Mobile cellular networks have always been built on the principle of frequency reuse, the ability to increase capacity of a radio network by subdividing use of available frequencies within a coverage area. A simple way to explain this is how a cellular network and a tV broadcast network use [...]

Many mobile service provider executives have professed concern about the business model for 5G, which might be considered misplaced, given industry history. That makes sense for the net new use cases and revenue models that might be possible: those business models must be built. source: [...]

Somes a bug can be a feature. Consider atmospheric attenuation of radio frequency signals at 60 GHz, At that frequency, oxygen in the atmosphere attenuates about 98 percent of the emitted energy. That limits coverage. So it might be paradoxical that Terragraph is working to commercialize use of [...]

Some storylines are irresistible, even if wrong. Slow U.S. 5G speeds provide an example. A classic storyline about U.S. telecommunications is “U.S. is behind,” and, so far, 5G fits that model. source” Opensignal Author Steven Pressfield, in his book Nobody Wants to Read Your Sh*t, points [...]

Since the 3G era, potential new use cases enabled by the latest mobile platform or generation have tended to lag by about a decade. If we know anything from our history with 3G and 4G, it is that many promised and promoted new use cases might well not occur until the succeeding generation. Many [...]

At a recent session of the PTC Academy, APTelecom President Sean Bergin starkly contrasted the choices connectivity providers (telcos and others) now face. As demand for traditional connectivity services continues to decline, service providers face two basic choices: stick to the core business [...]

What does your business look like if the key constraint is removed? It is a question so challenging–and often so seemingly impossible–that most of us never ask it. Most connectivity service providers, though, have had to grapple with the business implications of nearly-free [...]

End user demand for various connectivity services changes over time, but typically when some new need arises. Or when major suppliers decide to push its use. 5G will not be different, as has been the case for mobility in the past and for fixed network broadband as well. Since 5G requires new [...]

All of us are by now used to the idea that Wi-Fi access inside buildings is supplied by the building tenant or resident, not a communications service provider. In the 5G era, it is possible that something similar will arise, in most locations other than large public venues, for 5G indoor [...]

In purely technical terms, every digital mobile generation (3G, 4G, 5G) has produced an order of magnitude increase in bandwidth and an order of magnitude decrease in latency. Each next-generation network has used more advanced coding and modulation, partly responsible for the increased [...]

Despite lots of presently-hypothetical use cases, much of the early enterprise demand for 5G still relies on the traditional value of “more capacity,” even if the long-term value will tend to be built around latency performance. New enterprise use cases will develop, but require the [...]

With the caveat that industry professionals can be quite wrong about the future, there is a fairly substantial consensus on the value of 5G for end users. Industry professionals expect “speed” to be the top driver of value for consumer end users, but latency performance is the [...]