2022.01.07 – Open Broadband News

A new age! Gigabit subscriptions set to soar in 2022

Global gigabit subscriptions are expected to jump to 50 million in 2022, more than doubling from 24 million at the end of 2020, according to a new report from analyst firm Omdia. “Demand for reliable broadband is set to drive growth in gigabit services, with fiber playing a key role,” said Peter Boyland, Principal Analyst, broadband at Omdia.

According to Omdia, accelerated fiber deployments are helping to drive an increase in gigabit connectivity. “There were fewer than 620 million fiber subscriptions globally at the end of 2020, but we expect these to grow to 719 million in 2022,” with the majority of fiber subscribers expected in China, wrote the analysts. However, Omdia warns that service providers must “carefully consider market demand” for their gigabit strategies and make targeted investments in fiber.

“Service providers need to carefully plan and execute gigabit network rollout, analyzing a number of factors, including infrastructure challenges, market competition, and expected demand,” wrote Omdia. “But this does not stop with network rollout – operators need to continually monitor potential competitors and constantly innovate, refresh, and build service offerings so they stay ahead of rivals.”

Bonkers for broadband! UK usage rose to record-breaking levels in 2021

The UK’s broadband usage reached record levels in 2021 as a result of stay-at-home orders and a year of significant sporting fixtures.

Openreach recorded more than 62,000 Petabytes (PB) of data used throughout 2021 – a 20 percent rise on 2020’s 50,000 PB. It would take one person around 870,000 years to use the equivalent of 62,000 PB, even if they were downloading a dozen HD films every day, according to Openreach’s calculations.

Colin Lees, Openreach’s Chief Technology and Information Officer said that increasing numbers of people gaining access to faster broadband speeds were also likely to have played a part in the record-breaking figures. “It was an incredibly busy start to the year as another national lockdown, this time during the winter months, meant that most of us spent huge amounts of time at home,” Lees added.

FTTH set to dominate fixed broadband in APAC 

Fiber-To-The-Home/Building (FTTH/B) service is set to cement its position as the leading fixed broadband technology in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) market and will go on to account for 94.8 percent of the total fixed broadband service revenue in the region by 2026, according to GlobalData, a data and analytics company.

An analysis of GlobalData’s Asia Pacific Fixed Communication Forecast Model (Q3-2021) indicates that the share of fiber lines in the total fixed broadband lines in APAC will increase from 90.7 per cent (672.2 million) in 2021 to 92.5 per cent (792 million) by 2026, driven by the growing demand for high-speed Internet services, fiber rollouts and the ongoing national broadband networks across most countries in the region.

Singapore will have the highest share of FTTH/B lines as a percentage of total fixed broadband lines in the region, almost reaching 100 percent by 2026. Singapore will be followed by Vietnam, Hong Kong, and Malaysia with 96.6 percent, 93 percent, and 92.8 percent share, respectively, in 2026.

Is 6G on the horizon? The Indian Government thinks so!

India has constituted a Technology Innovation Group (TIG) to prepare a manufacturing and services ecosystem to capitalize on the Sixth Generation (6G) opportunity in the telecom sector.

In an official release, the Ministry of Communications said that the telecom department mandated immediate deliverables by March 31, 2022, that included mapping of 6G activities and capabilities worldwide, and a whitepaper on India’s competencies including research and pre-standardization activities.

“A 6G Technology Innovation Group is constituted by DoT with the objective to co-create and participate in the development of 6G technology ecosystem through increased participation in a capability description, standards development at international standard-setting bodies. This would be necessary to prepare India’s manufacturing and services ecosystem to capitalize on the 6G opportunity,” the statement said.

Satellite broadband on the up as Starlink outperforms fixed broadband in France, Germany, and the UK

Elon Musk’s Starlink broadband satellite project is giving faster speeds than fixed broadband from local telcos, according to research from Ookla.

The company – which also runs the Speedtest.net service around the world – said that “Starlink [is] nearly twice as fast as fixed broadband average” in the UK, where the company will soon be competing with OneWeb, in which the UK government has a stake.

Ookla says that the median download speed in the UK in the third quarter, this being July to September – was 111.66 Mbps, up from 108.30 Mbps in the previous quarter. The median speed for fixed broadband was 53.16 Mbps, according to Ookla with an increase by almost the same 3 Mbps margin in the same period. Intriguingly, Starlink download speeds are also up in Germany, but down in France.

“Starlink users in France saw a median download speed of 102.15 Mbps in Q3 2021 (down from 139.39 Mbps in Q2 2021, likely due to increased usage),” says Ookla’s Head of Content, Isla McKetta. But “Starlink’s median download speed in Germany of 95.40 Mbps was much faster than the country median [for Starlink] of 60.99 Mbps during Q3 2021,” McKetta added.

2022: The year of AI in augmented and virtual reality according to research

In its new whitepaper, ‘70 Technology Trends That Will—and Will Not—Shape 2022’, ABI Research analysts identified 35 trends that will shape the technology market and 35 others that, although attracting huge amounts of speculation and commentary, are less likely to move the needle over the next twelve months.

Over 20 million active users will leverage Artificial Intelligence (AI) for augmented reality usage in 2022. Enterprises have been leaning into AI to extract the maximum value from hardware, platforms, and services.

Augmented Reality (AR)/Virtual Reality (VR)-specific usage has missed some of this momentum due to its more nascent state, but that is changing rapidly. AI for machine vision is in place, but it will grow in capability, increasing captured data and enabling greater analytics and insight potential for platforms. Prediction and automation are a significant value add for any organization, and the increased data flowing from and through AR/VR devices, combined with AI/ML, create a hotbed for both prediction and automation of worker-facing and backend systems.

The year 2022 was slotted as the likely release of the company’s first foray into Head-Mounted Devices (HMDs), but that looks increasingly less likely with supply chain slowdowns and general market readiness signs for the company. Even if a product ships in 2022, it will be late in the year and will not have time to prove impactful in the market, according to ABI Research.