Posts Tagged ‘3G’
Written on August 31st, 2009 by ADMINno shouts
Smartphones are double-edged swords for carriers. They attract big-spending customers, but tax networks designed for simpler times, explains Fortune.
Independent telecom analyst Chetan Sharma estimates that the typical wireless subscriber consumes 120 megabytes each month; typical iPhone owners use four times that.
And it’s just getting worse. By 2010, global mobile data traffic is expected to exceed 200 terabytes per month, six times last year’s levels, according to Cisco Systems.
“3G networks were not designed effectively for this kind of usage,” says John Donovan, AT&T’s chief technology officer, referring to the current generation of broadband wireless. “We fight the day-to-day guerrilla warfare as the customers move around.”
Many of AT&T’s 60,000 cell towers need to be upgraded, with new 850 MHz gear and backhaul. That could cost billions of dollars, and AT&T has kept a lid on capital spending during the recession. AT&T will delay their LTE upgrade, upgrading its HSPA 3G network from 3.6 Mbps to 7.2 Mbps, instead.
Verizon plans to have 30 US LTE Markets by 2010. Verizon will use their nation-wide 700 MHz band. The carrier hopes to have a data-only LTE trial service available in Seattle and Boston later this year.
It can’t come soon enough. The tsunami is about to hit. Android phones from Samsung, LG, and Motorola are due in stores by early 2010. Motorola will launch their Android portfolio on September 10th. The data-oriented Palm Pre, which operates on Palm’s WebOS platform, is already on Sprint and should be in Verizon stores early next year.
A Cisco Mobile Forecast for 2008-2013 noted that a single high-end data phone today generates more data traffic than 30 basic-feature cell phones, while a single laptop air card generates more data traffic than 450 basic-feature cell phones. Cisco projects that mobile data traffic will increase a thousand-fold over the seven years from 2005 through 2012, with video being a significant component.
AT&T offers free Starbucks WiFi (with a paid data subscription) while Verizon is partnering with Boingo to deliver free WiFi access at hotels, airports, restaurants and coffee shops (with a data plan). PCCW, the Hong Kong operator, has started using Wi-Fi hot spots to ease the load from smartphones and its digital TV service.
AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson has said that the most active 5% or so of data users are causing problems for the other 95%. AT&T is working on a revamped data plan whereby light data users would pay less, and heavy users would pay a premium rate — or leave.
Source: Dailywireless
Written on August 29th, 2009 by ADMINno shouts
Smartphones are double-edged swords for carriers. They attract big-spending customers, but tax networks designed for simpler times, explains Fortune.
Independent telecom analyst Chetan Sharma estimates that the typical wireless subscriber consumes 120 megabytes each month; typical iPhone owners use four times that.
And it’s just getting worse. By 2010, global mobile data traffic is expected to exceed 200 terabytes per month, six times last year’s levels, according to Cisco Systems.
“3G networks were not designed effectively for this kind of usage,” says John Donovan, AT&T’s chief technology officer, referring to the current generation of broadband wireless. “We fight the day-to-day guerrilla warfare as the customers move around.”
Many of AT&T’s 60,000 cell towers need to be upgraded, with new 850 MHz gear and backhaul. That could cost billions of dollars, and AT&T has kept a lid on capital spending during the recession. AT&T will delay their LTE upgrade, upgrading its HSPA 3G network from 3.6 Mbps to 7.2 Mbps, instead.
Verizon plans to have 30 US LTE Markets by 2010. Verizon will use their nation-wide 700 MHz band. The carrier hopes to have a data-only LTE trial service available in Seattle and Boston later this year.
It can’t come soon enough. The tsunami is about to hit. Android phones from Samsung, LG, and Motorola are due in stores by early 2010. Motorola will launch their Android portfolio on September 10th. The data-oriented Palm Pre, which operates on Palm’s WebOS platform, is already on Sprint and should be in Verizon stores early next year.
A Cisco Mobile Forecast for 2008-2013 noted that a single high-end data phone today generates more data traffic than 30 basic-feature cell phones, while a single laptop air card generates more data traffic than 450 basic-feature cell phones. Cisco projects that mobile data traffic will increase a thousand-fold over the seven years from 2005 through 2012, with video being a significant component.
AT&T offers free Starbucks WiFi (with a paid data subscription) while Verizon is partnering with Boingo to deliver free WiFi access at hotels, airports, restaurants and coffee shops (with a data plan). PCCW, the Hong Kong operator, has started using Wi-Fi hot spots to ease the load from smartphones and its digital TV service.
AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson has said that the most active 5% or so of data users are causing problems for the other 95%. AT&T is working on a revamped data plan whereby light data users would pay less, and heavy users would pay a premium rate — or leave.
Source: Dailywireless
Filed under Communication Apps
Tags:3G, 4g, Android, AT&T, LTE, mobile marketing, Motorola, phone, Samsung, Verizon, WIFI destinations
Written on August 19th, 2009 by ADMINno shouts
Lots of interesting developments are happening in India at the moment. The first and the most basic being MNP or Mobile Number Portability finally becoming a reality. For the first time users will be able to move operators and retain their number. This will change the way the users will use their phones. For example most users use their mobiles as secondary phones for making calls while they give their land line numbers to important people. The reason being they are not sure how long they will stick with the current operator. If they change the operator they will get a new number. I think that this will definitely change with MNP.
MNP is not the only thing. Many operators and equipment manufacturers are waiting for the 3G spectrum auction for some time now. The auction was recently postponed for variety of reasons. The auction will let the private operators to bid for the spectrum and they can decide if they want 3G or WiMAX or LTE. The state run MTNL and BSNL have already launched 3G and in Northern India but there have been not many takers yet. Maybe the people are but sceptical right now or maybe the lack of devices. The other thing is that people are maybe not sure if the technology they invest in will be around tomorrow or not.
MTNL is keen to experiment with WiMAX but it does not want to do it alone. There are many companies in India that have developed WiMAX protocol stacks so it may be a boost for these generally small and medium sized companies if WiMAX is deployed by MTNL. The only problem with WiMAX is that there are hardly big global names with any WiMAX devices/equipment. As a reult the prices could be higher and the consumers may have less choice. 3G and LTE will help in this scenario. Qualcomm for example is already looking forward to getting a big chunck of the Indian market.
India has a very big pool of keen technologists and they will whole heartidly embrace mobile broadband and the variety of apps/mobiles but only when they know that there will be stability and reliability. Once the ball starts rolling then the snowball will turn into an avalanche. The question is not if, but when. Source: BlogSpot.com
Written on August 19th, 2009 by ADMINno shouts
Its while now since the launch of the femtocell, the small box in the home that links to the broadband network and provides a mini base station for 3G phones to improve coverage and provide some interesting new services.
UK certainly is positioned well in femtocells which are lead by two companies – ip.access in Cambridge and Ubiquisys in Swindon, UK. PicoChip in Bath is another company which is providing silicon for the vast majority of the 3G femtocell rollouts.
But there is now significant competition, both from new divisions of companies such as Pirelli, established telecoms companies such as Sagem and Alcatel-Lucent (who have joined together to provide the Vodafone femtocell) and large players such as Huawei of China which ships equipment to 60m broadband subscribers and is a major supplier to the Chinese mobile operators.
However there is new factor which start to develop from the past year or so, i.e the factor of energy costs. It’s not a secret for anybody how energy process has soared in the past few years and now the telecoms are getting affected by this as well. Energy costs, both to build and run mobile networks, are getting increasingly important. Operators use a phenomenal amount of power, 400GW – or 200,000 tons of carbon – and over half of this is on the radio access. While this seems a lot, this equates to 25kg per user, or the same as an hour’s drive on the motorway.
There is now research in place in order to study the whole energy chain, from the carbon cost of building the base stations, macrocells and femtocells, to the running costs.
In my view after looking at the femtocells especially at the Green Radio at the Wireless2.0 conference in Bristol recently, it’s not clear whether femtocells are a lower energy solution, even though they provide 
a way of filling in the network at lower cost for the operators. Having a mini base station in your home obviously brings the access point closer for the mobile phone and hence the power consumed may be less. Bit how much of this is true I don’t know.
There is no doubt that energy factor is going to have a significant impact on the design and manufacture of femtocells and traditional mobile phone cells. If, as expected, the market takes off with millions of devices, this is going to have a huge energy cost.
As mentioned by Nick Flaherty in his blog that the carbon emission will also be a challenge for the home grown suppliers to provide low energy solutions, both in operations and also in the manufacturing to provide truly green radio. And this will help the UK expertise and innovation drive green radio technologies and processes into the industry.
There is no choice for the companies to look for the alternative and green solution. As costs of deploying solar and wind power falls and energy costs rise, carriers have started looking toward green cell sites.
Once such company who is taking a lead in this prospect is Alcatel-Lucent. It’s planning to have alternative energy-powered cellsites matches that of electrically powered cell sites, which could prompt a new wave of solar-and wind-powered base stations, even in areas where an electrical connection is available. In my opinion there is no other way round as the cost of traditional energy is increasing manifolds (together with carbon emission), the price of green technology falls and networks become more efficient, using alternative energy to provide all or part of the energy at cell sites is becoming less prohibitive
Alcatel-Lucent has been working with alternative energy in wireless for five years, but it has deployed only 300 sites, mainly in Africa and the Middle East until now, which rely entirely on alternate fuels. But in the last year especially after the recent recession the alternative energy solution become a priority which resulted in a surge in interest in those technologies.
Every body in this credit crunch are finding means to cur the cost and the operators are looking to avoid the enormous costs of transporting diesel to their remote cell.
The recession has certainly given some momentum to the alternative energy cell sites and there is no doubt acceleration towards this genuine cause.
This is purely simple Economics as Electricity is a large part of an operator’s operational budget as it feeds massive quantities of power to a highly distributed network of cell sites to support not just the base station power amplifiers and radios on-site but also the air-conditioning units necessary to power them. The increase in energy costs is being largely offset with the increased power efficiencies of most vendors’ equipment. The huge site cabinets are now getting replaced with compact modular base stations, which not only consume less power but also require far less cooling. The current generation of equipment has cut power consumption between one-third and one-half. Many new radio systems also are coming equipped with energy-saving software, which powers down the base station during non-peak hours or when relatively few customers are on the cell.
Current economic climate and energy efficiency factor will definitely serve to promote green energy sooner rather than push it off to a later date. Furthermore as the market for alternative energy solutions grows in other industries the cost of the technology goes down for telecom, sending the price of solar panels and wind turbines down. Combining the above trend together with regulatory and political environments the alternative energy solution is imminently favorable as a green solution. Source: Blogspot.com
Written on August 3rd, 2009 by ADMINno shouts
On the Road to 4G While the top-of-the-line smartphones of today rely on third-generation wireless networks, carriers are looking ahead to 4G networks, which will facilitate even faster data transfers to and from wireless devices. WiMax and LTE are two of the more talked-about technologies, but their development paths are vary and they may end up doing different jobs. Though most major U.S. wireless carriers today tout the ubiquity of their third-generation, or 3G, wireless networks, they are simultaneously planning for the future, pushing the development of fourth-generation (4G) networks that they hope we’ll all be using in a matter of years. Two of the best-known 4G technologies now on the horizon are WiMax, or Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access; and LTE, or Long Term Evolution. However, these two different technologies will likely take different paths in their development and eventually be used for different applications. Source: http://www.xscx.info/2009/07/on-road-to-4g.html
Written on August 3rd, 2009 by ADMINno shouts
So far we came across the term 3G, because it is the latest wireless technology that is in use today in many parts of US as well in many other developed nations. The many analysis going on regarding 3G and its advancement of 4G and 5G between the group of scientists in IEEE communication society. The basic idea behind this 3G is to augment good old TDM voice with broadband data. So far the international association of wireless telecommunication industry CTIA estimates that only 80% of the penetration is possible as the data need to be the engine of growth if voice market saturated. But 4G will provide both voice and data together under IP umbrella hence extension around wireline to wireless is possible with IP. If we are potentially talking about the 5G, we can have the maximum throughput of 100 Mbps or more; but in case of 4G, we can look up to 300Mbps without loss as LTE is going to be the 4G technology of choice. ource: http://www.dhinawandreaming.com/2009/05/bright-future-of-4g.html
Written on August 3rd, 2009 by ADMINno shouts
Verizon Wireless (NYSE:VZ, NYSE:VOD) is jumping into long-term evolution (LTE), launching its first networks this year, while AT&T (NYSE:T) is taking a little more time, planning its rollout in 2011 and upgrading its 3G network in the interim. In Japan, there’s a similar story. NTT DoCoMo (NYSE:DCM) is as gungho over LTE as is Verizon, but Softbank Mobile appears to be in no hurry. Source: http://telephonyonline.com/wireless/news/3g4g-mobile-broadband-economics-0630/
Written on August 3rd, 2009 by ADMINno shouts
AT&T has announced that the release of the latest iPhone 3.0 firmware has lead to a dramatic increase in its WiFi hotspot usage. Use has increased nearly 41% over the previous quarter, according to AT&T.
The major reason for such a spike, is the fact that the 3.0 firmware update included an easier way for users to login to freely available hotspots sponsored by AT&T at places like Starbucks, McDonalds and other public places.
Before the update, users had to enter their phone number, receive an SMS message with an embedded link, and click the link to be logged into any WiFi network. Now, the iPhone will automatically detect and log a user in automatically. This ease of connection has resonated with consumers, and usage is finally taking off.
AT&T, and other carriers, have been introducing massive WiFi networks to its customers using smartphones in an attempt to save bandwidth on their 3G networks. AT&T in particular has a major need for this shift, given that increased iPhone saturation is putting a major burden on its network.
Any attempt to get users off its network and using WiFi is a win for AT&T- and it’s doing a pretty good job at it. The company said it has already had 25.6 million WiFi connections for 2009, which already surpasses the 20 million times the service was used in all of 2008.
It’s a relatively smart move for a company that’s been receiving plenty of bad press regarding its weathered 3G network and its surge of iPhone data usage. By covering as much ground as possible with WiFi, AT&T is making sure it’s network remains strong- but will it work? Early reports say it’s helping more than expected, but we’ll have to wait and see. Source: http://www.mobilemarketingwatch.com
Written on August 1st, 2009 by ADMINno shouts
3G Americas whitepaper titled, “3GPP Technology Approaches for Maximizing Fragmented Spectrum Allocations”. There are quite a few interesting things that caught my attention. One of them is this section on Digital Dividend Spectrum. Here is what the whitepaper says:
The Digital Dividend refers to the reallocation of significant amounts of spectrum as a result of the switchover from analog to digital TV, a phenomenon occurring across the globe. Historically, analog TV operates in the UHF band between 470-862 MHz.
The analog to digital switchover will free a substantial amount of spectrum for new services, including digital television and mobile broadband.
Mobile services will need at least 100 MHz of this spectrum for mobile broadband. The results of WRC 07 incorporate this vision, as well as the need to promote harmonization of these bands, as reflected in the following above.
As is planned, there is no one globally harmonized Digital Dividend spectrum band. Further, the APAC countries have the flexibility to adopt the Region 1 or Region 2 plans. The important task of promoting harmonization and aligning band plans as far as possible with WRC-07 agreement, in order to realize the benefits of harmonization for their citizens, now falls to policymakers to accomplish.
In fact, the EC recently launched a consultation on Digital Dividend spectrum. Noting that importance of taking prompt action “to prevent the emergence of fragmented national legacy situations” that would stymie the development of future equipment and services in the 800 MHz band, the consultation proposes that the EC undertake two urgent actions by autumn of 2009: (1) Member States that have not completed the digital switchover would be requested to confirm switch off of analogue TV under national law by 1 January 2012; and (2) the EC would draft a Commission decision, for regulatory opinion in the autumn of 2009 and formal adoption at the beginning of 2010, on technical harmonization measures for transitioning the 790-862 MHz band to non-broadcast uses. Source: http://3g4g.blogspot.com/2009/07/digital-dividend-spectrum.html
Credit to 3G Americas for publishing these interesting white papers.
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