Showing posts with label Statistics Base Stations. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Statistics Base Stations. Show all posts

Tuesday, 3 September 2024

South Korea has Nationwide 5G Coverage

Back in April, the Korean Ministry of Science and ICT (MSIT) announced that South Korea had nationwide 5G coverage. Just as a comparison, South Korea is about 2.4 times smaller than United Kingdom with a population of 52 million vs 68 million. 

Tefficient compares it with Sweden, which is four times bigger but has a far lower number of base stations compared to that of South Korea. 

While the OpenSignal report from late last year wasn't that impressive regarding the 5G availability, it would be good to compare it with the next one whenever released. 

Finally, here are other couple of charts from Tefficient highlighting the 5G data traffic growth and the subscription growth from South Korea:

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Wednesday, 17 November 2021

5G Network Sharing using MOCN for Rural South Korea

South Korea may have been the first country where all the networks switched on their 5G but that does not mean they have been having an easy ride. 

Back in April, the ICT ministry announced that the three major mobile carriers will share their 5G networks in remote coastal and farm towns in a move to accelerate the rollout of the latest generation networks. The Korea Herald reported: 

The carriers -- SK Telecom Co., KT Corp. and LG Uplus Corp. -- signed an agreement so that 5G users can have access to the high-speed network regardless of the carrier they are subscribed to in 131 remote locations across the country, according to the Ministry of Science and ICT.

Under the plan, a 5G user would be able to use other carrier networks in such regions that are not serviced by his or her carrier.

The ministry said telecom operators will test the network sharing system before the end of this year and aim for complete commercialization in phases by 2024.

The ministry said the selected remote regions are sparsely populated, with a population density of 92 people per square kilometer, compared with those without network sharing at 3,490 people per square kilometer.

The move comes as the country races to establish nationwide 5G coverage, with network equipment currently installed in major cities.

In another article back in September, The Korea Herald reported:

The number of 5G network base stations in South Korea accounted for just 11 percent of the total in the second quarter, data showed Monday, amid continued user complaints against the latest generation networks.

As of the April-June period, there were 162,099 5G base stations in the country, compared with a total of 1.47 million mobile network base stations, according to data from the Korea Communications Agency.

The number of 5G base stations was far outnumbered by around 1 million 4G base stations and over 300,000 3G base stations.

In comparison, the number of 5G users accounted for 23.8 percent of the total in July at just over 17 million, while there were 50.5 million 4G users and 20.2 million 3G users.

The latest data comes as local mobile carriers have faced complaints from 5G users over spotty connection and slower-than-expected speeds since the networks' launch in April 2019.

At a recent GSMA conference, Daehun Lim, Head of Global Strategic Partnerships, LG Uplus shared the 5G Rural Network Sharing plans in more details. The picture on the top shows the timelines and the areas that are planned to be covered by each operator.

The network sharing will be based on MOCN which we have explained in our tutorial here.

Since the 5G spectrum allocation for all the operators is very similar, we don't expect any issues with the network sharing plan going forward. We will have to wait a couple of years before is becomes commercially available though.

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Sunday, 23 May 2021

Germany gets Two 5G Standalone Networks

The analyst firm Tefficient recently said, "Germany goes from a European 4G laggard to a European 5G leader" as German operators reportedly built 19,371 5G base stations in 2020 as compared to 13,334 LTE base stations. It's true that Germans are not necessarily known for mobile technology advancements but the launch of second 5G Standalone network definitely adds them to the top 10 of 5G lists.


Just this week Telefónica Germany, a.k.a. O2 Deutschland announced that they have accelerated the 5G rollout. If I understand correctly (as the original article is in German), 5G Standalone will be using the 3.6 GHz spectrum while the 5G NSA uses Dynamic Spectrum Sharing (DSS) in 1.8 GHz band. They are also going to add 700MHz for 5G, which I am assuming will provide the coverage for 5G Standalone.

The translated article says:

There are now around 1,300 5G antennas operating in around 60 cities. O2 has thus doubled the number of cities with 5G coverage within a few weeks. All 5G antennas use the powerful 3.6 GHz frequencies , which offer O2 customers high speeds, short response times and thus a better 5G network experience overall. In addition, O2 has reached a technological milestone: The provider has put its new 5G standalone core network into operation and is setting up the 5G standard on its own. Telefónica Deutschland / O2 The technological basis was created in their network at an early stage in order to enable private and business customers to use even the most demanding 5G applications in the future.

5G standalone scores in particular through the further lower latency of a few milliseconds and higher data rates in the gigabit range, by bundling different 5G frequency bands (carrier aggregation) arise. These advantages are for example for mobile gaming, virtual and augmented reality or networked drivingimportant to ensure optimal, delay-free connectivity. The company will offer commercial offers for O 2 customers as soon as 5G standalone brings real advantages for the mass market. By summer 2021 , the task now is to implement the new 5G core network nationwide in all of its own data centers. This means that the O 2 network is not only optimally prepared for the future requirements of the 5G era , it is also at the forefront of technology among German networks.


Vodafone Germany on the other hand, launched their 5G Standalone network last month. In addition to the announcement, they made a lot of infographics available and referred to 5G Non-Standalone (NSA) as "Training Wheels"

Some of the features of their Standalone 5G is listed as: 

  • Bandwidth: initially around 700 Mbit / s, soon more than 1,000 Mbit / s possible
  • Latency: data exchange possible in real time (10 to 15 milliseconds)
  • Network slicing: 5G networks with guaranteed bandwidth, latency and stability become possible
  • Capacity: 5G standalone can network 10x more people and machines
  • Greater range: antenna range increased by around 20 percent
  • Less electricity: the energy consumption of smartphones drops by around 20 percent

Also like the way they explain the different 5G spectrum in use:

Finally, with all these 5G advancements, Vodafone will be switching off their 3G network end of June. 2G is still active for users that can't do VoLTE or roamers.

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Sunday, 7 February 2021

China Mobile on The Next Phase of 5G: Progress, Challenges, and Opportunities


China always makes the news when it comes to the number of base stations and the vastness of the mobile network deployment. According to Tefficient, China will soon have 10 million mobile base stations. Of these, 718K are 5G equipped.

According to a recently posted lecture from IEEE 5G World Forum back in September, Dr. Chih-Lin I of China Mobile showed that there were 480k+ 5G capable base and the number of users that have a 5G capable phone or subscription exceeded 130 million. 

Back in April 2020, we looked at China Mobile's 5G+ network in detail here. There has been a lot of progress as over 200 5G devices were available back in October and over 400 5G application trials were conducted.

Remote surgery is one of the applications I take an exception with and have detailed it here and here. It looks like China Mobile is using 5G for a lot of medical use cases. Some of these are detailed in the pictures above and more details is available in the video below.

Finally, it is good to see that China Mobile sees 6G as Open & Smart. They are one of the founding operators of O-RAN Alliance so they definitely have a vision for open. AI is expected to play a big role in 6G networks and hence Smart.

At the IEEE 5G World Forum 2020 Virtual event, Dr. Chih-Lin I delivered her presentation embedded below. Chih-Lin I is one of the authorities driving the transformation. As China Mobile’s chief scientist, she is one of the experts helping to create a faster, greener, and healthier 5G world. You can find her complete bio here.

Her talk is embedded below.

While slides from this talk were not shared, Dr. Chih-Lin I delivered a very similar presentation to the Open Networking Foundation (ONF). The slides from that are available here and the video from that is here.

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Saturday, 15 August 2020

How many 5G Cell Towers & Base Stations Worldwide?

A question I often see people ask is how many cell towers / base stations are there worldwide? Surprisingly this information is not as easy to obtain as you may think initially. We can use this chart from a Light Reading webinar as a starting point:


Many years back someone explained a rule of thumb to me. There is on an average 1 site for every 1000 subscribers. With roughly 8 billion subscribers, this will amount to 8 million sites.

Omdia statistics from above says that there are 7 million physical sites and 10 million logical sites. As there are many sites hosting infrastructure from multiple operators, the number of logical sites are more than the number of physical sites.

In addition there will be small cells mounted on lamp posts, side of the buildings, indoors, etc. that generally may not be included in the count mainly.

When it comes to base stations, there is a debate on what is included. For example on a tower hosting multiple operators, each of them will have their own Baseband Unit (BBU), so this is multiple base stations. If for an operator, there are multiple generations of technologies and within each of these generation, multiple frequencies, sectors, etc. Do they count as a single base station or multiple?

Then there are towers and masts. Wikipedia nicely explains that "The terms "mast" and "tower" are often used interchangeably. However, in structural engineering terms, a tower is a self-supporting or cantilevered structure, while a mast is held up by stays or guys."

So coming back to 5G, how many base stations have been rolled out in the major markets?

Japan

In an earlier post on NTT Docomo, we pointed out that Docomo coverage is forecast to increase from 500 base stations in 150 locations to 10,000 sites (in about 500 cities) by June 2021 and 20,000 by March 2022.

According to Tefficient, Rakuten had 5739 LTE base stations on air at the end of June. The three incumbent operators have roughly 200000 LTE base stations each.



South Korea

South Korea were the first to launch commercial 5G by all operators in the country. As of July 2020, they had 121,000 5G base stations



China

Back in December last year, Global Times reported, there are currently approximately 6 million 4G base stations worldwide, more than half of which are in China and about 300,000 in the US. Why does China have so many base stations? This is because of a nation-level project in China in 2003. The project required that more than 95 percent of remote mountainous areas should be covered with communication signals and the fees must not be higher than those in urban areas.

In an earlier post we reported, the total number of 4G base stations in the first half of 2019 was 2.71 million including a net addition of 300,000, providing robust support for the development of large volumes of data traffic business.

European 5G observatory reported that China intends to have 600,000 5G base stations by the end of 2020. According to RCR wireless, Chinese telcos have already deployed over 20,000 5G base stations in Shanghai.

According to Tefficient, China Mobile had 188k 5G base stations in June 2020. So China then had a total of 398k 5G base stations



This video from CGTN a few months back gives some good info on the Chinese 5G deployments.




There isn't information available from other countries. If available in the next few months, I may add them here.

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Wednesday, 29 April 2020

NTT Docomo's Aggressive 5G Expansion Plan


Source: NTT Docomo

NTT Docomo, maybe the largest operator in Japan, however they recently announced a drop in profit and revenue for the past financial year but in response, detailed for the first time a plan to grow their 5G network. There 5G expansion plans are both aggressive and ambitious.

The operator, which launched 5G service last month, said it signed up 14,000 5G users at end-March and targets 2.5 million subs by March 2021 and 20 million three years later.


Coverage is forecast to increase from 500 base stations in 150 locations to 10,000 sites (in about 500 cities) by June 2021 and 20,000 by March 2022. Despite lagging behind the United States and South Korea, which introduced their versions in April last year, the new wireless service  available in the 150 locations in Japan covers 29 of the nation's 47 prefectures.

Their 5G plans for its next fiscal year ending 30 March 2021 include promoting Open RAN technology and deploying millimeter wave, as well as expanding the range of 5G smartphones, which stood at six devices at launch. It also mentioned pursuit of new experience and sensory services, e.g., music, gaming, video, sports, etc and value creation suited to remote‐work society  (medical / education / manufacturing, etc.)


Docomo's 5G plans for its next fiscal year ending 30 March 2021 include promoting O-RAN (see Open RAN terminology) technology and deploying mmWave, as well as expanding the range of 5G smartphones, which stood at six devices at launch.

Source: NTT Docomo

NTT Docomo has delivered Japan's fastest speeds for both downloads and uploads for the last two years. Operators in Japan have received an ideal amount of spectrum for 5G services. NTT Docomo 5G service is achieving a maximum data rate of 3.4 Gbps in downlink currently which is expected to increase to 4.1 Gbps in June. Of course these are theoretical maximum values and no individual user can expect to receive this.

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Wednesday, 22 April 2020

China Mobile Establishing "5G+" Competitive Advantages


China Mobile is the world's largest mobile operator by subscriber numbers. There is roughly a difference of around 400 million subscribers between them and Vodafone Group, next on the list. According to the latest numbers published in the Interim 2019 report that covers a period of up till June 2019, they had 935 million, of which, the total number of 4G customers reached 734 million. Tefficient reported a total of 942 million subscribers at the end of Feb 2020.

The total number of 4G base stations in the first half of 2019 was 2.71 million including a net addition of 300,000, providing robust support for the development of large volumes of data traffic business. By the end of 2019, China Mobile planned to set up more than 50,000 5G base stations in China and launch 5G commercial services in more than 50 cities.

According to the report, China Mobile is working on implementing the following comprehensive “5G+” plans:

5G+4G. We will drive 5G and 4G technology and resource-sharing, and nurture synergies between the 5G and 4G network coverage and business operations. We will leverage the 4G base station sites and transmission facilities to build out our 5G network in a cost-effective manner. Our plan for this year is to set up more than 50,000 5G base stations in China and launch 5G commercial services in more than 50 cities. At the same time, we will play a more significant role in the next phase of setting international standards for 5G (Release 16). We will coordinate industry efforts to carry out research on fundamental 5G technology in order to ensure the continued advancement of this technology.
5G+AICDE. We will assimilate emerging technologies such as AI, IoT, cloud computing, big data and edge computing into 5G in order to combine connectivity with digital services. In addition, we will build out our service capability in areas including industrial IoT designated network slicing, one-stop cloud network convergence, secure and reliable big data services and telecommunications-grade edge computing. Centred around 5G, we will build a ubiquitous digital infrastructure, launch new capabilities and applications, develop new use cases and nurture more new businesses. Our goal is to become a leading new smart city operator.

5G+Ecology. We will establish an all-encompassing 5G open ecology that nurtures a 5G system by connecting partners throughout the information and communications industry chain, key verticals, innovative powers in society, high-performing technology and research institutes, and other telecommunications operators. Through our 5G Innovation Centre, 5G Device Forerunner Initiative, 5G Industry Digital Alliance and 5G Multi-media Innovation Initiative, we will drive, with our partners, the development of 5G devices, the innovation of 5G applications and the creation of 5G premium content. In addition, we will launch the BEST commercial plan, which aims to reinforce the “Basic service”, provide premium “Enabling services” and strengthen “Specialised services” so that we can march into the “Time of 5G” with our partners.

 5G+X. Building on the foundation of the three “5G+” initiatives above, we will develop a “5G+X” strategy, where “X” stands for the wider application of 5G in a plethora of industry sectors and the mass market. On the one hand, we will launch innovative and integrated 5G applications to promote digitisation across sectors such as agriculture, industry, transport, healthcare, city administration, finance and education. On the other hand, for general customers, we will launch 5G ultra high definition videos, games and ring videos to satisfy customers’ appetite for a better digital life. We have accumulated more than 60 use cases of 5G across verticals, such as smart power grids, smart factories, smart ports, autonomous driving in certain designated areas, emergency rescue missions, remote medical treatment, smart campuses and high-definition cloud-based games. The 4G era has already improved people’s lives, and the 5G era will transform our society, bringing opportunities for development that have never been possible before. 5G will become the foundation for all-encompassing smart connections. In this historic moment, we will strive to maintain our competitive advantage and set the benchmark for the global telecommunications industry. We will continue to enhance the value of China Mobile surrounding “5G+”

Dr. Chih-Lin I, China Mobile, presented '5G++ the Journey Continues' at 5G World Forum Dresden, 2019 where she paints an immersive picture of what the network looks like from 4G changing lives to 5G changing society. She further discusses the timeline and trials beyond today’s 5G environment, including China’s spectrum status, licensing, standards and the all-encompassing capabilities from entertainment to medical services to open-source architecture, that the cutting edge 5G has to offer. Some of these things may be a bit outdated but there are a lot of insights in the talk




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Saturday, 13 January 2018

Overview: Indonesia Mobile Operators and 4G development

Mobile Operators in the sprawling archipelago nation of Indonesia are transitioning their networks  to meet the demands of the latest technologies and an increasingly connected population.

Indonesia, a country with nearly 410 million mobile connections, experienced rapid uptake of 4G services over the past year, with connections increasing 2.5-times and LTE penetration hitting 21 per cent.

The country’s 4G connections jumped from 34 million in Q3 2016 to 85.5 million in Q3 2017, according to data from GSMA Intelligence (GSMAi). LTE penetration in Q3 2016 stood 7.9 per cent.

To support the growth, mobile operators almost doubled the number of 4G base stations deployed in the opening six months of 2017, with 55,700 sites at end-July compared with 26,000 at end-2016.


In developed countries, the internet is everywhere. In homes, if not then readily available in schools, coffee shops and libraries. In developing countries this is not the case, if it were not for mobile phones, millions of people would be left on the losing side of the divide. As we can see in this chart, the vast of majority of people in Indonesia (and other countries) use the internet exclusively on mobile devices

COTD_11.15





The country’s mobile market was characterised for many years by the large number of players licensed by the local regulator. Seven mobile operators are competing for revenues in the Indonesian market: Telkomsel, Indosat, XL Axiata, 3 Indonesia, SmartFren, Bolt and Bakrie Telecom (BTel). Market leader Telkomsel continues to maintain a huge presence but is under increased threat from the competition.














Telkomsel has a market share of about 44% in Indonesia and is the only operator which is active in all provinces. It had 180 million users in late 2017 making it the 6th largest cellular provider in the world. It is 65% owned by the state through Telekom Indonesia, the remainder owned by Singapore Telecom.

The operator, with a 44 per cent market share, sourced network equipment for the deployment from Ericsson, Huawei, Nokia and ZTE. It is using 20MHz of 1.8GHz spectrum combined with 4×4 MIMO technology in the country’s capital city Jakarta and also Medan, Bandung, Denpasar, Mataram, Pontianak, Makassar, Manado and Ambon.

Telkomsel paid Rp 1.01 trillion ($74.7 million) to secure a license for a 30-megahertz band on the 2.3 gigahertz spectrum, which will enhance its capacity to offer wireless broadband services across the country.The new license means that Telkomsel now has a total band of 77.5 MHz on the 2.3 GHz, 2.1 GHz, 1.8 GHz, 900 MHz and 800 MHz spectrums.


The operator said they have deployed at least 5,200 4G base stations in 180 cities across the country to date. It had about 12 million 4G subscribers in Q3 2017 and expects to have 15 million by the end of the year, accounting for nearly 9 per cent  of its mobile users, according to GSMA Intelligence.

According to Open Signal Telkomsel was well ahead of its rivals in 4G speed, averaging downloads of 14.6 Mbps in their tests. However 4G availability was where they fell behind their rivals. 



Indosat         

Indosat, Indonesia's second-largest telecommunications operator had about 82 million mobile subscribers last year, compared with Telkomsel's 180 million.  It has a good coverage on the main islands of Java, Bali, Kalimatan, Sulawesi and Sumatra, at low prices. 4G/LTE has started in Jakarta, Bandung, Yogyakarta and Bali and is available in about 94 cities at the end of 2016 on 900 and 1800 MHz with speeds up to 185 Mbps: 4G coverage map. In 2017 they bid for further spectrum on 2100 MHz.


XL Axiata

XL Axiata is the 3rd provider in Indonesia. According to its website they have 46.5 million subscribers.  It is owned by Axiata Ltd. and has about a 90% coverage on these islands: Java, Bali and Lombok. Furthermore, it covers cities on Sumatra, Kalimatan, Sulawesi and a very limited coverage on Papua. Where it has 3G, speeds are often faster then Telkomsel. 4G/LTE has started in Jakarta, Medan, Yogyakarta and is spread to other regions like Bali, Lombok, Surabaya and East Kalimatan and Sulawesi on 900 and 1800 MHz.

As at 31 October 2017, XL Axiata says it had  rolled out 4G LTE services to around 100 towns and cities in Indonesia and had more than 20 million 4G subscribers nationwide, using a network comprising 16,000 BTS. At the same date, its total number of ‘on-air’ base stations had reached nearly 100,000, of which more than 44,000 were 3G-equipped.




Tri indonesia

3 called Tri in Indonesia is now the 4th provider with approximately 21 million  subscribers  previously with the lowest coverage, but the cheapest rates. However the mobile operator controlled by Hong Kong-based CK Hutchison, has revealed that its in-deployment 4G LTE network is now available in 227 cities and districts, including 1,769 sub-districts and 7,296 villages in 25 provinces. Their coverage extends from Lhokseumawe to Manado, and includes the islands of Sumatra, Kalimantan, Sulawesi, Java and Bali. Commenting on the development, Tri Indonesia President Director Randeep Sing Sekhon said: 
‘Digital and multimedia services are expected to experience rapid growth this year. And in future the success of these services is reliant on [Tri rolling out] mobile internet infrastructure to support growth, as it is expected to become the main channel to carry such services’.
People wishing to sign up to the Tri 4G LTE network will need to buy a suitable 4G LTE SIM card and handset. Customers can exchange their old Tri 3G to 4G SIM card without extra charge at any 3Store.

Tri currently has a total capacity of 25 MHz -- 10 MHz in 1,800 MHz frequency and 15 MHz in 2.1 GHz frequency.



Smartfren Telecom


Smartfren owned by Indonesian PT Smartfren Telecom Tbk is a major player in the country. It had around 13 million customers in 2016 and has now migrated entirely to LTE. In 2016 Smartfren started the most widespread andfastest LTE in the country so far. It employs LTE Advanced that reaches higher speeds through carrier aggregation. But two rare frequencies are used: 850 MHz FDD (Band 5) and 2300 MHz TDD (Band 40). Already 5 million customers have been migrated to LTE. 

Smartfren's coverage is on the islands of Java and Bali, parts of Sumatra, Sulawesi, Lombok and Kalimantan. It started 4G/LTE in 25 centers so far and reaches 188 cities in 2016.

Since Smartfren phased out its 3G network, it has an impressive 4G network in terms of reach for those 2G and 3G customers to migrate to. According to Open Signal Smartfren testers were able to find an LTE signal more than 90% of the time, winning Smartfren their 4G availability award.
Bolt!
Bolt! owned by Internux is an Indonesian wireless broadband provider based on TD-LTE. It started in 2014 and has already 3 million customers in 2017. It uses the rare 2300 MHz TD-LTE (band 40) that is not covered by usual devices. That's why you are likely to buy new hardware for them. It only operates so far in the cities of Jakarta and Medan. Therefore it's more like a substitute for a landline ADSL-provider than a travel option.


The smallest and troubled mobile operator owes the government millions of dollars in licence and frequency rights fees. It originally launched CDMA service in 2003 in Jakarta, West Java and Banten and started to offer fixed wireless service in 2007. It had about eight million subscribers at its peak. Last year the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology revoked its fixed wireless access (FWA) and fixed licences. Huawei have recently acquired a near 17 per cent stake in Bakrie Telecom. 




Questions for the future: Can the Indonesian market sustain this number of mobile operators? Who will win the 4G and subsequent 5G race? 
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