Press releases
Welcome to our press release page, containing extracts from our analysis of wireless technology and the wireless industry .
For more information on any of our press releases, or to discuss the implications for your business, please call us on +44 (0) 1480 819391 or email contact@unwiredinsight.com.
Press release: 3G traffic volumes will increase 20-fold by 2014, says Unwired Insight
3G operators must be able to support huge increases in mobile data traffic over the next few years, according to a new report from Unwired Insight. The report, entitled ‘Will 3G Networks Cope?’, shows that 3G traffic volumes will rise to unprecedented levels, and some 3G operators will not be able to cope.
Behind the satisfaction of mobile operator executives over the success of mobile broadband services lies an uneasy concern over the implications of continued take-up of such services. Unwired Insight has developed models that forecast, for the first time, realistic future 3G traffic levels and network capacities, to determine if 3G networks are going to be able to cope. The new report provides disturbing reading.
“3G networks have nowhere near the capacity of fixed broadband networks and some 3G networks will quickly become swamped by traffic,” says co-author Dr Alastair Brydon
Key findings of the new report are:
- With the vast majority of cellular users still supported by 2G networks, 3G networks have been underutilised. This is about to change, as cellular users rapidly migrate to 3G services. 3G penetration will reach 120.1% of the population in developed markets by 2014. By this date, 3G will account for over 90% of all cellular (2/2.5/3G) handsets and terminals.
- Mobile broadband services will account for the largest proportion of 3G traffic volumes, and will be one of the biggest challenges for 3G operators. While USB modems and datacards will represent only 16% of 3G devices, they will contribute 73.5% of all 3G data usage by 2014.
- Smartphones, such as the Apple iPhone, will continue to generate significantly higher data usage than more basic mobile phones. The attractive services enabled by smartphones will cause their proportion of the total number of 3G devices to increase from 8% at the end of 2008 to 36% at the end of 2014.
- The overall mix of wireless network traffic will change significantly between 2009 and 2014, with traffic-intensive data services dominating the mix. By 2014, data services will account for 99.4% of all service usage. Video streaming and downloads will contribute the largest proportions of total data usage, at 56.4% in 2014. This is because video services will require a relatively high data rate and will be popular services, being adopted by many users and used for a significant period of time.
“On average, 3G networks will need to support over 1GB per month of traffic per user,” says co-author Dr Mark Heath. “While such usage is perfectly manageable for fixed broadband networks, most HSPA networks will not be able to support anywhere near this level,” he warns.
The new report ‘Will 3G Networks Cope?’ published by Unwired Insight addresses one of the biggest concerns within the mobile industry, as to whether 3G networks will be able to cope with future increases in 3G traffic volumes.
The report gets to grips with this critical issue by quantifying how 3G network capacity and 3G traffic will evolve over the next five years. The report contains 120 pages, 29 figures, 18 tables and 30 000 words. For more information, or to buy the report, click here, email contact@unwiredinsight.com or telephone +44 (0) 1480 819391. Dr Alastair Brydon and Dr Mark Heath are authors of more than 40 reports on key issues in the mobile industry.
A free whitepaper associated with the report is available to download from the Unwired Insight website.
Press release: LTE may be too little too late, says Unwired Insight
A new report from Unwired Insight, entitled ‘Will 3G Networks Cope?’, shows that the relentless growth of 3G traffic volumes will create a 3G network capacity crisis for some mobile network operators as early as 2010. Early deployment of LTE will be essential, and continued growth in data consumption will create insatiable demand for LTE spectrum.
3G traffic volumes are set to increase by a factor of 20 by 2014, driven by many factors, including the increased adoption of traffic-intensive services such as mobile broadband and mobile TV services, the increased proportion of smartphones and dramatic reductions in mobile data pricing.
Dr Alastair Brydon, co-author of the new report says, “Pricing of mobile data has changed dramatically since the days that SMS was the dominant service. Mobile broadband pricing has fallen as low as USD2 per gigabyte, which is nearly half a million times smaller than the price per gigabyte of an SMS message.”
Key findings of the new report are:
- As 2G users continue to migrate to 3G services, the available capacity per 3G user will decline rapidly in networks utilising HSPA, to less than 100MB per user per month in some cases. LTE will be essential to counter this decline.
- While LTE promises peak data rates of over 100Mbps, this is only possible with wide allocations of spectrum, and even then is only experienced by a few lucky users that have particularly good radio conditions. Other users will achieve much lower data rates, so the average data rates from practical LTE networks will be nowhere near the peak values.
- Network operators will have an insatiable appetite for LTE spectrum, to stand any chance of keeping up with forecast traffic demand. For some operators, 10MHz of spectrum will be able to support forecast traffic levels only until 2011. A further 10MHz will be needed by 2012 and another 10MHz in 2013. In addition, some operators will have to embark on major network expansion programmes to keep pace with forecast traffic levels.
“LTE’s ability to relieve the capacity constraints of HSPA networks will be limited initially, until operators can acquire additional spectrum and seed a sufficient number of LTE devices in the market place,” says co-author Dr Mark Heath. “We don’t expect to see LTE handsets until 2011,” he warns.
The new report ‘Will 3G Networks Cope?’ published by Unwired Insight, addresses one of the biggest concerns within the mobile industry, as to whether 3G networks will be able to cope with future increases in 3G traffic volumes. The report gets to grips with this critical issue by quantifying how 3G network capacity and 3G traffic will evolve over the next five years.
The report contains 120 pages, 29 figures, 18 tables and 30 000 words. For more information, or to buy the report, go to the website www.unwiredinsight.com, email contact@unwiredinsight.com or telephone +44 (0) 1480 819391. Dr Alastair Brydon and Dr Mark Heath are authors of more than 40 reports on key issues in the mobile industry, with more than 250 different organisations worldwide using their insight.
A free whitepaper associated with the report is available to download from the Unwired Insight website.
Press release: Femtocells and broadcasting solutions must rescue 3G networks, says Unwired Insight
With a 20-fold increase in 3G traffic volumes forecast over the next five years, alternative means of delivering services to 3G handsets will be essential in order to prevent major capacity problems, according to Unwired Insight. A new report, entitled ‘Will 3G Networks Cope?’, shows that complementary distribution methods, including femtocells and broadcasting solutions, could collectively carry nearly half of total service traffic by 2014.
“Many 3G network operators are in for a tough time over the next few years,” says co-author Dr Alastair Brydon. “If they don’t now start using complementary distribution methods, such as femtocells and broadcasting networks, 3G networks will not be able to cope with future traffic demand, even with LTE,” he added.
Key findings of the new report are:
- Vodafone was the first 3G operator in Europe to launch a femtocell product in July 2009, signalling the start of femtocell roll-out in Europe. Indoor wireless systems should be a core part of the delivery platform for 3G operators, and they should use both WLAN and femtocells to deliver services through fixed broadband connections wherever they can. By 2014, indoor systems could deliver 13.8% of total service traffic.
- Separate TV streams to each 3G user can quickly use up 3G capacity. Despite a slow start, dedicated broadcasting networks, such as DVB-H, can be an effective way of minimising the traffic carried on conventional 3G networks. Also, developments such as eMBMS and IMB provide the option of delivering broadcast services over existing 3G networks. 8% of service usage could be carried by broadcasting solutions by 2014.
- Sideloading – where content can be transferred from a PC to a mobile phone and stored in its memory – could become an increasingly important method for delivering multimedia content to 3G devices, thereby avoiding the use of conventional 3G networks. More than one-fifth of service usage could be delivered using sideloading by 2014.
“Taken together, indoor systems, broadcasting networks and sideloading could collectively deliver 43% of total service traffic by 2014,” says Alastair Brydon.
The new report published by Unwired Insight addresses one of the biggest concerns within the mobile industry, as to whether 3G networks will be able to cope with future increases in 3G traffic volumes.
The report gets to grips with this critical issue by quantifying how 3G network capacity and 3G traffic will evolve over the next five years. The report contains 120 pages, 29 figures, 18 tables and 30 000 words. For more information, or to buy the report, click here, email contact@unwiredinsight.com or telephone +44 (0) 1480 819391. Dr Alastair Brydon and Dr Mark Heath are authors of more than 40 reports on key issues in the mobile industry.
A free whitepaper associated with the report is available to download from the Unwired Insight website.
