4G World 2010 Draws Significant Commitments to Premier Event
By Kate Walsh
4G World™, the wireless industry’s first and only conference and expo covering the entire ecosystem of next-generation technologies that enable the mobile Internet revolution, has confirmed significant sponsor commitments. The four-day conference, to be held October 18-21, 2010 at McCormick Place in Chicago, brings together industry, government and academic professionals in a comprehensive multi-track forum covering the entire 4G and mobile Internet global ecosystem.
4G World 2010 will draw over 10,000 global attendees, more than 140 exhibitors and more than 250 corporate, media and association sponsors. With the resounding success of the 2009 event, 4G World has become the “must attend” event of the year for all players in the 4G and mobile Internet ecosystem.
“We are very pleased to confirm that Alvarion and Motorola will join as Corporate Hosts and are as well excited to confirm that Cisco, Huawei, Nokia Siemens Networks and Samsung will partner with us as Premier Sponsors,” said Eliot Weinman, president of Yankee Group’s Events Division and conference founder and chair. “Also, we are pleased to welcome as key participating industry association sponsors, 3G Americas, Telemanagment Forum, WCAI, WiFi Alliance and the Limo Foundation.”
The 4G World 2010 conference program covers 4G mobile operator business models, mobile network infrastructure, advanced devices, managed services, next generation applications, services and content and open mobile development, requires broad and significant commitments from organizations across the entire wireless ecosystem. Platinum Sponsors include Continuous Computing, Kabira, Keynote, Netscout, Redline and Sequans Communications. Gold Sponsors include Acme Packet, Agilient Technologies, Alcatel-Lucent, BelAir Networks, Dragonwave, Qwest Wholesale, Sagem Communications and Tellabs. Berkeley Varitronics Systems and Cavium Networks are Contributing Sponsors.
Andrew Mitchell, content director of 4G World shares Weinman’s enthusiasm. “The 4G World 2010 program is comprehensive and compelling,” says Mitchell. The pre-conference program includes the 16th Annual WCAI International Symposium and focused summits on Network Topology and Backhaul, along with advanced technology training programs. The full conference program includes 12 industry leader keynotes from operators and thought leaders as well as executive panel sessions, and more than 175 speakers from across the entire 4G and mobile Internet ecosystem. “We have 4 days of business and technology sessions and workshops, over 40 in total, which are delivering case studies, best practices, innovations and deep technical insights.”
Opportunities for speakers and sponsorships are still available. For further details on speaker opportunities please visit http://4gworld.com/speakers/call-for-speakers.
Program Contact:
Andrew Mitchell
Content Director
amitchell@yankeegroup.com
Sponsorship Contact:
John Sellazzo
VP Sales and Business Development
jsellazzo@yankeegroup.com
Marketing Contact:
Kate Walsh
Sr. Director of Marketing
kwalsh@yankeegroup.com
Mobile World Congress: LTE trials mount up but mood is still cautious
By Caroline Gabriel
In the home of the 3GPP carriers at Mobile World Congress, there was less hype about LTE than many had expected, though there was plenty of talk of trials and pre-commercial products. More important were issues of extending the life of 3G networks with successive HSPA upgrades, and of migrating ’smoothly’ to LTE with unified cores and overlay strategies. Obstacles to rapid LTE progress were discussed as much as the promise of the new technology, with spectrum fragmentation, device timelines and the perennial voice issue all in the limelight.
Meanwhile, the WiMAX community was stressing its headstart, with a strong line-up of operators using the technology for real world and advanced business models. And as it looked to the new standard, WiMAX2, its supporters were showing increased maturity in addressing a wide range of business cases, some of them heavily geared to coexistence with cellular networks - 2G in emerging markets, 3G for offload and rapid broadband migration, even LTE for some operators with certain spectrum or market requirements.
First, the good news for LTE. It really is achieving a unified operator community worldwide, mending the old CDMA/GSM divide for good. This was highlighted by the decision of three CDMA majors - China Telecom, KDDI and Verizon Wireless - to join the GSM Association, which also represents carriers using W-CDMA/HSPA and now LTE. And in the most symbolic move of all, Qualcomm joined the GSMA as an associate member - no surprise given its likely market lead in LTE device silicon and its huge participation in HSPA, but nonetheless, offering a final laying down of arms in the mobile war.
Then, the bad news. Unity is not what drives the mobile industry to greater lengths and LTE is already facing wars of its own. One is with ‘the other 4G standard’, WiMAX - boasting over 550 commercial deployments and with its next generation iteration, 802.16m or WiMAX2, due to be finalized this year, keeping its headstart over LTE-Advanced (these two standards hope to achieve ‘true 4G’ capabilities like 100Mbps mobile download rates, and both are submitted as candidates for the ITU’s IMT-Advanced set of official 4G platforms). What is really important is how much ground WiMAX will take from LTE before the latter becomes commercially mainstream, which most - despite a host of first stage deployments - think will be 2013. WiMAX, for its part, hit that point last year, after several years of work on certification, device ecosystem and service models, all of which still lie ahead of LTE.
The WiMAX community was very clear at Barcelona - it will steal ground in the mobile world on three main fronts. One, by powering alternative operators that are pursuing non-traditional business models such as machine-to-machine or advanced wholesaling. Two, by acting as a data offload partner for 3G carriers whose networks are under strain, at least until they have significant LTE capacity built out. And three, by providing a quick route to data services for 2G-only carriers in developing markets.
It can afford, for a short while at least, the smugness of being the ‘real’ technology. It has 555 deployments, though many of these are using fixed WiMAX and/or are very small. However, 95 are with mobile operators, many using WiMAX as a data overlay for 2G in markets where 3G is scarcely available. This contrast with 74 cellcos that have committed to trials or deployments of LTE, and two commercial operators, though the figure will clearly expand substantially this year.
But MWC was not the LTE-fest some had expected. The overall tone was one of caution about promising too much too soon, with carriers stressing ‘realistic’ timescales and efforts to eke the most out of 3G first. Even Qualcomm, which is likely to be the first tier one chipmaker to have LTE device silicon, was notably cautious about timelines and the time it will take to achieve a mass market. And many of the vendors were mainly focusing on HSPA+ roadmaps and demonstrations.
Even so, the LTE trials and commitments mount up. This is a summary of the main ones that surfaced during the Barcelona festivities.
· SFR, Vodafone’s joint venture in France, has turned to home supplier Alcatel-Lucent plus Nokia Siemens for 3G/3G expansion and for early LTE trials, with a view to deploying the new system as an overlay with a converged core (a popular approach with 3G carriers with sufficient spectrum, as it reduces first stage cost). The trials will focus on performance and on multimedia applications. NSN, which has been overshadowed by Ericsson and Huawei in European LTE so far, has a strong platform for overlay strategies, the Flex Multiradio base stations. SFR is looking to use this to reuse 900MHz GSM spectrum for rural 3G, and to simplify its network overall, and Flexi could also support migration to LTE. NSN will also implement, operate and maintain SFR’s mobile packet core and associated IP network. Meanwhile, ALU will provide its own multi-platform RAN, the new MC-TRX, which is heavily focused on refarming.
· Across the Atlantic, cableco Cox Communications says it has completed initial LTE tests in AWS and 700MHz spectrum in Phoenix, Arizona and San Diego, California. The trials achieved peak download speeds around 25Mbps, but Cox’ VP of wireless services, Stephen Bye, stressed the wireless system would be “complementary” to the cable network, and that LTE would never handle the traffic loads that wired internet users generate. Cox used equipment from Huwaei and ALU for its trial. It is one of the only major cablecos that is pursuing its own 4G build-out rather than participating in the Clearwire WiMAX based initiative, and also has an MVNO deal with Sprint. Its peak speeds were achieved using 2×2 MIMO in a 2×5MHz channel in AWS, but were only seen close to the cell site and with a single user - at the edge, speeds were about 10Mbps and this would, of course, reduce with multiple users.
· Motorola has been counting on its TDD experience in WiMAX to give it a headstart in the TDD flavor of LTE, and has - with ALU - got the deal to deploy China Mobile’s first TD-LTE network, for the Shanghai Expo this year. But the firm has made some FD-LTE inroads too, notably with KDDI in Japan and now Zain Saudi Arabia. Zain’s roll-out will start in the second half of this year, in capital Riyadh. Motorola will provide RAN and evolved packet core infrastructure, 4G devices, plus network optimization and integration services. The network will operate in the 2.6GHz band, overlaying Zain’s 3G infrastructure. In China, ALU said it had achieved peak download rates of more than 80Mbps on the China Mobile system, using a single 20MHz band.
· Saudi Arabia is becoming something of a hotbed of 4G, after lagging in 3G - it has several WiMAX services and now two LTE trials. As well as Zain, incumbent Saudi Telecom Company (STC) has awarded Ericsson an LTE contract.
· Alcatel-Lucent has been selected by MTS Ukraine to conduct an LTE trial, which will begin in the second half of 2010. Andrei Dubovskov, head of the Russian-owned cellco, said: ‘The launch of the trial LTE solution will enable us to assess the benefits of 4G technology not just in theory but through real practical experience.’ ALU will provide LTE base stations, the evolved packet core, IP service routing network elements as well as operation, administration and maintenance (OAM) systems, project management, planning, installation, integration and commissioning, and testing.
· MobileOne of Singapore has worked with Nokia Siemens to achieve transmission speeds of 100Mbps on a data call, on its trial LTE network. The carrier commented: “Our network modernization contract with Nokia Siemens represents the first steps in our evolution towards LTE, and this trial helps pave the way to faster and better quality mobile broadband services in the future.’
· The flagship LTE operator, Verizon Wireless, said it was on track with its LTE plan. CTO Dick Lynch said its network was now in fourth-phase testing and due in 25-30 US cities this year, potentially reaching 100m people. Verizon expects to deliver 5-12Mbps downstream and 2-5Mbps upstream in 700MHz spectrum.
· ZTE has been overshadowed by Huawei’s list of LTE trials, but had one of its own to announce just in time for Barcelona, at Hungarian carrier Pannon. Pannon is part of the Telenor Group, which has been moving very aggressively on LTE in its Norwegian home, and also putting cats among pigeons by working with Huawei rather than the regional giant Ericsson. It claims it is saving up to 50% by choosing the Chinese vendor over its incumbents Ericsson and NSN. Now its Hungarian unit has picked ZTE for its live network trial, which if successful, could lead to a commercial deal around midyear. ZTE will provide radio and core infrastructure as well as user terminals.
This partial list shows that LTE will be, for some time, very much a developed market play. Here, the operators must wrestle with pricing models and business cases, and also wait for a device ecosystem to evolve. Ironically, those issues are less important in developing economies, where WiMAX will aim to keep its lead, and to offer a 2G/4G proposition to GSM or CDMA 1X carriers.
AT&T goes with Ericsson and Alcatel-Lucent for LTE
By Caroline Gabriel
However greedily Huawei has been biting at the mobile vendors’ heels in their European heartlands, the US door remains firmly slammed in its face. AT&T has announced its LTE vendors, a year almost to the day since Verizon Wireless did the same thing, and has chosen exactly the same RAN suppliers - Ericsson and Alcatel-Lucent.
This will be a huge relief to both suppliers, which have been feeling the pressure from Huawei in the first round of LTE trials and contracts. The Chinese giant has moved beyond its old reputation for competing purely on price and shown itself able to challenge even in cutting edge technologies. And with the firm overtaking ALU and Nokia Siemens in the overall mobile infrastructure rankings last quarter, the traditional players need to ensure their bugbear does not convert too many of its early LTE trials into major deployments.
Breaking into the US is tough for Huawei, largely for political reasons, and so far it only has 4G deals with Clearwire for WiMAX and cableco Cox. This leaves north America, which promises to surpass even Japan in early adoption of 4G technologies, a surprisingly clear run for Ericsson. Once the Swedish giant’s weak spot, the region now accounts for 12% of group revenues, following the acquisition of CDMA, LTE and GSM assets, and the huge outsourcing deal with Sprint. Providing LTE kit for both the big two cellcos gives it a good springboard to dominate this market going forward, pushing more entrenched local players like Motorola aside - even if LTE, as Ericsson has said itself, will not generate meaningful revenues for a couple more years.
Alcatel-Lucent, the incumbent in north America thanks to Lucent’s huge CDMA base, will be even more relieved to have secured part of the AT&T contract. Despite its win at Verizon, it has so far been overshadowed in European and Asian LTE by Ericsson and Huawei, and badly needs to ensure that the decline in CDMA revenues and margins will be offset by new sales, most urgently in the US.
AT&T will start field trials later this year and plans initial commercial deployments in 2011, a timeline that has been brought forward slightly, probably to address fears that the cellco would fall too far behind Verizon in mobile broadband capability. These fears have been particularly acute given the failure of its 3G network to support the mobile data explosion, much of it driven by its iPhone exclusive, in key urban areas.
Although the carrier is upgrading its whole network to HSPA, it is only moving to the 7.2 Mbps iteration, while many operators in other parts of the world are implementing 14.4 Mbps or even HSPA+ (21 Mbps or 42 Mbps) for areas of high capacity requirement. AT&T will certainly have some catching up to do, if it is to retain Apple’s favors, support new data-driven devices like the iPad and netbooks, and compete with Clearwire and Verizon LTE in key metro markets.
Initial roll-outs will focus on these city-based regions of high data demand. Despite their early timescales compared to European carriers - most of which will not start deploying until 2012 at the earliest - Verizon and AT&T are expected to confine their roll-outs to fairly limited areas of high population density for at least a couple of years. Verizon will also use LTE for some rural access requirements, in its 700MHz spectrum, whose long range is strong for covering sparse populations and getting signals indoors (though problematic for dense urban hotzones, where the revenues will lie). AT&T is also expected to use 700MHz spectrum acquired in the 2008 auctions, and also to overlay some of its 3G networks with LTE, linked to a common core.
The firm played down its timelag behind its arch-rival, hinting that Verizon would roll out before there were devices available anyway. By contrast, John Stankey, CEO of AT&T Operations, said the AT&T schedule “aligns with industry expectations for development of LTE technology and widespread availability of equipment and compatible LTE mobile devices”.
The carrier also said that “as part of the supplier agreements, 3G equipment delivered to AT&T by the suppliers starting this year will be easily convertible to LTE, enabling A&T to upgrade existing equipment and software rather than install entirely new equipment in many cases”. This will be one factor in the choice of Ericsson and ALU, both of which currently supply AT&T’s HSPA network, though the cellco said it had tested equipment from other providers too. But they will support a parallel strategy for 3G and LTE, which Stankey was keen to contrast with Verizon’s more abrupt migration path between CDMA and the new platform.
“AT&T has a key advantage in that LTE is an evolution of the existing GSM family of technologies that powers our network … As some competitors move away from their existing investment in niche 3G platforms, we are able to efficiently and quickly move toward LTE while enhancing our existing 3G performance and providing access to a strong ecosystem of customer devices,” he said in a clear swipe at Verizon - a swipe from which ALU will be keen to distance itself, since one of its key selling points to its CDMA base is the ease of migration it offers with its multimode strategy.
Financial terms of the deals with Ericsson and ALU were not disclosed. The clear loser in the US market is now Nokia Siemens. With the top three cellcos secured in terms of 4G RAN, NSN only has a contract with Verizon Wireless for its LTE IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem), shared with ALU, having dropped out of the Clearwire supplier list at an early stage. It will be hard for the firm to maintain the brave face it put on Verizon’s choices a year ago, when then-CEO Simon Beresford-Wylie commented: “This is their first wave of build-out - we’re right at the beginning of this. I look forward to being there in the second wave.”
Auctions must be decoupled to release brakes on mobile broadband
By Caroline Gabriel
Auctioning licenses in several bands at the same time appears to be a good idea, and one increasingly favored by regulators round the world. Rather than selling each set of frequencies in sequence, and often with no over-arching strategy, governments can offer bidders the flexibility to acquire the right mix of spectrum for their business models.
So India decided to offer 3G and WiMAX spectrum at the same time, allowing operators to create plans that combined 3G for coverage with 4G for data intensive zones and fixed broadband. The authorities argued this would be a better model than one based on a single technology and frequency, both for commercial return and the expansion of services around the country. In the UK, a very different market, the idea was to auction the two bands earmarked for 3G expansion and 4G - 2.6 GHz and digital dividend around 800 MHz - simultaneously. Again, this would allow operators to make a clearsighted judgement on what balance of frequencies they needed to balance wide coverage with urban capacity, and to value the bands accordingly, rather than in isolation.
All this sounds very progressive, compared to a past situation where operators often had to snap up whatever band was available at any one time, even if it was not optimal. But we are talking about government agencies here. Putting two auctions together doubles the complexity, the bureaucracy and the opportunity for delay. So while countries like Sweden, sticking to sequential auctions, already have 2.6 GHz out of the door, and are hurtling towards 800 MHz sales, cellcos in the UK and India are living with protracted delays in being able to acquire any spectrum at all for the next generation of their services.
This is leading to calls for auctions to be decoupled again, especially in the interests of new entrants with new service models. In the UK, existing cellcos can make do with their existing holdings for some years, now that they are almost certain to be able to refarm their GSM bands for 3G (though the possible redistribution of 900 MHz, which only Vodafone and O2 hold, remains a sticking point even for that). But operators hoping to acquire a license to create a new model and introduce added competition and new types of services are increasingly frustrated. The UK was supposed to be the first European country to auction 2.6 GHz licenses, back in 2008, and that would have provided a favourable environment for a new mobile player (or a returning one like British Telecom) to leverage a new technology like WiMAX, to leap ahead of the existing 3G incumbents. The longer the delay, the less attractive that opportunity is, because the new players will be running head-to-head with the incumbents’ LTE plans, as that technology becomes available.
In India, even entrenched mobile operators cannot afford to wait much longer for new spectrum, since exploding demand is overloading their current networks to breaking point. However, there is still a case for separating the two auctions, since the problems that are delaying the 3G sale (mainly disputes over when the Department of Defense will vacate spectrum, and the reserve prices) do not affect the 2.5 GHz band, and at least the WiMAX providers could make a start on addressing the country’s glaring shortage of broadband services.
Yet the two sales remain bound together, and delayed yet again, probably until the new fiscal year starting in April, according to government sources. The auctions have been delayed many times, most recently until January 14 and then February 12. This will be bad news on all fronts. The wireless infrastructure suppliers may not be expecting quite a big a boost as from Chinese 3G, given the price competition in India, but the sheer size of the market is still vital to a still pressurized sector; India is probably the world’s largest potential market for WiMAX; and the Indian cellcos themselves badly need the new spectrum to add desperately needed capacity and launch higher margin services.
All this is creating a groundswell of lobbying for the WiMAX sale to go ahead regardless of the constantly changing rules on the number, price and conditions of the 3G licenses. An internal note authored by two units of the Department of Telecom, and quoted in the Economic Times newspaper, bemoans an “amazing array of inconsistencies in the government’s approach to 3G mobile licenses, which are unlikely to be granted anytime soon”. As the paper points out, further delays could “stymie the progress of the telecoms sector, the vaunted success story of liberalized Indian infrastructure. This hurts the economy, forgoing enormous, life changing growth potential in rural India.”
It voiced the views of many elements of the telecoms industry, saying: “The time has come for the government to delink the auction of licenses for wireless broadband services using WiMAX from auction of 3G licenses. The government should move ahead with WiMAX spectrum auctions, without waiting to complete 3G auctions. This would open up much needed new revenue streams for the industry. The issues that hold up licenses in 3G do not apply to WiMAX. The government should move ahead on this front.”
The most likely opposition to this view would come from LTE suppliers, reluctant to see WiMAX get such a powerful beach head in the world’s second largest market. Such parties would be pleased to see 2.5 GHz allocations delayed, especially as the Indian DoT and regulator TRAI said last week they were considering further auctions “very soon” after the 3G and WiMAX transactions, to support ‘4G’ services. The first would be digital dividend spectrum around 700 MHz, which India has long planned to bring into play ahead of most of the world. As 2.5 GHz will be used almost entirely for WiMAX, because of the immediate availability of the technology, this leaves 700 MHz as the only near term band with international support for LTE suppliers to target, although HSPA and WiMAX may be more likely options. LTE proponents like Ericsson and Qualcomm have already been accused by the WiMAX community of lobbying to delay mobile broadband auctions in countries like Brazil, until their favored technology was ready.
This was also a factor, as we saw above, in a very different mobile economy, the UK, where timely spectrum availability could have given WiMAX a foot in a firmly GSM-focused door. That door may be closing, as the country is now likely to wait until 2011 for its 2.6 GHz sale, leaving carrier plans for LTE or WiMAX on hold. Kip Meek, the government appointed independent spectrum broker, says a 2010 auction is now “a real stretch” and 2011 is the probable date.
The auction was originally delayed by a legal challenge from the UK arms of T-Mobile and O2, which argued that they could not put a realistic valuation on the new bands until regulator Ofcom had clarified its policy on refarming GSM spectrum. That in turn would require a settlement of the long running dispute over whether O2 and Vodafone, the only holders of that lower band GSM spectrum in 900 MHz, should be forced to redistribute their holdings, which are valuable for cost effective rural coverage.
Now, other factors are causing delays - the proposed merger of T-Mobile UK and Orange UK, which could break existing spectrum caps even without new allocations; and the decision to sell the 2.6 GHz licenses in tandem with the digital dividend spectrum around 800 MHz.
Meek’s latest update was reported by online newspaper ZDNet UK (www.zdnet.co.uk), at a Westminster eForum on the spectrum implications of the digital switchover. Meek said the outcome of his proposals for 2.6 GHz allocation was “uncertain” because of operator concern over the TMo-Orange merger, and there is threatened legal action from British Telecom. He told ZDNet: “The government will be considering its response to the consultation paper, [but] that process is taking longer than originally anticipated. They will have to take a view whether, in the dying months of this government, they will want to push through with this particular set of proposals.”
Meek wants Vodafone and O2 to receive 800 MHz allocations only if they surrender an equal amount of 900 MHz spectrum. And TMo and Orange should be able to bid only for limited amounts of 2.6 GHz, unless they give up some holdings at 1.8 GHz or 2.1 GHz. He has also proposed making 2.1 GHz 3G licenses indefinite in length, in return for commitments from cellcos to improve 3G coverage. Currently, they are due to expire in 2020.
This last idea is the one that could incur BT legal challenges. The incumbent has described it as “a gift of several billion pounds from the UK taxpayer to the mobile operators”. BT spun off its own cellular arm, which became O2 and is now owned by Telefonica. BT was widely expected to bid for a 2.6 GHz license and run WiMAX in it, primarily as a wholesale network or to support new business models such as machine-to-machine.
Softbank could get 4G by the back door with Willcom rescue plan
By Caroline Gabriel
With China turning off its low cost PHS (Personal HandyPhone Service) networks, Japan’s Willcom is left as the world’s only significant user of the technology. This has raised doubts over the commercial viability of its roadmap to a mobile data upgrade for PHS, called XGP, and despite rumors of an acquisition, the operator is now set to file for bankruptcy protection in order to turn itself around.
Willcom, reports the Nikkei news agency, will work out a radical turnaround plan under the auspices of Japan’s Enterprise Turnaround Initiative, with the help of third cellco Softbank, which was previously said to be bidding to acquire the smaller firm. This may still happen, as part of the restructuring, but the main thrust of the plan will be to split Willcom into two entities. One will run the existing PHS business, and the other will build and run the network for high speed services.
The latter will use the 2.5 GHz license awarded to Willcom in 2008, but the firm is likely to abandon XGP and move to another OFDM-based TDD system, either WiMAX or TD-LTE. This unit will be led by Softbank, which would gain access to a 4G-class network and spectrum, without the burden of the legacy PHS business, with its low margins and declining user base.
This arrangement would also get round the conditions set on the 2.5GHz licenses, which barred an incumbent cellco from having a majority stake in a winning bidder. Softbank would presumably take a large, but not controlling, share in the new business, to avoid a long process of reversing this rule, which could have been necessary in the face of a direct takeover plan.
Both top mobile operators, DoCoMo and KDDI, bid in the auction as part of consortia and, along with Willcom, the latter won a license, with its Intel-backed UQ Communications joint venture. This has given KDDI a headstart over rivals in the mobile broadband sector, where UQ’s WiMAX build-out is targeting high margin data plans - important to fend off the rapidly rising, data-driven upstart eMobile - and a wholesale model.
As of the end of September 2009, Willcom’s liabilities stood at JPY173.1bn, including JPY93.5bn in loans. ETIC will oversee the reorganization of the existing services company. If the talks go smoothly, Willcom could be applying for court protection from creditors as early as February. Investment fund Advantage Partners is still considering participating in the turnaround plan.
Hopes that XGP, an OFDM-based technology like WiMAX, would become a standard and ecosystem outside Japan were dashed when China decided not to support a new generation for PHS, and instead ordered the PHS services to be would down over the coming few years, and their spectrum in 1.9 GHz turned over to 3G. As a single operator solution, the OFDMA-based XGP clearly has a limited ecosystem, which could encourage the new unit to seek permission to replace the technology with a more mainstream option like WiMAX or LTE. If the latter, this could also create the combined China-Japan ecosystem, around TD-LTE, originally envisaged for PHS’ successor.
Although initial roll-outs of XGP in Tokyo and elsewhere are said to be delivering very strong performance and spectral efficiency, and release 2.0 will add MIMO and other enhancements next year, there are very few devices. The two chip suppliers are Altair of Israel and WaveSat of Canada, both of which applied WiMAX experience to the creation of XGP silicon, but while this is now incorporated in PC cards and Altair promises a dongle soon, there has not yet been sufficient customer base to attract handset makers. Eran Eshed, head of marketing at Altair, said recently: “There are between 300 and 400 base stations across Tokyo now. XGP is very high capacity, scalable and supports self-instal. But the ecosystem is not robust and OEMs like Sharp are sitting on the fence.”
In May, Altair announced a common platform for WiMAX, TD-LTE (and later FD-LTE) and XGP. All use its O2P software defined processor architecture, with integrated baseband and RF transceivers and protocol stacks from PHY up to NAS layers. One of Altair’s main focuses has been on ultra-low power consumption.
3 Scandinavia and Telstra in tussle for HSPA+ leadership
By Caroline Gabriel
The Baltic states continue to be the frontrunners in advanced wireless services. TeliaSonera claimed the laurels for the world’s first commercial LTE launch, now 3 Scandinavia claims it will have “the world’s fastest 3G network”, with a migration to multicarrier HSPA+ (HSPA Evolution) over the coming 18 months.
The operator is conventional in one sense, opting for local supplier Ericsson for its upgrade, which eventually promises peak download rates of 84 Mbps, up from a peak of 21 Mbps on the carrier’s current HSPA systems. Of course peak rates are far from typical performance, but the roll-out does show 3 leaping ahead of its larger rivals in one of the most competitive mobile markets.
The firm has leapfrogged Australia’s Telstra as the most advanced deployer of new HSPA+ standards, at least in terms of its publicity. In fact, it will only move to 42 Mbps during this year, and then leap to 84 Mbps in late 2010 or, more likely, 2011, when devices may be available. Telstra is currently rolling out 42 Mbps systems and plans to go to 84 Mbps in the coming 12-18 months too. It recently became the first operator in the world to test HSPA+ Dual Carrier technology outside a vendor lab, on a closed portion of its Next G network, using equipment from Ericsson and Qualcomm’s MDM8220 chipset. The operator went live with ‘Next G’ in October 2006, introducing HSPA with peak download rate of 3.6 Mbps, and then progressing to 14.4Mbps and, early last year, 21 Mbps HSPA+.
Other frontrunners in 14 Mbps and 21 Mbps HSPA have been Telecom Italia, Japan’s eMobile and CSL in Hong Kong. For 3, Ericsson will provide the two-stage upgrade to HSPA Evolution and also a 900 MHz HSPA RAN and IP-based optical and microwave backhaul. Roll-out will start during this quarter and the contract covers a national system in Denmark and four major Swedish cities. No financial details were disclosed.
The HSPA+ roadmap is moving rapidly as many carriers look to eke more performance out of their existing infrastructure and spectrum rather than moving too hastily to LTE, which requires new frequencies and a whole new build-out. In the Nordic region, where refarming and 4G auctions have been offered far in advance of most of the world, TeliaSonera is going live with LTE in cities in Sweden and Norway this year; while Net4Mobility, a joint venture between Telenor and Tele2, is working on LTE in Sweden too.
By contrast, 3 is sticking with HSPA for now, and taking advantage of the combination of multicarrier implementation and MIMO smart antennas, which is boosting the network’s peak speeds so rapidly. HSPA+ can reach 28 Mbps using MIMO only but the addition of multicarrier has got it to 42 Mbps already. Huawei has demonstrated 56 Mbps systems and Ericsson has now shown off 84 Mbps, and says the technology can be stretched further over time, to beyond 100 Mbps.
This begs the question of why carriers need LTE at all - the answer, of course, lies in the need for greater capacity, and the economics of an all-IP network. And the operators are not only concerned with capacity but 3G coverage, which remains inadequate in many parts of Europe a decade after licenses were awarded and national penetration targets set by regulators. 3 Scandinavia is planning to expand its 3G coverage by using refarmed 900 MHz GSM spectrum, also in partnership with Ericsson.
Sweden and Finland were among the first countries to allow 2G bands to be adapted for 3G use, a trend that is set to spread across Europe, freeing up new capacity in low frequency bands that are particularly suited to cost effective rural coverage. Telia is rolling out 3G in 900 MHz in Finland already, and Swedish operators gained this right back in March 2009, hard on the heels of the country’s 2.6 GHz auction.
Peder Ramel, CEO of 3 Scandinavia, commented on the three-year contract with Ericsson. He said in a statement: “We were the first to launch turbo 3G in the Nordic region and now we are signing up for the world’s fastest 3G. Our Scandinavian customers are sophisticated users with high demands in terms of mobile broadband services.”
3 Scandinavia is a 60:40 joint venture between Hutchison Whampoa and Sweden-based Investor AB.
Verizon paves the way for usage-based pricing for LTE
By Caroline Gabriel
The LTE operators will be looking to new pricing approaches for their new networks, trying to achieve a better balance between flat rate tariffs and the booming usage of their network capacity. Verizon’s CTO Dick Lynch told The Washington Post that LTE pricing would probably involve a basic flat fee plus usage-based charges for any bandwidth consumed on any LTE-enable device.
The resulting bill could be similar to that for cable service or utility, with a base rate plus premium add-on fees. Increasingly, carriers need to get users accustomed to paying extra for high usage of overstretched wireless capacity; as well as finding ways to support multiple devices within one contract and bill, including portable hotspots like the MiFi or Overdrive.
Whatever the details of LTE billing, the days of all-you-can-eat are ending, and both Verizon Wireless and AT&T are revising their tariff structures for 3G too, to get more value from mobile data. Verizon shook up its prepaid and postpaid price plans last week to get more revenue from exploding data usage. AT&T quickly followed suit. Verizon’s moves are designed to improve the situation where rising data levels, on flat rate contracts, deliver little added value to the carrier. The sop to consumers is that they will be simplified in structure and provide lower unlimited price points for more casual users.
“To me, the future here is about data, and this is about data in my view,” said Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam on an investor call. “It’s the smartphone portfolio teamed together with very simple data pricing.” He added that this was mainly geared to attracting high value customers, “as an on-ramp to LTE”.
Under the new monthly plans, the unlimited price point falls from $99 to $69.99 for unlimited calling or $89.99 for unlimited talk and text. Nationwide Family Share Plans will now have unlimited options for $199.99 for voice, or $149.99 per month for voice and text on just two lines.
Verizon has also sought to simplify its confusing device structure, splitting all but the most basic handsets into three categories - full smartphones, like the BlackBerry and Droid; ‘3G mediaphones’, typically with an HTML browser and the Brew software platform; and ’simple featurephones’. Each category comes with its own distinct data plan, designed to ensure that users of smartphones, which drive high volumes of data consumption, generate greater value for Verizon; while owners of midrange handsets are encouraged, with new entry points, to increase their data usage and possibly upgrade to higher end gadgets.
So, the $9.99 25Mb monthly data tariff is now extended to all 3G ‘mediaphones’, axing the $19.99 option. Customer on featurephones will continue to pay $1.99 per Mb or go for a $9.99 or $29.99 data contract. Consumer data packages for 3G smartphones, including BlackBerry, Windows Mobile and Android devices, will remain at $29.99 per month, but this will be the minimum rate required for using data on a smartphone.
Also in the service of streamlining, as well as lower costs, Verizon plans to reduce the number of devices offered by its stores from 80 to 50, and in future, this number will fall further. This will intensify the competition among handset makers for slots at Verizon, but should generate better volumes and value for the successes. McAdam plans to add 20 new smartphones “down the road”, offering Droid-type capabilities. These will run a mixture of BlackBerry, Android and, reportedly, iPhone and LiMO systems.
Verizon has always been wary of flat rate prepaid plans, but it has changed its mind, offering the new Prepaid Monthly Unlimited Talk plan, at $74.99 a month, compared to $69.99 for the same plan on contract. There is also a prepaid talk/text option for $94.99. Previously, the cheapest unlimited plan was $99.99. McAdam said this still showed Verizon charging a premium for its network quality and brand, but it would be able to compete with unlimited carriers too.
Over at AT&T Mobility, the response to Verizon’s changes was swift. Within nine hours, the number two cellco had brought its rates into line with its arch-rival’s, as it accelerates the upgrade of its 3G network to HSPA. AT&T has slashed $30 off its monthly single-line, unlimited calling plans for featurephones, now $70 a month. Two-line family plans will include unlimited calling at $120 per month, down from $200, plus an additional $20 per month for texting on single lines, $30 for family plans.
For its ‘quick messaging devices’ - the AT&T equivalent of Verizon’s midrange ‘mediaphones’ - customers will have to sign up for an unlimited messaging plan as well as just voice, so tariffs for these products will start at $90 per month for a single line. The QMDs are to have an enhanced position in AT&T’s portfolio this year, and the firm has introduced new operating systems such as Brew to the range.
Smartphone users will be able to purchase unlimited voice and data for $100 per month, plus an unlimited messaging option for another $20. The new plans will be available to both new and existing customers, though the latter will not be required to extend their current contracts.
Sprint and Verizon show 4G devices, while Clearwire opens in Spain
By Caroline Gabriel
The US claims two of the biggest 4G flagwavers in the world, Clearwire for WiMAX and Verizon Wireless for LTE, and both were showing off their wares at the Consumer Electronics Show last week, while Clearwire was also announcing a live network in Spain.
The operator, which is backed by Sprint, Intel, Google and three cablecos, was providing WiMAX coverage, and device rentals, at the show, having recently gone live in Las Vegas. And various WiMAX devices made their debut, including Sprint’s Overdrive portable hotspot, which connects up to five Wi-Fi gadgets via a shared mobile broadband connection.
In terms of real experience, WiMAX certainly upstaged LTE, especially as the major cellcos were scarcely visible at CES, apart from Verizon issuing an update on LTE progress. This is despite the fact that both WiMAX and LTE will rely heavily on non-phone devices for their success and to differentiate their services, as wireless becomes embedded in a wide range of CE products.
The importance of Clearwire’s high profile at the show, then, was not really about its choice of WiMAX, although this is indeed the first of the truly broadband mobile standards. It was more about sending a signal that the WiMAX community is ready for the new age of ubiquitous wireless, cloud services and anywhere internet access. This community is dominated by carriers seeking to steal a march on their rivals by taking an early position in this new world, whether directly or via a partnership with a WiMAX network owner (like Sprint’s with Clearwire).
Sprint’s CEO Dan Hesse was pursuing this theme in an investor update last week. He said that WiMAX would be “enormously important” for the company this year, and that “2010 is the year of 4G for Sprint”. This is because Sprint will be able to hold mobile broadband tariffs stable by offering more capacity, plus device choices like the new Overdrive portable hotspot, but its cost of delivery of broadband should be lower, the more traffic goes over WiMAX rather than 3G.
The Overdrive is one of a new breed of gadgets that allows a broadband connection to be shared between various devices, usually via Wi-Fi. The Novatel MiFi has been a popular example in 3G, but arch-rival Sierra Wireless has come up with the Overdrive for Sprint/Clearwire. It shares a WiMAX link between up to five Wi-Fi enabled products, or connects via EV-DO where the 4G network is not available.
This increases the value of a mobile broadband subscription, and doing this via WiMAX rather than 3G gives Sprint a clear competitive edge where that network is available, because the bandwidth and capacity will support more devices and a better experience. Such routers can be used as ad hoc hotspots for multiple users, or to connect a range of different gadgets such as netbooks, gaming consoles or cameras, as well as phones. Sprint said WiMAX was sufficient to support HD video or audio streaming simultaneously with web surfing and games playing.
The Overdrive will be sold at from January 10 in 10 markets, via Best Buy, whose CEO was also at the event. It will cost $100 after a $50 mail-in rebate, with two-year contract for Sprint’s 3G/4G data service, whose prices start at about $60 a month. Sprint now offers the Clearwire service in 27 markets across the US.
As Clearwire itself has seen with its own router from Cradlepoint, such devices not only enhance the perceived value of a broadband subscription and encourage users to commit to contracts, but bring the huge base of Wi-Fi enabled devices into the WiMAX fold, so that customers do not have to wait until they have a WiMAX laptop or MID before they invest in a connection.
Although the Overdrive garnered plenty of attention in Las Vegas, the biggest Clearwire news of the week came from the other side of the Atlantic, where the carrier launched WiMAX services in the Spanish city of Malaga. Although Clearwire owns spectrum in many parts of Europe, and even runs networks in some places such as Ireland and Denmark, this is its first standards-based WiMAX operation to go commercial in the continent.
It is likely to look for wholesale partners/investors, as in the US, and also to use its Spanish deployments as a proof of concept for mobile broadband in the 3.5 GHz band. Although this spectrum is available and affordable in many regions, it has been considered expensive for mobile deployments because of its short range, but as operators look to smaller cells for urban build-outs, it is gaining new interest, and Clearwire hopes to tap into this.
The Malaga offering covers 600,000 people so far, under the Instanet brand, and promises average download speeds of 3 Mbps to 6 Mbps, with peaks of 10 Mbps, at tariffs from €29.90 a month.
Clearwire CEO Bill Morrow also confirmed what he has previously hinted - that he is actively courting further wholesale partners and MVNOs to join Sprint and the cablecos. He told news agency Reuters that T-Mobile USA, Leap Wireless and MetroPCS could “make sense as partners” despite their competition with Sprint and also said Clearwire was in talks with further cablecos, satellite operators, smaller telcos and consumer electronics companies for wholesale partnerships. He added that the network would be ramped up to support a wider range of MVNOs.
Meanwhile, on the LTE front, Verizon Wireless demonstrated various device prototypes at CES to whet the appetite for the upcoming standard, as well as showing apps such as streaming video and live videoconferencing. The carrier said it was also collaborating with partners, notably Ericsson, for vertical market applications in areas such as the enterprise or healthcare - expected to be an important additional revenue stream, to top up consumer broadband income.
The videoconferencing demo used portable units from Creative Labs, which replaced Wi-Fi and Ethernet in its InPerson system with LTE. It is working to shrink InPerson products and incorporate an LTE module based on its Zii chip to make live videoconferencing fully mobile. In another demo, the movie Up was streamed in 1080p HD video over LTE at 4Mbps to a small tablet made by Motorola, with a processor from Nvidia, embedded LTE, and a user interface from Innovative Converged Devices.
Ericsson and Huawei bicker over Nordic region’s LTE headstart
By Caroline Gabriel
Late last year, TeliaSonera won the laurels that most thought would go to Verizon or DoCoMo, of the first live LTE network, admittedly a small one, covering the downtown area of Swedish capital Stockholm. Although Telia is working with both Ericsson and Huawei on its trials, this system runs on the local vendor’s kit, but shortly afterwards a row broke out between the suppliers over their various Scandinavian networks.
TeliaSonera customers are being issued with Samsung LTE dongles to test the network. Kenneth Karlberg, president and head of mobility services at Telia, said: “Thanks to the successful cooperation with Ericsson we can offer 4G to our customers in Stockholm earlier than originally planned.” A commercial launch of the trial network in Oslo, Norway, supplied by Huawei, will follow soon.
The carrier plans to expand its LTE reach to Sweden’s 25 largest cities and vacation areas, and Norway’s four largest cities, in 2010. The capital expenditure for this will amount to SEK500m ($70m). It will also kick off a pilot LTE network in Finland in the first quarter, in its 2.6 GHz spectrum acquired in the recent auction. All three of these Baltic countries have been ahead of the curve in selling 2.6 GHz licenses, enabling the early shift to commercial 4G services, in contrast to the hesitant process towards opening up new frequencies in the major western European economies.
In parallel with the LTE roll-out, TeliaSonera also promises “extensive expansion of our Turbo 3G [HSPA] networks to increase coverage and capacity”. Like most 3G carriers looking to introduce LTE to their networks at an early stage, Telia will go for an overlay approach, with a common IP core integrating 2G, 3G and 4G systems.
It stressed that it has not confirmed which suppliers will provide the networks for the national roll-outs. “Evaluation of suppliers for TeliaSonera’s common 4G core network and radio networks in the Nordic and Baltic countries is in progress and vendors will be selected in the beginning of 2010,” said TeliaSonera’s head of mobility services, Kenneth Karlberg. “Choosing Ericsson and Huawei was a result of what vendors were available at the time for these two cities. The next deal is for a bigger roll-out… and now there are more vendors that can provide LTE equipment - the evaluation should be completed in January.”
To attract users to the Oslo and Stockholm networks, Telia is offering ultralow introductory pricing. In Stockholm, consumers signing up for a 12-month contract pay just SEK4 ($0.56) a month until July 1 2010. They receive the Samsung dongle free, with a free upgrade to Samsung’s multimode 3G/LTE dongle when it is available in the second quarter next year. From July, customers will pay SEK599 ($83) per month for 30 Gb of data, and the modem will be charged as an extra, as yet unspecified, fee. In Oslo, the same procedure applies, except the initial monthly cost until April 1 2010 is NOK1 ($0.17), after which time the monthly tariff is increased to NOK699 ($120).
Mikael Bäckström, Ericsson’s president for the Nordic and Baltic regions, told Total Telecom : “In the Nordic market in general there is a big uptick in users and revenues when it comes to mobile broadband. It is a competitive market also, so being able to offer more bandwidth, more capacity and higher speeds than your competitors is important.” He claims customers will experience speeds of 20 Mbps to 80 Mbps and this will increase as the network is optimized, adding that LTE will enable new revenue streams from enterprise services, and will “enable governments to take services that were only accessible using the fixed line internet, and make them available on the mobile, and offer a more advanced service.”
Huawei may not have grabbed the kudos of providing the first live LTE system, but it quickly claimed that its Oslo trial network had reached peak download speeds of 96 Mbps, compared to 44 Mbps on the Ericsson system in Stockholm. This bit of one-upmanship becomes rather less interesting when you realize that the Oslo network uses 20 MHz of spectrum - the channel size usually assumed when LTE performance statistics are quoted, but in reality rarely available to cellcos. By contrast, the Stockholm build-out has only the more common 10 MHz. The Oslo network goes live this month.
Huawei has also won another LTE deal right in Ericsson’s home country, with Sweden’s Net4Mobility, a joint venture between Nordic carriers Tele2 and Telenor. It aims to start rolling out LTE in 2010 and cover 99% of the Swedish population before the end of 2013, starting with densely populated areas. The deployment also includes a provision to increase the number of 2G base stations for voice traffic by 30% to 50%, to improve coverage indoors and in rural areas (and allow the operator to put off the voice-over-LTE decision for a while).
Unusually, Ericsson issued a statement about its failure to get the contract in its homeland, and was keen to suggest that Huawei had won on price rather than superior performance. “We are of course disappointed that we did not manage to reach an agreement with Net4Mobility … We would very much liked to have delivered this LTE network in our home market. In the negotiation process we went as low as we could in terms of price but it was not enough,” said the firm.
Uplink performance could be LTE’s dark horse advantage
By Caroline Gabriel
In the old days of the Internet, it was all about the downlink, with most activities centered on browsing and downloading. The slower performance of wireless technologies on the uplink did not matter, but increasingly the focus is shifting, as two-way applications like social networking become key drivers of mobile web behavior. As LTE looms on the horizon, then, carriers are interested in its uplink behaviour for the first time, and several companies are trying to enhance its credentials.
In the UK’s ‘Silicon Glen’, Cambridge Consultants is claiming a breakthrough in improving LTE uplink performance, without any changes needed to handsets. This is done with its Duel (Dual-Domain Uplink Equalizer for LTE) receiver technology, an alternative to the conventional receiver design, MMSE. Duel is implemented as an extension to LTE base station receiver designs, providing a set of “unique and highly complex algorithms” that generally run on DSPs, but can also be deployed on FPGAs or ASICs. No changes at the device end are required to gain the performance benefits.
Uplink performance is increasingly important as mobile Internet usage patterns shift from downloading of web information to two-way communication and content generation. But as with all mobile platforms, LTE uplink remains significantly slower than downlink and the high data transfer rates promised by LTE require ideal channel conditions, such as low mobility or high diversity.
Duel, says Cambridge Consultants, improves uplink performance in all channel conditions, by better exploiting the inherent advantages of LTE’s uplink technology, SC-FDMA. It has developed a test platform that includes a conventional MMSE receiver alongside the Duel device to allow their performance to be compared on the same received signal. The test system uses a combination of devices from Cambridge Consultants’ proprietary Viper development platform and from partner picoChip.
The SC-FDMA technology is the most novel aspect of the LTE standard, and the most important area where it differs significantly from fellow 4G platform WiMAX. In many ways, the two systems are technically very similar, and both use OFDMA on the downlink, but while WiMAX also uses this technology for upload, LTE combines two approaches. LTE proponents believe SC-FDMA is more efficient for fast uploads and good coverage because of its multipath qualities, but also that it conserves battery power better than OFDMA. It allows devices to transmit low power signals without the need for expensive power amplifiers. SC-FDMA resembles OFDMA in many ways, but it splits and recombines uplink transmissions on a single channel, which is a low power approach that could be important in counteracting the otherwise power hungry nature of early 4G silicon. It uses a Fourier transform to convert OFDMA’s separate subcarriers on separate frequencies into a different, time-domain, form, which could improve its operation at high mobility.
While companies like Beceem are working on improvements to WiMAX’ uplink too - the chip designer released its 4G Turbo, with enhanced uplink reach and performance a key feature - the next WiMAX standard, 802.16m, is expected to use SC-FDMA for its uplink modulation too, to take advantage of its reduced peak-to-average power ratio, which is high in OFDM technologies.