2021.08.20 – Open Broadband News

Get Smart: US smart home device adoption reaches 36%

Parks Associates research shows that 36 per cent of US broadband households now own a smart home device, an increase of 2 per cent over Q4 2020.

“The residential security industry continues to experience a blurring of lines between professional and DIY solutions,” said Elizabeth Parks, President, Parks Associates. “Professional monitoring providers, like ADT, Brinks, and Comcast, have added self-monitoring options, while companies that started in the DIY space now offer professional monitoring. We expect more innovation, especially in AI and video analytics, as companies attempt to find a winning business model to increase monthly monitoring subscribers for security and smart home services.”

“The keys to the industry reaching its full potential are focusing on the customer experience and driving value,” said Don Young, EVP and COO, ADT. “This means making it easier to harmonize the many single-point devices into a single smart home ecosystem. It means using sensors and data to make security\ become more predictive and more proactive. And it means extending security beyond the home to vehicles and personal mobile devices. All of these add value and relevance to the underlying security relationship with the customer and, when done correctly, increase the convenience of feeling protected.”

No Himalay-ing around for India’s broadband speeds

Ookla has released updates to its Speedtest Global Index for the month of July. According to the data, India recorded the highest growth in fixed broadband download speeds.

The fixed broadband upload speeds have also witnessed a spike from 35.04Mbps in July 2020 to 56.47Mbps in July 2021. The Speedtest Global Index released by Ookla for the month of July ranks India on 68th spot. India has gone up by 7 ranks from that of last year in the fixed broadband speeds.

India’s overall performance in mobile download speeds has increased consistently, with a slight dip in months from December 2020 to April 2021. While there was also a slight decrease in mobile download speeds from June 2021 to July 2021, 17.84 Mbps to 17.77 Mbps respectively, India maintained its global mobile ranking at 122nd place.

As per recent Ookla insights, the launch of 5G network in India has the potential to increase the median download speeds up to 10 times compared to 4G LTE. The findings are based on Speedtest data from other markets in Asia that have recently launched 5G that shows the differential between 4G-LTE and 5G speeds was on average approximately 9-10 times in Q2 2021.

Fixin’ for 5G use cases

Fixed wireless access will be among the most valuable use cases for 5G network operators, according to reports that predict compound annual growth rates in excess of 70%.

ABI Research and Mobile Experts forecast that 5G fixed wireless access connections will increase at a compound annual growth rate of 71% and “over 70%,” respectively. ABI Research expects global 5G fixed wireless access to exceed 58 million residential households by 2026, and Mobile Experts predicts 5G fixed wireless access to serve 66.5 million customers by 2026.

Fixed wireless access is a decades-old technology, but its prominence and rate of growth grew substantially during the last year amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has forced billions of people worldwide to stay home.

Mobile Experts projects the number of global fixed wireless access connections will more than double to 190 million by 2026. “LTE (4G) will be the dominant technology of choice for larger mobile operators in developing regions, constituting about 60% to 80% of fixed wireless access connections,” Kyung Min, principal analyst at Mobile Experts, wrote in a report.

FCC opens the RAN cost debate

Some elements of open RAN technology are officially less expensive than traditional RAN products, at least according to a new network equipment pricing catalogue published by the FCC.

That’s a noteworthy development considering an initial version of the agency’s pricing catalogue didn’t show much daylight between the prices for open RAN equipment and traditional RAN equipment.

As a result, some vendors made sure to call out that pricing situation: “The draft cost catalog also demonstrates that there are not cost savings being offered through open RAN equipment estimates compared to integrated RAN estimates,” Nokia wrote to the FCC in April following the release of the agency’s initial, draft pricing catalogue. Finland’s Nokia built its business around traditional RAN equipment but has been supplying hardware and software for open RAN networks.

Diverse tech crop needed for rural broadband success

The UK’s Broadband Stakeholder Group (BSG) says it has compiled some interesting research on the practicalities of providing broadband coverage in areas in the UK that are the hardest to reach.

The report provides details of a wide range of broadband technologies, including fixed and wireless, terrestrial and non-terrestrial that could be deployed in the UK between 2021 and 2027, for the government to consider.

In fact, it may be the sheer profusion of different ways to tackle the rural and remote broadband problem that makes the whole field a bit of a political minefield. The scope for getting hauled over the political coals for getting things wrong is considerable.

The report says that the Government’s stated ambition is to ensure that at least 85% of UK premises have access to gigabit-capable broadband by 2025 and for 80% of that coverage to be delivered commercially. For the 20% expected to be beyond commercial deployments, £5 billion funding is being allocated to support the delivery of gigabit broadband through Project Gigabit. The Report also provides an assessment of the ability to deliver either 30 Mbit/s or 300 Mbit/s download speeds.