Mobile & Wireless Roundup #50

Welcome to the 50th edition of this newsletter. Many people do not understand that most wireless technologies, including mobile, offer best effort services. Wikipedia describes this as follows: “Best-effort delivery describes a network service in which the network does not provide any guarantee that data is delivered or that delivery meets any quality of service.” In even simpler terms, a mobile network delivers what it can whenever it can.

This came up because someone asked me during the week why I didn’t do a newsletter last weekend. Because the newsletters are also best effort services ??. Sometimes life decides to throw a spanner in your plans and some things get dropped. Having dropped an edition does not mean I dropped all the news from last week, most of the interesting ones I saw made it in this one.

Having missed couple of newsletters during the year, this 50th edition also makes it a year since this newsletter was launched. Initially I wasn’t sure how long I might continue, but as I realised the benefit to my own work and picked-up a tailored newsletter for a client, I guess this will continue for a foreseeable future.

For those of you who don’t know me, I am a technologist with over 24 years’ experience in mobile wireless technology, currently working as an independent advisor, analyst, consultant and a trainer. This newsletter is a summary of my posts and others news that caught my attention since the last newsletter.

? 6G

• Free 6G Training: ITU-R Releases 'Wheel diagram' and 'Palette diagram' for IMT-2030 (link)
• Free 6G Training: Ericsson's Keynote at EuCNC & 6G Summit 2023 on '6G – Connecting a cyber-physical world' (link)
• Dean Bubley on LinkedIn: “You can expect to see the diagrams below a lot over the next few years. They represent the culmination of the ITU's work to date on defining usage scenarios and key capabilities / KPIs of #6G, officially called the Recommendation Framework for IMT-2030…” (link)
• Samsung Research: All Set for 6G! (link)
• A Vision and An Evolutionary Framework for 6G: Scenarios, Capabilities and Enablers (link)

? 5G

• The 3G4G Blog: Small Data Transmission (SDT) in LTE and 5G NR (link)

• Ookla Insights: Combating 5G Battery Drain Concerns (link)
• Fierce Wireless: 5G uplink trial makes waves with addition of third transmit antenna (link)
• Light Reading: Huawei has a 5.5G problem (link)
• OpenSignal: Benchmarking the Global 5G Experience — June 2023 (link)
• Light Reading: AT&T to deploy network tech to aid 5G battery life (link)

? 4G/LTE

• TelecomTV: India’s Jio unveils $12 internet-enabled phone alongside low-cost 4G service plans aiming to attract the 250 million people in India who, until now, have only been able to afford 2G services (link)

? 2G/3G

• New Zealand operator 2degrees to close 3G services late 2025 (link)

? Open & Disaggregated Networks (including Open RAN, vRAN, etc.)

• Light Reading: HPE boasts algorithm to cut open RAN energy use (link)

? Spectrum

• Dean Bubley on LinkedIn: “Hybrid spectrum-sharing could be the answer for the upper-6GHz conundrum. That's the theme Ofcom is looking at in a new consultation…” (link)
• Commsupdate - 5G Frequency Frenzy: A Guide to Latin America’s Upcoming Spectrum Auctions (link)
• Tefficient on Twitter: “Yonhap reports that the South Korean government will set to reserve price in the upcoming 28 GHz 5G auction to just 30% of the price that SK Telecom, KT and LG U+ paid. All their 28 GHz licenses were revoked due to insufficient rollout in the band…” (link)
• My discussion on LinkedIn and Twitter about the naming of spectrum in 5G and 6G.

? Private Networks

• Private Networks Technology Blog: Telia's Tactical Networks for Defence and Peacekeeping (link)

• Network World: Private 5G/LTE growing more slowly than expected (link)
• Mobile Time: Brazil has 128 private cellular networks (link - Portugese) – LinkedIn discussion here.
• Dean Bubley on LinkedIn: “There's a growing divergence in optimism and attitude about #privatenetworks in the US vs. Europe…” (link)
• Different kinds of mobile networks: public, private and hybrid networks (link)
• Light Reading: Apple gives the private wireless 5G industry a helping hand (link)
• Gov.uk Open consultation: Call for Information on the uses and security of Private Telecommunications Networks within the UK (link)
• Light Reading: Orange Business uses 5G SA for French hybrid private network (link)
• RCR Wireless: Industrial 5G vs 5G-for-industry – making sense of a two-speed private 5G market (link)

? Telecoms Infrastructure, Small Cells, Antennas & others

• An interesting discussion on BBU on LinkedIn, with many interesting comments (link) – worth pointing out that the post has been plagiarised from here.
• CCS Insight: UK Operators Dial Up Coverage at Major Events (link)
• Dell’Oro: RAN Market to Decline at a 1 Percent CAGR Through 2027, According to Dell’Oro Group (link)

? IoT / M2M / Smart Homes

• Connectivity Technology Blog: Is LTE Cat 1bis Uniting the Fragmented Cellular IoT Market? (link)
• RCR Wireless: A question of money – why all private-5G hopes are pinned on RedCap (link)
• Deutsche Telekom: Digital helpers for the church (link)

? Virtualization, Cloud & Edge

• VMO2 blog post on Google Cloud: Modernizing telecommunications and keeping the UK connected (link) – HT TMN

? Security & Privacy

• The Record: Hackers claim to take down Russian satellite communications provider (link)
• ZeroHedge: French Cops Can Now Secretly Activate Phone Cameras, Microphones And GPS To Spy On Citizens (link)

? Smartphones, Devices, Wearables & Gadgets

• CCS Insight: Second-Hand Smartphone Sales Surpass $13 Billion in 1Q23, Curbed by Low Supply (link)

? AI, ML & Automation

• ETSI's Operational Co-ordination Group on Autonomous Networks (OCG AN) released a whitepaper “Unlocking Digital Transformation with Autonomous Networks” (link)

? Satellites, HAPS, Drones, UAVs & Space

• Telstra: We’re working with Starlink to connect more people in remote Australia (link)

? Metaverse & Extended Reality (XR)

• Light Reading: China Mobile fires up metaverse with alliance partners (link)
• 9to5Google Report: Samsung XR headset delayed ‘up to six months’ as a result of Apple Vision Pro (link)
• The Nation: Lessons From the Catastrophic Failure of the Metaverse (link)

? Sustainability

• Peter Elvidge on LinkedIn: “Three things I learned from GreeningofStreaming last week that changed my views: 1: Lowering streaming bitrate does not reduce carbon impact of networks. 2: Substantially more environmental impact from device production than use. 3: Saving energy during encoding may use exponentially more energy during decoding…” (link) – Dean Bubley continues this discussion here.

? Other News and Technology Stuff

• Global LiFi firms welcome the release of IEEE 802.11bb global light communications standard (link)
• Allan T. Rasmussen on LinkedIn: “Who said telcos only know how to make money on minutes and megabytes - Telenor is milking their most loyal customers with a payment trap” (link)
• FT: Mukesh Ambani seeks winning edge over Disney in India’s streaming battle (link)
• Light Reading: 3GPP moving to prevent power grab by Apple, others (link) – LinkedIn discussion here.
• Bloomberg: New EV Battery Materials Will Beget New Dilemmas (link)

? Picture of the week: Starlink (and other LEO satellite services soon) is making a huge impact for many different people in different parts of the world. In Africa for example countries after countries are getting an option to connect to the internet via Starlink. Nigeria first and now Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Zambia, etc. I included a Tweet from Ben Wood previously about how businesses in festivals are using Starlink for card payments backup if/when mobile connection fails. Climbingvan has a nice article looking at how campervan are using Starlink to access high-speed internet from anywhere. The picture today is a collage of Starlink receivers from Ben Wood’s Tweet and Climbingvan’s article. I find it fascinating how LEO satellites are making a huge impact for providing connectivity to people who could afford it but had no good options. It will be a lot more fun once they have a lot more options available.

Happy to hear your thoughts. Feel free let me know what worked, what didn’t, how I can make this better, etc. Get in touch over LinkedIn!

PDF version of this and previous newsletters are available here.