Will 5G Be Irrelevant?

Last week I had the privilege to discuss the latest wireless industry trends with colleagues at the RAN and Backhaul conference. We discussed 5G in addition to host of other topics ranging from architecture to virtualization and much in between: spectrum, Het Nets, IoT, etc. As I contemplate the proceedings, I came to wonder about the relevance of 5G!

Today, the focus is on developing consensus on what 5G is and will be: what are the applications and which use cases will it serve? Which technologies and architectures will be best to meet the objectives? Which spectrum it will operate in?  What type of physical layer it will employ? These are but a few questions the ecosystem is debating. But what everyone agrees on is that 5G will support IoT connectivity for a great number ‘things’ in addition to providing better than ever personal broadband connectivity services.

Behind The Headlines: Will Small Cells Thrive Under Spectrum Sharing Regime?

Momentum for spectrum sharing is gathering strength, particularly for the 3.5 GHz band which is slated for small cell deployments. The NTIA has done detailed studies and prioritized this band ahead of other candidates such as 1700 MHz and 4 GHz bands for fast track evaluation.  The FCC followed by issuing a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to solicit comments from stakeholders. So what are some of the details behind the headlines?

How Small Cells Are Reshaping The Wireless Landscape

There’s much talk about small cells these days – on industry news sites, at conferences, in corporate announcements. This is not surprising given that mobile traffic doubles every year and, according to Cisco, will grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 78 percent from 2011 to 2016. Wireless network architecture has relied greatly on macrocells, but with the advent of the small cell era, how will small cells shape the wireless landscape? To answer, consider the following:

Spectrum Sharing: The Wireless Carpool Lane

The vision of urban planners in the late 1940’s and 1950’s was that of a suburban population commuting to work in the main city. People flocked to the suburbs and highways were built to connect suburbs with cities; cars were sold and soon enough the model became unsustainable. More highways were needed and existing ones needed more lanes. The model became prohibitively expensive not to mention rising public awareness to environmental issues resulting from car emissions. Municipalities soon realized the need for solutions to congested highways. One such solution is the carpool lane open to vehicles with more than one passenger. Shared transportation became encouraged: if you car pool, you’ll save time, money and help save the environment.

Wireless communications is similar in many respects. Spectrum is a scarce resource, as much as highway capacity is a limited one. More spectrum has been the mantra to date, much as more and wider highways was thirty years ago. Operator’s message to regulator is a simple one: traffic demand will exceed supply; we need more spectrum; and not all bands will work out for us. This obviously is not sustainable for the long term much as building more highways is.

Small Cells and the Predictability Challenge

Anyone closely involved with small cells base station could not have failed to notice the contentious debate on backhaul capacity requirements. On the one hand, vendors of millimeter wave equipment advocate the need to support peak capacity figures, while on the other hand, vendors of other types of backhaul solution including point-to-multipoint systems point that the peak is rarely if ever achieved in practice.

In Focus: Interference in the 2.4 GHz ISM Band

In my previous blog entry, I set out to answer the question of how much WiFi is deployed. Here, I like to focus on the question of interference.  Unfortunately, I think there are fewer studies that characterize WiFi usage and interference than there ought to be. I will show here a few of the results and conclusions and present my own model and take on interference.

How Much WiFi Is Out There?

The success of WiFi is nothing short of outstanding. Who would have thought that wireless network operators would adopt the technology and deploy WiFi access nodes in their tens of thousands to off-load their wide area networks? But with more carrier WiFi being rolled out in addition to your typical enterprise and personal access nodes, how much WiFi is out there? How much interference does it generate? And what does that say about the future when it comes to unlicensed band spectrum utilization?

Challenges & Impediments to Implementing Spectrum Sharing

There are several problems to overcome in making spectrum sharing a reality. Some are technical but more often than not, it is easier to overcome those hurdles than commercial ones. So what are those challenges? And when can we expect to resolve them to make spectrum sharing a reality?

Under the Microscope: AT&T’s Nextwave Acquisition

In the most recent deal, AT&T filed to acquire Nextwave’s WCS (Wireless Communication Services) and AWS (Advanced Wireless Services) assets for $650 million. The bulk of this deal is about the WCS band, so what is this deal about and what does AT&T get for the money?

Aligning Mobile Services with Spectrum Properties: Information Showers

One essence of wireless communication does not change: the reliance on spectrum availability. The frequency spectrum is endowed with different features and characteristics that make trade-offs a necessity. One trade-off is that between data rate and mobility. The lower part of the frequency spectrum which is most amenable for mobile services due to economic reasons aggregate in a few gigahertz below the 6 GHz band. By comparison, the entire 60 GHz band features up to 9 GHz of spectrum where atmospheric absorption limits the range of propagation to short distances. As bandwidth correlate with throughput, we achieve much higher data rates at the higher frequency bands which are unfortunately less amenable to mobility services. So, how to bridge this divide?