The importance of content, especially video content, delivered on mobile networks can be glimpsed from a new forecast by Ovum. By 2028, about 90 percent of 5G traffic is expected to be video. Between 2019 and 2028, Ovum analysts predict, media and entertainment companies will compete for about [...]

Will 5G allow mobile operators to create speed tiers as fixed networks routinely offer? And, if so, will the differentiated products help create value and differentiation? The notion that 5G retail packages could be created on the model of fixed network services (speed tiers rather than simply [...]

Blockchain is one of those concepts one hears about all the time (artificial intelligence and machine learning also), is likely destined to be important in the communications industry, but in ways that are not always intuitive, or necessarily visible to most practitioners. It is rather akin to [...]

In the era of 5G millimeter wave communications, one long-standing problem in wireless communications will assume new importance: indoor signal coverage. That has gotten to be a bigger issue as mobile communications have migrated up from 800 MHz into the 2-GHz range, and will increase as we [...]

Comcast, AT&T, Reliance Jio and SingTel are among the more-salient tier-one suppliers that aim to recreate their businesses, taking new positions elsewhere in the value chain, rather than relying solely on connectivity revenues. Most telcos will not be able to do so, and many will ridicule [...]

One rule of thumb I use when looking at business model change is to assume that a tier-one service provider will have to replace half its current revenue with new sources every decade. And that might be a reasonable rule for suppliers of apps, platforms, devices and components as well, not just [...]

Virtualization of core and access networks is a key trend that will shape the communications business over the next couple of decades. In the 5G era, as core and access networks are virtualized, it will be possible for service providers, enterprises, app and platform providers to construct [...]

Competition in the Italian mobile market, especially from new entrants who need more spectrum, seems to be driving up 3.6 GHz to 3.8 GHz spectrum prices, which are now being auctioned in Italy. That can be a big problem, as industry executives with long memories can attest. In the past, 3G [...]

Edge computing is almost always touted as a necessity in the 5G era to support ultra-low-latency services, the typical examples being support for autonomous vehicles, remote surgery or even prosaic requirements such as supporting channel changes on video screens supporting ultra-high-definition [...]

India’s mobile service provider industry is highly distressed, where it comes to ability to generate sustainable revenues at a level sufficient to cover its debt.  Airtel’s ability to cover its interest payments is about 0.6 percent. Idea, merging with Vodafone, does not even have that level of [...]

As always, global trends can obscure what is happening in discrete communications markets. That seems to be the case for mobile communications as well. Of the 1.6 billion new mobile internet users between now and 2025, the overwhelming numbers will come from China and India. Account additions [...]

How will communications demand change in the 5G era, if at all? Much depends on how edge computing develops, as that will drive another oscillation in computing architecture, and such changes always have changed demand for data communications.  Changes in computing nearly always have [...]