Turning Mobile into Mobile Broadband for everyone
By Johan Jemdahl
In Q3 2015, Nigeria was among the top five countries worldwide in terms of mobile subscription additions, and Nigerian businesses are increasingly adopting mobile-first strategies. But, while 4G LTE deployments began in some sub Saharan countries the transition and deployment in Nigeria hasn’t come out of the starting blocks, subscriptions were predominantly still GSM and WCDMA in 2015. This is expected to change rapidly as we look towards 2021, when the mobile broadband access options, WCDMA/HSPA and LTE, will account for almost 80 percent of subscriptions. So, how do we get there from here? How will mobile operators leverage the reach, maturity and increasing affordability of today’s 3G technology, while continuing to invest in their LTE rollouts, to deliver mobile broadband for everyone? Logically, many operators start by leveraging their existing 2G GSM network assets. GSM coverage supports basic mobile telephony services such as voice, SMS and low-speed data and there are still hundreds of thousands of legacy GSM sites worldwide. Today, 3G capabilities can be added to an existing site while reusing the 2G antennas, power, transport and shelter, already in place, effectively overlaying a 3G deployment on an existing 2G site. Reusing resources, through this intelligent antenna sharing (see image) can reduce the operator’s total cost of ownership by more than 60 percent compared with building a conventional 3G site, and enables accelerated rollout of 3G technologies. And, because 3G WCDMA supports voice traffic, the GSM spectrum can be refarmed. Once refarmed, the installed GSM transmission hardware becomes redundant and can be removed. So, the resulting GSM+WCDMA configuration has no additional power requirements, or associated operating costs, compared to the original GSM configuration. In addition to expanding the reach of mobile broadband, operators are also challenged to satisfy growing demand in areas where 3G coverage is already in place. One way to do this is through an approach called “flow of users”, which consists of WCDMA software features, parameter settings and recommended radio access bearers. The basic premise is to enable a good flow of smartphones through the operator’s WCDMA system starting when a user, or an app, activates the radio connection and moves from the dormant state to the active state. The flow of users approach ensures that there are not too many simultaneous users active, and the result is that each consumer experiences much better service. But, equally important is the fact that, since uploads and downloads are quicker, users also leave the active state sooner, thereby enabling more users to be admitted to the network, while still benefitting from the improved bitrates and overall service level. Using this systematic approach, operators can double mobile broadband downlink throughput and increase data uplink throughput by up to 200% while improving the quality of voice services, even in highly dense urban areas. And, these performance improvements can be achieved with no additional hardware requirements. By industrializing the flow of users approach and applying it to cell sites throughout the network, the network also becomes self-optimizing. This minimizes the requirements for the operator to configure and tune the network – it essentially becomes “zero touch” – thereby reducing associated operating costs, while still realizing optimal network performance and user experience. A recent ConsumerLab survey of internet users in Nigeria found that 83 percent of mobile phone subscribers rely solely on their mobile device for their internet connectivity. With growing smartphone ownership and a lack of fixed broadband availability, mobile broadband will continue to be the most common way to connect to the internet. So, it will become increasingly important to bring mobile broadband to everyone. By optimizing the performance, efficiency and reach of their 3G mobile broadband coverage in areas where LTE is not available, operators can complement their LTE rollouts with 3G WCDMA to address mobile broadband demand, open up internet access to more people, and satisfy smartphone users across the country. Johan Jemdahl, is the Managing Director, Ericsson Nigeria
Read more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2016/02/turning-mobile-into-mobile-broadband-for-everyone/
In Q3 2015, Nigeria was among the top five countries worldwide in terms of mobile subscription additions, and Nigerian businesses are increasingly adopting mobile-first strategies. But, while 4G LTE deployments began in some sub Saharan countries the transition and deployment in Nigeria hasn’t come out of the starting blocks, subscriptions were predominantly still GSM and WCDMA in 2015. This is expected to change rapidly as we look towards 2021, when the mobile broadband access options, WCDMA/HSPA and LTE, will account for almost 80 percent of subscriptions. So, how do we get there from here? How will mobile operators leverage the reach, maturity and increasing affordability of today’s 3G technology, while continuing to invest in their LTE rollouts, to deliver mobile broadband for everyone? Logically, many operators start by leveraging their existing 2G GSM network assets. GSM coverage supports basic mobile telephony services such as voice, SMS and low-speed data and there are still hundreds of thousands of legacy GSM sites worldwide. Today, 3G capabilities can be added to an existing site while reusing the 2G antennas, power, transport and shelter, already in place, effectively overlaying a 3G deployment on an existing 2G site. Reusing resources, through this intelligent antenna sharing (see image) can reduce the operator’s total cost of ownership by more than 60 percent compared with building a conventional 3G site, and enables accelerated rollout of 3G technologies. And, because 3G WCDMA supports voice traffic, the GSM spectrum can be refarmed. Once refarmed, the installed GSM transmission hardware becomes redundant and can be removed. So, the resulting GSM+WCDMA configuration has no additional power requirements, or associated operating costs, compared to the original GSM configuration. In addition to expanding the reach of mobile broadband, operators are also challenged to satisfy growing demand in areas where 3G coverage is already in place. One way to do this is through an approach called “flow of users”, which consists of WCDMA software features, parameter settings and recommended radio access bearers. The basic premise is to enable a good flow of smartphones through the operator’s WCDMA system starting when a user, or an app, activates the radio connection and moves from the dormant state to the active state. The flow of users approach ensures that there are not too many simultaneous users active, and the result is that each consumer experiences much better service. But, equally important is the fact that, since uploads and downloads are quicker, users also leave the active state sooner, thereby enabling more users to be admitted to the network, while still benefitting from the improved bitrates and overall service level. Using this systematic approach, operators can double mobile broadband downlink throughput and increase data uplink throughput by up to 200% while improving the quality of voice services, even in highly dense urban areas. And, these performance improvements can be achieved with no additional hardware requirements. By industrializing the flow of users approach and applying it to cell sites throughout the network, the network also becomes self-optimizing. This minimizes the requirements for the operator to configure and tune the network – it essentially becomes “zero touch” – thereby reducing associated operating costs, while still realizing optimal network performance and user experience. A recent ConsumerLab survey of internet users in Nigeria found that 83 percent of mobile phone subscribers rely solely on their mobile device for their internet connectivity. With growing smartphone ownership and a lack of fixed broadband availability, mobile broadband will continue to be the most common way to connect to the internet. So, it will become increasingly important to bring mobile broadband to everyone. By optimizing the performance, efficiency and reach of their 3G mobile broadband coverage in areas where LTE is not available, operators can complement their LTE rollouts with 3G WCDMA to address mobile broadband demand, open up internet access to more people, and satisfy smartphone users across the country. Johan Jemdahl, is the Managing Director, Ericsson Nigeria
Read more at: http://www.vanguardngr.com/2016/02/turning-mobile-into-mobile-broadband-for-everyone/
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