page.
1 AT&T products and services are provided or offered by subsidiaries and affiliates of AT&T Inc. under the AT&T brand and not by AT&T Inc.
Allied Telesis Introduces Single & Multi-Channel Blanket Hybrid WiFi Solution
Century Link tops Mid-Year 2018 U.S. Carrier Ethernet LEADERBOARD
CenturyLink maintains the top spot in Vertical Systems Group’s (VSG) mid-year 2018 U.S. Carrier Ethernet Services Leaderboard. AT&T, #1 in 2017, claimed the #2 spot, followed by Verizon, Spectrum Enterprise, Comcast, Windstream and Cox. All of the companies maintained their year-end positions. The leaderboard ranks incumbent telcos in order based on U.S. retail Ethernet port share. VSG calls this an industry benchmark for measuring Ethernet market presence.
CenturyLink’s acquisition of Level 3 Communications, along with continued growth in Ethernet ports for both companies, allowed it to power its way to the top of the year-end ranking.
“After a flurry of M&A activity duing the past two years, the Ethernet marketplace stabilized during the first half of 2018,” said Rick Malone, VSG principal. “U.S. port growth was more than 6 percent for the period, with accelerating deployments of multi-gigabit speed services. Most providers experienced acute price compression across all data rates, partially offsetting the revenue typically generated from higher-speed services. All providers are grappling with longer sales cycles due to SD-WAN, however the impact on the U.S. Ethernet base has been negligible to date.”
Other providers selling Ethernet services in the U.S. are segmented into two tiers as measured by port share. The first, or challenge tier, includes Altice USA, Cogent, Frontier Communications, GTT, Sprint – which is attempting to merge with T-Mobile – and Zayo.
The second or Market Player tier includes all providers with port share below 1%. Companies in the Market Player tier include the following providers (in alphabetical order): Alaska Communications, American Telesis, BT Global Services, Cincinnati Bell, Consolidated Communications, Crown Castle Fiber, DQE Communications, Expedient, FiberLight, FirstLight, Fusion, Global Cloud Xchange, Great Plains Communications, Hawaiian Telecom, Logix Fiber Networks, LS Networks, Lumos Networks, Masergy, MegaPath, Midco, NTT America, Orange Business, RCN Business, Tata, TDS Telecom, Telstra, TPx Communications, Unite Private Networks, US Signal, Vodafone, WOW!Business and other companies selling retail Ethernet services in the U.S. market.
