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Wire & Cable ASIA – July/August 2016
Telecomnews
Mobile broadband, the white paper
asserted, “is capable of bridging
the digital divide” and offering new
development opportunities: especially
in rural and remote areas where
fixed telecommunications operator
infrastructure is rare, making wireless
the only alternative for bringing
broadband services to the population.
Mr Tomás noted that, according to 5G
Americas, most regulatory agencies
in Latin America have expressed
interest in auctioning spectrum on
the 700MHz band in the near future.
At least eight countries had already
made allocations in the first quarter
of 2016.
Elsewhere in telecom . .
Ø TowerXchange, specialising in
research into the telecom tower
industry, believes that European
telecoms are on the cusp of
a major shift in infrastructure
ownership, to play out over the
next five years.
As reported by Anne Morris
of FierceWireless:Europe (22nd
April), a new TowerXchange study
indicates that 48 per cent of the
mobile towers in Europe will be
owned by independent tower
companies by 2020 as mobile
network operators continue to
divest their infrastructure.
Also on 22nd April, Telefónica
Deutschland became the latest
operator to demonstrate the trend,
with plans to sell almost all of its
mobile towers to Telxius – the
new mobile tower unit set up by
Telefónica in Spain. The German
provider said it will be receiving
$662 million for 2,350 towers.
Ø The 13th Five-Year Plan, as
outlined by China’s legislature,
envisions a total population 85
per cent covered by a mobile
broadband network by 2020, up
from the current 57 per cent.
But Naomi Ng of the South China
Morning Post (24th April) cautioned
that Chinese telecoms and
handset makers face a challenging
year ahead as smartphone
subscriber growth cools.
Competition among operators
and smartphone vendors can
be expected to intensify in
an already saturated market,
pushing companies to evolve
as the country’s economy
undergoes the transition from a
manufacturing-based model to
one led by the service economy.
Analysts told the Post that this
presents an opportunity for
China’s telecom industry; and
Steve Lo, a technology managing
partner with Ernst and Young in
Beijing, noted that the industry
would be receiving significant
support in terms of investment by
the government.
But the increasing rivalry will,
Ms Ng wrote, put pressure on
corporate profits even as it favours
market leaders like state-owned
China Mobile, the world’s largest
wireless network operator by
subscribers.
Ø While Internet usage in Canada
has sharply increased over the
past half-decade, according
to new research from the
Canadian Radio-television and
Telecommunications Commission
(CRTC) only around 33 per cent
of Canadians are satisfied with
the cost of their home Internet
connections; and approximately
that percentage is unhappy about
the speed and reliability of the
service.
As Canadian Internet providers
are among the few in the OECD to
enforce data transmission caps,
respondents to a recent CRTC
survey also complained of a lack
of capacity.
Telecoms Tech reported (1st April)
that OpenMedia campaigns direc-
tor Josh Tabish declared these
findings “unsurprising” since
incumbent Internet providers
dominate more than 90 per cent of
the Canadian market.
Mr Tabish noted that the OECD
ranks Canada 30th among
34 countries in broadband
affordability.
Ø Declaring 2015 “the year IoT
gained legitimacy,” Verizon asserts
that the concept of network
connectivity among physical
objects is now “mainstream”.
In its 24-page report “State of
the Market: Internet of Things
2016”, issued on 5th April, the New
Jersey-based telecom describes a
broadening IoT marketplace, with
“companies across all industries
[now having] IoT squarely on their
radar.”
Thus the projected 17 per cent
jump from 9.7 billion connected
devices in 2014 to more than 25.6
billion in 2019, hitting 30 billion in
2020.
For carriers mulling where to
concentrate their resources,
Mark Bartolomeo, vice president
for IoT connected solutions
at Verizon, identified smart
cities as one of the areas of
greatest need. He cited the
great number of municipalities
demanding “solutions that
address sustainability, safety and
economic growth.”
Ø According to the market research
company Vertical Systems Group
(Norwood, Massachusetts), the
“fibre gap” continued to narrow
in the USA last year as business
fibre penetration in commercial
buildings grew to 46.2 per cent.
(The gap refers to the remaining
commercial buildings without
optical fibre facilities that readily
connect to business network
services.)
The research covered fibre-
connected multi-tenant and
company-owned buildings with
20 or more employees: more than
two million individual business
establishments.
It was found that fibre penetration
increased as network operators
targeted greenfield metro areas
and mid-size multi-tenant
buildings for new installations.
Fibre access to network services
is being pre-built into nearly every
new commercial building across
the USA.
Vertical Systems pronounced
fibre the most widely deployed
access technology for delivery
of carrier Ethernet services in
the USA, increasingly drawn
upon to support higher-speed
hybrid VPNs, cloud and Internet
connectivity; as well as mobile
traffic aggregation and emerging
SDN-enabled Dynamic Network
Connectivity Services (DNCS).