Showing posts with label Vendor Samsung. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Vendor Samsung. Show all posts

Friday, 11 November 2022

Is South Korea Losing its 5G Crown?


South Korea is second only to Hong Kong in the world rankings of telecom market maturity. It enjoys a highly competitive but stable market, with strong central government support that helps drive the rollout of advanced infrastructure in both the fixed and mobile arenas. South Korea is also on the leading edge of the latest telecom technology developments, including around 6G. And it is host to two of the world’s top equipment manufacturers in the form of Samsung and LG.

With its highly urbanised, tech-savvy population, South Korea also enjoys very high penetration levels across all segments – fixed-line telephony (44% at the start of 2022), fixed broadband (46%), mobile voice and data (144%), and mobile broadband (120%). The performance of the mobile sector is on a par with other developed markets around the region, but it’s the wireline segment that allows South Korea to stand out from the crowd. This is partly a reflection of the large proportion of its population who live in apartment buildings (around 60%), making fibre and apartment LAN connections relatively easy and cost-effective to deploy. The government’s Ultra Broadband convergence Network (UBcN) had aimed to reach 50% adoption by the end of 2022, but that target may be a few more years away. Still, the country already has one of the world’s highest fixed broadband rates.

Fixed-line teledensity is also at a very high level compared to most of the rest of the world, but it has been on a sharp decline from a penetration rate of 60% ten years ago. That fall has forced the incumbent telco KT Corp to diversify into other telecom segments (including investments in 5G and the development of 6G) as well as non-telecom sectors (such as autonomous vehicles) in an effort to transform itself into a digital platform company. However, a major network outage in October 2021 drew the ire of the government and the police (in addition to the consumers and businesses directly affected by the shutdown), suggesting that the company may need to refocus its attention back on its core business.

On the mobile front, users have enthusiastically migrated from one generation of mobile platform to the next as each iteration becomes available. There also doesn’t appear to be any great concern about there being a lack of demand for 5G in South Korea (when the country is already well supported by 4G networks), with 30% of all subscribers having already made the switch. Part of the reason behind the rapid transition may be the subsidised handsets on offer from each of the MNOs and the MVNOs – a practice that has become so widespread and cutthroat that the regulators has regularly stepped in and fined the operators billions of won for breaching the subsidy level and risking a price war that will ultimately damage the entire industry.

There were over 22 million 5G subscribers in South Korea at the end of March 2022 which represented a penetration rate of 45%, served by 215,000 5G base stations. South Korea is one of the most advanced 5G markets in the world, and the scores of South Korea's operators in this report highlight the extent of 5G success.

The total number of 5G subscribers in South Korea reached nearly 24 million in May 2022, according to the latest available data from the Ministry of Science and ICT.

South Korea was the first country to launch commercial 5G networks in April 2019 and currently has 5G coverage across its 85 cities. Korean mobile operators have deployed a total of 202,903 5G base stations as of the end of February, according to previous reports. This figure is equivalent to 23% of total 4G LTE base stations installed in South Korea.

Not everyone is impressed by 5G in South Korea though as you can see in the Tweets above.

KT (Korea Telecom) is the public provider and 2nd network in the country with a good coverage. It's a formerly public enterprise, is relatively cheaper than SK Telecom with the largest WiFi coverage in Korea and a well-organized prepaid plan available. Remember, there is no 2G anymore, just 3G, 4G/LTE and now 5G NR.

KT has also unveiled plans to build a specialized 5G testbed running on the 4.7 GHz band with the aim of enabling multiple customers to access its core network equipment from the public cloud and test private or “specialized” networks.

“When KT’s 5G specialized network testbed is established, it will be possible to perform a one-stop service for testing equipment for 5G specialized network, interworking with terminals, and conducting network trial operation and inspection. It is expected to greatly reduce the cost and technical burden of companies considering the introduction of a 5G specialized network.”

The Korean operator added the testbed is expected to reduce the cost and technical requirements for companies considering introducing private networks.

KT is deploying private 5G networks at Seoul National University and Samsung Seoul Hospital.

SK Telecom is the biggest mobile provider in South Korea. SK operates 3G on the usual 2100 MHz, but 4G/LTE on the rather unusual 850 MHz (band 5) as primary frequency that is rarely covered by devices from overseas (except those capable of AT&T's LTE in the US). The more usual 1800 MHz (band 3) is only employed for back-up. But the coverage is reported to be better than that of KT, by press every year. 2G has been switched off in 2020.

In November of 2021, Swedish vendor Ericsson announced a partnership with SK Telecom, with the aim of supporting 5G Standalone networks through the deployment of a cloud-native dual-mode 5G Core.

Ericsson and SK Telecom had initially unveiled next-generation cloud-native 5G Core networks technology, architecture, implementation and operations plans in March 2019. The vendor said that this latest cooperation builds on the existing partnership. According to Ericsson, the dual-mode 5G core is deployed on its bare metal solution, known as Ericsson Cloud Native Infrastructure.

Ericsson had previously provided SK Telecom with 5G radio access network (RAN) equipment and network management system for their commercial 5G network rollout.

LG Uplus is working to further expand its 5G coverage across the country. In July this year, the operator secured an additional 20 megahertz of spectrum to use for 5G.

The Ministry of Science and ICT confirmed the allocation of the 3.4-3.42 GHz frequency band to LG Uplus, in addition to the 3.42 to 3.5 GHz spectrum that the telecom company bought in 2018.

LG Uplus had previously asked the Korean government for an additional 20 megahertz of spectrum to boost its 5G offerings. In a government spectrum auction in June 2018, rival operators SK Telecom and KT had secured 100 megahertz of spectrum, while LG Uplus had only acquired 80 megahertz.

During a keynote speech at Huawei’s 2022 Mobile Broadband Forum, held this week in Bangkok, Thailand, Yoon Ho Choi, president of XR business department at LG Uplus noted that the company’s 5G coverage had reached 85% of the population in large cities and central rural areas across Korea. The executive also highlighted that the level of 5G availability at a national level was 90.9% and 95.2% in capital Seoul. He also noted that the average download speed of the telco’s 5G service was 640.7 Mbps.

While the mobile operators have been very enthusiastic about 5G, people aren't as excited. While the data rates have increased and latencies reduced, there are still many technical issues that regularly plague the users. One of the lessons Japanese operators learned after being the first to launch 3G was to not roll out a technology until it was thoroughly tested. The Korean operators maybe learning this as well.

South Korea is seeing a rapid adoption of 5G private networks, chiefly due to the widespread coverage of 5G technology in the country and the allocation of specific spectrum by the government to enable private network deployments.

In August, South Korean tech firm Samsung announced a tranche of new private 5G deployments in its home country, including with three public sector agencies and two private sector hospitals. The vendor noted that this project is part of the government initiative to advance the country’s private 5G ecosystem, allowing non-telecom operators to build and operate 5G networks using 4.7GHz and 28GHz — which are dedicated frequency bands for private 5G networks in Korea.

Samsung said it was selected in each case – by three state-owned utilities and two privately-owned hospitals – “as part of the government’s” drive to release spectrum for industrial change. Its three public sector contracts – with Korea Electric Power Corporation, Korea Industrial Complex Corporation, and Korea Water Resources Corporation – are geared around “workplace safety and efficiency”, it said.

The vendor also said that this new project follows Samsung’s previous deployment of what it claimed to be Korea’s first private 5G network at Naver’s new headquarters.

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Tuesday, 29 June 2021

Vodafone UK Selects Commercial Open RAN Network Partners

Vodafone has been a huge supporter of the Open RAN movement. Not only have they supported it with projects, expertise, etc., they have also contributed their IPR to TIP to drive it further. Last year, I wrote about how they have been evangelizing the benefits to other operators. Now, Vodafone has unveiled its strategic vendors – Dell, NEC, Samsung Electronics, Wind River, Capgemini Engineering and Keysight Technologies – to jointly deliver the first commercial deployment of Open Radio Access Network (RAN) in Europe. A press release said:

The company believes the move will spark other large-scale Open RAN launches and spearhead the next wave of digital transformation across Europe.

Pioneered by Vodafone and its partners, Open RAN will drive greater innovation through a diverse and open vendor ecosystem. It will lead to a more cost-effective, secure, energy efficient and customer-focused network of the future.

Vodafone’s initial focus will be on the 2,500 sites in the UK that it committed to Open RAN in October 2020. It is one of the largest deployments in the world and will be built jointly with Dell, NEC, Samsung and Wind River. Vodafone also expects to use new radio equipment defined under the Evenstar programme, a joint initiative it contributes to. Capgemini Engineering and Keysight Technologies are providing support to ensure interoperability between all the components.

Starting this year, the vendors will work with Vodafone to extend 4G and 5G coverage to more rural places across the South West of England and most of Wales, moving into urban areas in a later phase. Vodafone is also working to launch Open RAN in other countries within both Europe and Africa, enabling the digital society to be accessible to all, with no one left behind. 

Under this initiative to deliver an open and disaggregated network in the UK, Samsung will be a reference RAN software provider. Samsung and NEC will supply Massive MIMO – a method to boost capacity of a mobile antenna – along with Samsung and Evenstar radio units, which establish a signal between users’ smartphones or devices and the mobile mast.

Evenstar radios are part of a joint effort between Facebook and Vodafone to create ‘white-box’ radio units within the Telecom Infra Project (TIP) and are a key component for Open RAN success. These will provide vendors with detailed specifications needed to develop compatible radio units much more cheaply, and are designed to encourage new players to the market to boost the ecosystem and stimulate innovation.

The initial deployments will be implemented using COTS (common off the shelf) Dell EMC PowerEdge servers to support the combined DU/CU function running Containers as a Service (CaaS) software from Wind River Studio, which will provide a distributed cloud-native platform hosting the Open RAN applications and virtualised RAN from Samsung. This gives Vodafone the benefit of being able to mix and match and install new software releases and upgrades more easily. 

Keysight Technologies will deliver its comprehensive Open RAN test solution portfolio designed to support conformance, interoperability and E2E system testing. Capgemini Engineering will be the key partner within our lab testing to ensure interworking of the Open RAN multi-vendor ecosystem.

The O-RAN Alliance 7-2x split, that defines the interface between the radio antenna and the baseband unit, will be used in the deployments, following successful test and simulations that make it the option of choice. The resulting Open RAN network is expected to improve energy efficiency compared to the existing solution from traditional widely deployed RAN products.

In addition, Vodafone is working with several chipset suppliers, including an important research & development (R&D) collaboration with Intel, whose role in developing Open RAN is widely recognized in the industry. Vodafone’s Open RAN Test and Integration lab in Newbury, UK, has been devised to be an innovation centre to foster collaboration and implement new ideas. In this space, Vodafone’s newly announced partnership with Qualcomm will provide solutions that will be added to the project in the future.

The new Open RAN lab will be complemented by two newly created European digital skills hubs in Málaga and Dresden, employing 600 and 200 people respectively. Opening later this year, the skill hubs will be used to develop a number of new solutions for businesses, including cyber security, mobile private networks and Open RAN.

Vodafone is working with other operators to lower the entry barriers for smaller vendors and startups. Recently published Open RAN technical requirements by Vodafone and other telecommunications companies will provide a blueprint to help expedite the development of new products and services based on industry specifications from the O-RAN Alliance (of which Vodafone is a member) and eventually ETSI standards (from the European Telecommunications Standards Institute), always compatible with 3GPP.

There was a considerable amount of confusion regarding different G's and Core, etc. It was all clarified in a Tweet from VF UK Communications Manager as can be seen above. It seems that Samsung went off and dusted their 2G stack to support a legacy technology along with 4G and 5G.

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Friday, 6 March 2020

Jio going it alone for 5G Development


In September 2016, Reliance, an Indian conglomerate owned by Mukesh Ambani  launched a new mobile carrier and broadband network in India called Jio. It has become a phenomenal success, become the largest telco operator in India surpassing old horses like Bharati Airtel and Vodafone.

Reliance Jio began its services by offering free of cost SIM cards, free voice calls over a 4G network, and dirt cheap data at Rs. 22 (33c) per GB. Because of these early offerings, the telco’s subscriber numbers crossed the mark of 100 million in just 170 days.

As its user base grew, the company offered cheaper data plans. As of today, some of its plans offer data at Rs 3.17 (5c) per GB, which is the cheapest in the world. Jio also offers free content through a bunch of apps including JioTV, Jio Cinema, Jio News, and Jio Saavn (previously Jio Music).

The telco has had a crucial role in fuelling India’s mobile internet boom. A report by the Economic Times suggests after Jio entered the market it forced competitors to slash their prices; bringing data rates down to Rs 15 per GB (22c) from Rs 250 per GB ($3.63) on an average. It also notes that Indians now consume 3.7 billion GB data per month as compared to 200 million GB per month, three years ago, representing an 18.5x increase.

Reiance Jio now seeks the the government's permission to undertake 5G trials in India using its own technology and design. With this, Jio has emerged as the first Indian telecom major to seek 5G trials based on self-designed technology.

The operator had previously applied to carry out 5G trials with Samsung. Now RJio wants to end its dependence on Samsung and use its own gear, network architecture and infrastructure for 5G trials.  If those are successful, it may outsource the technology for manufacturing.

Few operators develop their own mobile technology from scratch, however Jio did previously set up  its 4G network and has shown an inclination to develop its own infrastructure as much as possible.

For several years after RJio procured 4G spectrum in 2010, 4G technology was not ready for commercial deployment in India. Over this period, Rancore Technologies, a subsidiary of RJio parent company Reliance Industries, carried out 4G research and trials in a bid to develop the 4G ecosystem and prepare for a commercial launch.

 Besides hiring Samsung, RJio also teamed up with Bell Labs (later Nokia Bell Labs) to explore ways of providing voice services on the 4G network.

All this demonstrates RJio's track record of conducting its own research and trials before launching services. It now seems eager to emulate its 4G experience in 5G, finding the best technology options before launching 5G services. The 5G tests look like a step in this direction.

Now a part of RJio, Rancore Technologies seems likely to play a significant role in these 5G plans. And it is not the only vendor that has been subsumed into the business. In 2018, RJio bought Radisys, a US systems and software vendor, to support what Akash Ambani, RJio's chief strategy officer, described as a push for "global innovation and technology leadership in the areas of 5G, IoT [Internet of Things] and open source architecture adoption."

As India's newest telco, RJio has made investments in a highly sophisticated, all-IP network that should provide a good foundation for 5G. Of similar use will be its fiber network, now India's most extensive at about 1.1 million kilometers. These assets put RJio in a better 5G position than its rivals.

RJio's strategy of conducting a 5G trial based on its design is also in keeping with the government's Make in India policy to promote local manufacturing. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has been asking telcos to opt for India-made gear. It has even provided incentives based on three categories: designed in India but manufactured abroad; designed and manufactured in India; and designed abroad but manufactured in India. RJio's initiatives are likely to fall under the first two categories.

After a court ruling that went against them, India's other operators, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone Idea, are busy scrambling for resources to pay off historical licensing fees they now owe the government. That leaves RJio relatively free to take a lead in the 5G space. Its trials, if successful, will clearly set a precedent.

On the 5G front, the biggest roadblock for Jio, or for that matter any operator, is going to be steep spectrum prices. The base price of the 5G spectrum (in 3,300 megahertz to 3,600 megahertz band) is highest in India. At TRAI's recommended reserve price of Rs 492 crore per MHz, operators will have to pay around Rs 50,000 crore for 100 MHz pan-India spectrum - that's the minimum spectrum required to deliver 5G services (in sub-6000 MHz bands) as per global body ITU. The government has also said that it's not planning to reduce the base price for the 5G spectrum.

Another major issue is the greater urgency for Jio to acquire more 4G spectrum than 5G spectrum at the moment. For two main reasons: some of the Reliance Communications' spectrum (in 800 MHz band) that Jio uses is expiring in July/August 2021. Then, the spectrum holding of Jio is lowest amongst the private operators. For instance, Jio's spectrum holding is 1480 MHz as compared to Vodafone Idea's 1850 MHz and Airtel's 1727 MHz. Given that it's the largest telecom operator in the country at present - with 370 million subs as on December 2019 - and it's adding nearly 7 million subs per month, Therefore one can conclude that Jio needs to first focus on its current services and subs before taking a plunge in the next-gen 5G.

Globally, the development of 5G ecosystem (devices, equipment) has suffered a huge setback due to coronavirus. China, which is expected to lead the market with mass-scale production of affordable 5G handset/equipment, has literally stopped the production lines. It is likely to push the 5G launch forward by a few quarters. Jio's vendor partner Samsung would likely be affected as South Korea is one of the worst affected countries from coronavirus.

In India, as the deadline to launch 5G trials keeps shifting (the recent buzz is April-June quarter), an expert says that Jio can be unpredictable with its moves too. "They might want to buy 5G spectrum with an intention of leading the market in launching the new technology, and benefit from the first-mover advantage," says analyst.


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Friday, 8 November 2019

Orange Romania Finally Launches 5G


Orange has entered the 5G fray with the launch of its first commercial network within its footprint, deploying the technology in three major Romanian cities. The operator launched 5G services in capital Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca and Iasi, with other Romanian cities to follow from 2020 onwards. At a launch event Ramon Fernandez, deputy CEO for Finance, Performance and Europe, explained the country was a natural choice to lead the operator’s 5G charge, having been a key part of its footprint since 1997. He also said the operator had invested “more than €3.5 billion” in its Romanian operations over the past 22 years.



Fernandez explained the operator deployed 115MHz of spectrum in the 3.4GHz to 3.6GHz bands, “more than double” the amount available to competitors. Orange stated the network offers peak download rates of 1.2Gb/s, with average rates of 600Mb/s.


Orange is the largest operator in Romania with 10.3 million connections according to GSMA Intelligence, just ahead of rival Vodafone’s 10 million.Vodafone and number four player Digi launched 5G earlier this year.

This launch and this network is the result of an attractive exclusive partnership with Samsung. An interesting partnership which works both ways. Samsung devices can only be sold by Orange, and Orange 5G tariffs can only be run through Samsung devices. It might sound unusual that two companies would want to limit this potential in this manner, but considering Orange is the market share leader for 4G (roughly 40%) while Samsung is the devices market share leader (estimates range between 50-55%), there are attractive gains for both parties.


The second interesting element of this announcement is the focus on Fixed Wireless Access (FWA). Orange has never been shy about its convergence ambitions, the success of bundling is evident in numerous markets but with no fixed assets in Romania it becomes difficult. There is a wholesale agreement in place with Telecom Romania, however this is far from an ideal position.

With 5G, FWA becomes a much more apparent opportunity to compete with the fibre services which are being offered by competitors. It certainly isn’t perfect by any means, but if Orange can deliver the promised gigabit speeds over the air, there will certainly be demand from increasingly speed obsessed consumers.

The final interesting aspect of this story could count against the Orange. After performing a number of speed tests across Bucharest, it became very apparent, very quickly, that the 4G network is excellent (60-96 Mbps), providing speeds which even the most demanding consumer could not make use of. In delivering such eye-watering speeds over 4G, one should ask whether this weakens the selling point of 5G. As attractive as 1.2 Gbps download speeds are, who actually needs that much power right now?

Despite the number of features and wild promises here, the success of Orange Romania in the 4G era might undermine the pursuit of early adopters for 5G. This is a difficulty which only remains while the operators discuss little more than speed upgrades, though as the ecosystems develop new services will be pushed at the consumer.


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Tuesday, 6 August 2019

Orange Romania Continues 5G Testing with Samsung


According to a recent Samsung announcement:

Samsung Electronics and Orange Romania have successfully deployed a 5G New Radio (NR) network to demonstrate a series of 5G use cases at Untold Festival 2019, the largest annual dance music festival in Romania, held from August 1 to August 4.

The two companies started their 5G collaboration in 2018 with a 5G Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) trial in Cluj county, Romania, where Orange mobile customers became the first European users to experience at home 5G services. Now, the companies are ramping up their efforts to bring the benefits of 5G to users in Romania.

At Untold, which drew over 335,000 attendants last year, Orange Romania and Samsung have set up 5G use cases to offer immersive experiences powered by the 5G network’s ultra-low latency and ultra-high speed, unfolding the potential of the next generation technology for all to see. The demonstrations include real-time streaming of the performances, captured by 360-degree cameras built onto the arena’s main stage. The stream is shown at an Orange VR zone set up outside the arena, providing a uniquely immersive viewing experience to fans who visit. The companies are also holding an event demonstrating 5G download speeds reaching above 1Gbps, with a latency reduction of 50% on that experienced when using current LTE technology.

“With these successful demonstrations, we are showcasing the experiences that 5G can bring to Orange customers in Romania,” said Emmanuel Chautard, Chief Technology Officer at Orange Romania. “Together with Samsung, we’re showing live network capabilities, with proof that goes beyond just impressive speeds more centered on the customer experience.”

“5G offers more than just a faster connection; it enables transformative use cases that will benefit people and businesses across the industry,” said GY Seo, Senior Vice President and Head of Global Sales & Marketing, Networks Business at Samsung Electronics. “These joint demonstrations allow for a glimpse into the new kinds of services and capabilities that will be made possible as we unlock the potential of 5G for users across Europe.”

The trial at Cluj Arena, where the festival is taking place, makes use of Samsung’s latest solutions, including 5G Massive MIMO Units (MMUs), which support the 3.4-3.8GHz frequency band. Samsung 5G MMUs have already been rolled out across Korea by all three Korean 5G operators for use with their 5G commercial service, which launched in April of 2019. This commercially proven MMU is one of the smallest and lightest in the industry, making installation in existing cellular sites very straightforward.

Here is a video from Orange Romania



Last year at around this time, Orange Romania was in news for doing the first European 5G multi-vendor Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) test

According to 5G Observatory Quarterly Report #4 (June 2019), the Spectrum situation in Romania is as follows:

The National Authority for Management and Regulation in Communications (ANCOM) launched a public consultation on 5G spectrum between May and June 2018. 

ANCOM launched a public consultation on the “National Strategy for the Implementation of 5G in Romania” between November 20th and December 21st, 2018.

In December 2018, the Romanian regulator, ANCOM, has issued a consultation about its action plan for 2019. ANCOM’s President, Sorin Grindeanu, said in a press release that its main project will be the auction of the 700 MHz, 800 MHz, 1500 MHz, 2.6 GHz, and 3.4 – 3.6 GHz bands for 5G services.

Spectrum in 700 MHz and 3.4-3.8 GHz frequencies could be auctioned in 2019/2020 and 26 GHz spectrum in 2021. 

In Romania, while Orange and Telekom plan to launch 5G in 2020, Vodafone launched 5G back in May and Digi launched 5G in July.

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Thursday, 28 March 2019

SK Telecom achieves 3.9 Gbps in tests by triple-coupling of 5G, LTE and Wi-Fi

Earlier this month we wrote about how "SK Telecom & Samsung performs 5G EN-DC tests, achieve 2.65 Gbps". We also explained this is mainly because of the large bandwidths available to each of the South Korean operator.

In another news (in Korean only), SK Telecom announced that they have achieved up to 3.9 Gbps by triple connectivity (triple-coupled or triple-aggregation) between 5G, LTE & Wi-Fi


The press release says (using Google translate):



* [5G-LTE-WiFi 3-Step Coupling Technology 'following' 5G-LTE Coupling '] Fastest 4Gbp
* Applied '5G media compression technology' to reduce media data consumption by more than 30%

SK Telecom has completed the key test for mass production of "Galaxy S10 5G" on 25th, followed by 2.7Gbps class 5G + LTE combination technology and "quantum cryptography" network.

For the past two months, SK Telecom has tested thousands of items including '5G Device Test Lab' in Bundang's office building, and interoperability testing between 5G network and smartphone, interface verification, and frequency compatibility at commercial sites. We also made a scenario-specific test by creating more than 100 virtual environments using special equipment in the laboratory.

'5G device test lab' and commercial network performance test is required to be able to launch the smartphone formal. This is why the process is called the final gateway to commercialization. With the completion of the core test, the launch of the world's No. 1 5G smartphone is expected to be smooth.

In the next step, SK Telecom will conduct a delivery inspection this week for mass-produced products produced at factories. The company plans to make its first launch of the 5G smartphone without any problem.

In addition, SK Telecom is preparing to hire a new 5G technology such as '5G Media Compression Technology' to reduce data consumption and 'Galaxy S10 5G'.


"5G-LTE-WiFi 3-stage coupling technology" is followed by "5G-LTE combining technology"

SK Telecom succeeded in verifying '5G-LTE combining technology' that speeds up to 2.7Gbps on November 11, and it was installed first in 'Galaxy S10 5G'.

Furthermore, SK Telecom implemented the "Triple Aggregation", which uses ▲ 5G ▲ LTE ▲ Wi-Fi for data transmission at the same time, in the Galaxy S10 5G, and completed the verification in the 5G commercial network.

The 'three-tier technology' allows users to download content or applications up to 3.9 Gbps in areas where three networks are simultaneously deployed. In just 4 seconds you can get a movie (2GB) on the other hand.

SK Telecom has upgraded Multi-Path TCP (MPTCP), a technology that connects LTE and Wi-Fi, and implemented the '3-step combining technology' preemptively to the Galaxy S10 5G.
...



Some people are quick to point out the different strategies by different South Korean operators. Dual connectivity means higher speeds but higher latency too while standalone will means lower latency and maybe lower data rates initially.

As we have pointed out, the South Korean operators have already got large amounts of 5G spectrum so speeds will be no issue in long run.
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Tuesday, 26 March 2019

KDDI and Samsung Strengthen their 5G Partnership

Samsung and KDDI have been working together since 2005. Back in 2015 they signed MOU for joint development of 5G technologies. Since then they have done quite a few joint demonstrations like:

  1. 5G Handover Using 28GHz Spectrum on a City Highway in Tokyo
  2. High-Speed 5G Mobility Test (Video)
  3. Demonstration of 5G on a Train Moving at 100km/hour
  4. 5G field trial held in Okinawa Cellular Stadium using Samsung’s end-to-end 5G solutions

Back in January, both the companies announced couple of other interesting joint trials

Real Time 4K Video Communication Powered by 5G at a Japanese Train Station
Samsung and KDDI Demonstrate Real Time 4K Video Communication Powered by 5G at a Japanese Train Station

Together with Waseda University, Keihin Corporation, and Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International (ATR), Samsung demonstrated effective communications through 4K UHD video using a 28GHz band 5G base station to enhance passenger safety in Tokyo.

The demonstration was conducted from November 21 to December 21, 2018 at the Haneda Airport International Terminal in Ota, Tokyo. As the number of incoming visitors is steadily increasing, Samsung and KDDI have been working on the real-world scenario, powered by 5G, to make their travels safer and more convenient.

During the demonstration, the video files collected from both 4K security cameras and security robots patrolling the station were sent via tablets using 5G. Then, the files were received by the base station to be displayed on the monitor and VR goggles in the monitoring room. Moreover, detecting any suspicious people or objects at the station was all possible through collecting and analyzing the received 4K files shown on the server.

Samsung’s 5G solutions were used to conduct the demonstration. KDDI was responsible for assessing and designing the 5G test environment at the train station, which was provided by Keikyu Corporation, while Waseda University provided the monitoring system, VR goggles and video evaluation.


Next-generation technology enhances classroom activities with ultra-high-definition video, providing an immersive educational experience for students


Samsung Electronics and KDDI announced the successful demonstration of their 5G capabilities by working with the Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International (ATR) to deploy ultra-fast communications at Maehara Elementary School in Tokyo. For the first time in Japan, 5G was utilized to help students download contents in class using UHD, powered by the infrastructure of next-generation technologies.

The demonstration, made possible by Samsung’s 5G solutions, was conducted from November 21 to December 12, 2018 at the gym inside Maehara Elementary School. In order to showcase 5G capabilities, the gym was set up with Samsung’s 5G network using a 28GHz band to enable transmission of UHD videos in a school setting. The demo involved comparing the difference between 5G tablets and Wi-Fi tablets in their ability to download and play back videos.

During the demonstration, students were given a chance to create their own videos and experience high-speed and large capacity transmission of large video files. In doing so, they verified the capabilities of 5G for this type of use case. KDDI was responsible for assessing and designing the 5G areas used in the trial and ATR provided the testing infrastructure.

Leveraging 5G will enhance various classroom activities and ultimately offer a whole new academic experience to students and teachers. During the Samsung and KDDI demonstration, large UHD videos were transmitted without interruption, despite requiring large amounts of bandwidth. This allowed the children to enjoy a seamless connection while engaging with the contents.

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Sunday, 17 March 2019

SK Telecom & Samsung performs 5G EN-DC tests, achieve 2.65 Gbps

South Korean MNO SK Telecom and Samsung Electronics has announced that they have successfully completed the network device interoperability test applying Dual Connectivity technology using both 4G and 5G networks provided by Samsung’s Networks Business, a.k.a. ‘E-UTRAN New Radio Dual Connectivity (EN-DC)’ based on the 3GPP Release-15 5G New Radio (NR) standard.

Before proceeding further, if you are not aware of different 5G Network Architecture Options (including EN-DC), you may want to check out our tutorial on 3G4G page here.


According to the Samsung press release:

During the test, both companies have successfully achieved 2.65Gbps in data speeds on the 5G smartphone, combining both 1.5Gbps in 5G using 3.5GHz frequency (100MHz bandwidth) with 1.15Gbps in LTE using 1.8GHz, 2.1GHz, and 2.6GHz frequencies (65MHz bandwidth) all of which are for commercial use by SK Telecom.

The test, carried out at Samsung Electronics located in Suwon, Korea, used Samsung’s commercial 4G and 5G NR end-to-end networks solutions which have been provided to the operator’s current service. In addition, companies used Samsung’s virtual core (vCore) that supports simultaneous 4G and 5G as well as its Galaxy S10 5G, Samsung’s first 5G smartphone which was unveiled last month.

SK Telecom, in particular, will be able to boost the overall transmission data speed by 80% by leveraging the 4G and 5G dual connectivity. It will allow users who are staying in the 5G service coverage to download UHD videos of 2GB in just 6 seconds, and large video content such as 4K VR video of 10GB in less than 30 seconds.

The two companies demonstrated the delivery of multi-gigabit speeds for 5G device, with a focus on seamless user experiences. Wherever mobile service subscribers are without being limited to 4G or 5G service areas, they can expect seamless, consistent, and stable mobile services. In the early stages of 5G era, the combined capabilities of 4G and 5G networks are important forces for mobile carriers to maximize the characteristics of the 5G network – ultra-fast speed, low-latency, and massive-connectivity by leveraging widely deployed 4G network coverage.

The success of the demonstration by SK Telecom and Samsung signifies a blueprint of early 5G deployment, spotlighting a rapid, stable and effective path to 5G service using a dual 4G and 5G approach.

This success is part of an ongoing collaboration between SK Telecom and Samsung of many years. Pushing forward early 5G commercialization, the companies have succeeded in the world’s first 4G and 5G interworking back in 2017 and world’s first 5G Next-Generation Core (5G NC) trial in June 2018, which featured control and user planes separation and VNFs implementation based on 3GPP release 15 standard. These joint forces have led Samsung to become a major partner for SK Telecom to successfully launch 5G mobility commercial service in Korea, December 1st 2018.


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Monday, 26 November 2018

South Korea Telcos: United in 5G Launch



South Korea has ambitions to be the first country to roll-out 5G and their three major mobile operators will work together to launch 5G networks at the same time in 2019 to “avoid excessive competition” and ensure the country is the first to launch the next-generation technology. This is discounting the fact that San Marino already launched nationwide 5G but its just a city state and the 5G launch does not really qualify to be considered a nationwide launch

SK Telecom, KT and LG Uplus have agreed to jointly introduce 5G services on “Korea 5G Day”, which is likely to be sometime in March 2019.

The South Korean government in April of this year mandated that operators collaborate on 5G deployments by sharing core fibre infrastructure, rather than RANs, in a bid to reduce the cost of rolling out the technology and so enable operators to pass on the savings to customers.

The triumvirate of mobile carriers plan to provide 5G services using mobile routers providing mobile connections for Wi-Fi devices, first rather than smartphones. The services on smartphones will be available a month later.

In an interview with The Korea Times, ICT Minister Yoo Young-min stressed the need for the government and companies to closely cooperate to reach the goal:

"The world's first 5G commercialization is very meaningful in that Korea will have an advantageous position in the global market and take the leadership. Amid intensifying competition among global mobile carriers, it is significant for the government and companies to join hands and reach the goal together."

There has been much speculation and discussion on who would be chosen to supply the 5G network equipment.

KT has chosen Samsung Electronics, Ericsson and Nokia. As expected, Huawei was excluded from the list. They elaborated:

“In choosing 5G equipment providers, the company considered a wide range of factors: the level of technology, investment costs and management stability based on the compatibility with the existing LTE network.”

SK Telecom named Samsung Electronics, Ericsson and Nokia as its 5G equipment providers. SK Telecom have recently opened one of their first commercial fifth-generation base stations in the central area of Seoul. Using equipment manufactured by Samsung Electronics, SKT introduced a 24-kilogram rectangular active antenna unit for the 3.5-gigahertz frequency band -- 1 meter in height and 23 centimeters in width -- installed at the rooftop of a small hotel building in Myeong-dong, one of the most crowded areas in Seoul. Compared to the fourth-generation Long Term Evolution antenna units hung at the rooftop railing, the 5G antenna unit consisting of a total of 32 individual antennas looked noticeably smaller and more compact, requiring just 10 square-meters of space for installation. 


Huawei was also excluded by them for the second time now despite having participated in internal tests along with the three selected.

SKT and KT’s choices were anticipated because both had used equipment from Samsung, Ericsson and Nokia for their 4G LTE networks.



LG U+ is the only one among Korea’s three mobile carriers that has not yet announced 5G equipment suppliers. The smallest mobile carrier is likely to include Huawei on its list. It partnered with the Chinese company for its 4G LTE network, along with Samsung, Ericsson and Nokia.

The biggest advantage of Huawei’s 5G equipment is cost efficiency. The Chinese company is known to charge prices that are 20 to 30 percent lower than other global competitors for high-quality 5G equipment. However the major issue with Huawei are the security concerns.
Due to its ties to the Chinese government, there have been worries that the company’s equipment may be used for spying. In August of this year, the U.S. and Australian governments banned Huawei from supplying equipment for their 5G wireless infrastructure citing security reasons. Britain said in July it “is less confident” about the integrity of Huawei products.

Huawei has been denying such allegations.

In a press release last month, the Chinese tech company highlighted that, despite ongoing security concerns, there has been zero cases of actual information leakage in the past.

Samsung is aiming to control 20 percent of the global market for 5G network equipment in 2020, the head of the company's network business has said. Samsung Electronics President Kim Young-ky claimed that the company is not a newcomer to the network equipment industry as it has been supplying products in this field for the past 20 years. According to the data compiled by industry tracker Dell'Oro, Samsung Electronics took up 11 percent of the global market for fourth-generation (4G) network equipment in the second quarter of this year.


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Tuesday, 4 September 2018

Orange Romania: 1st European 5G multi-vendor Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) test


According to The Mobile Network Magazine:

Orange has been trialling 5G Fixed Wireless Access (FWA), using the 5GTF specifications, with live customers in Romania. It is the first such trial in Europe, although other trials of the same radio access technology are much more advanced in the USA with Verizon, Sprint and AT&T.

Orange sees FWA as a likely use case for 5G in markets where fibre and fixed broadband availability is constrained. It said that in Romania it could see potential for up to 10% of the overall broadband customer base to have a FWA connection

In Floresti, Orange has two Samsung Fixed Wireless Access points operating over 500MHz of experimental 26GHz spectrum. The access points have 128 element MIMO antennas. Orange has one access point on a tower on top of a hill and one on a lower, 20m, tower. The trial runs from the start of June to mid July.

About 30km away in an Orange data centre the operator has sited vBBU capacity from Samsung on COTS server hardware, and a dedicated Virtual Core from Cisco. Arnaud Vamparys,  Orange Senior VP Radio Networks, said the operator would not necessarily deploy vRAN to support FWA deployments, but that it was important to do so in this instance to explore the potential flexibility and efficiency benefits that such an architecture could support. “We are not saying that FWA will be on virtual radio, but we are doing it in the beginning because it is important to understand the choice.” The operator had deployed a high layer split between the access point and vBBU, he added.

More details are available in TMN mag. Below is the official video about the FWA testing.



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Saturday, 14 July 2018

Verizon's 5G Progress & Plans


Verizon plans to launch 5G in at least 4 cities this year, two that have already been announced being Sacramento and Los Angeles. This information is based on Lowell McAdam, Verizon chairman and CEO, speaking to CNBC's David Faber back in May.

Their intention is still to use millimeter wave bands (mmWave) in 28GHz and do a Fixed-wireless access (FWA). Lowell McAdam referred to this as ultra-wideband 5G as he says there will be different flavors of 5G.

The videos (playlist) below shows some of the trials and applications and the first video is particularly interesting as it tries to dispel the myths associated with mmWave bands.


Verizon have publicly announced that they are doing trials with Samsung, Ericsson and Nokia. According to Light Reading, Samsung is supplying the gear for Verizon's fixed 5G network in Sacramento, Calif., while Ericsson's equipment will be used in Los Angeles, the only two markets announced so far.

We will see Nokia equipment being deployed in another city soon as its being heavily promoted by their marketing department and rightly so.

Verizon is also working with innovative universities, start-ups and other companies to develop the use cases that will run on tomorrow’s 5G networks. At Alley, site of Verizon’s 5G incubator, five of these innovators are getting to use real 5G technology to develop, refine and demonstrate ways 5G networks will change the ways we live, learn, work and play.

We are looking forward to seeing real world results after the services are launched on Q4 2018.

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Friday, 24 October 2014

Country Overview: The Philippines


                                 

With the second-largest population in South-east Asia after Indonesia, the Philippines has a large consumer base for its mobile market. Penetration in 2012 reached 106%, or 102.3m subscribers, according to a report by PwC. Filipinos are also among the world’s most prolific texters, accounting for 10% of global SMS messages.

The two major network operators for mobile internet in the Philippines are Smart Communications and Globe Telecom, which combine to make a total of 83 percent of the market share. Sun Cellular is a distant third.

3G services
The roll out of the 3G network began in 2005 when the government opened bidding on five new 3G licences. Despite having five licences on offer, the NTC ultimately granted only four, as it argued that the remaining applicants lacked the capacity to effectively provide 3G services. The four successful companies included Globe Telecom, Connectivity Unlimited Resource Enterprise (CURE), Smart Communications (owned by PLDT), and Sun Cellular. Smart Communications, having acquired CURE in 2008, was itself acquired by PLDT in 2011. As a condition of the latter deal, PLDT agreed to relinquish its CURE licence.

Delays in spectrum allocation have been a drag on the region’s 3G uptake, which has been relatively slow. Low penetration of smartphones that are equipped for mobile broadband have also dampened growth.
All the same, growing data demand and the introduction of low-cost smartphones, such as the Nokia Lumina series unveiled in the Philippines in March 2014, paint a bright picture for the future of the industry.
LTE
Smart Communications was one of the first operators to introduce 4G LTE services in the Philippines. In August 2012, it launched LTE service at bands of 850 MHz and 2600 MHz, adding additional capacity at 1800 MHz the following month. These services are already available in larger cities such as Manila, Caloocan, Las Piñas, Makati, Quezon City, San Juan, and Valenzuela, according to Telegeography, a telecoms research firm.
The company is also set to expand this service further. In March 2014, it unveiled plans to extend its 4G LTE network to all major cities by the end of 2014 – areas including Bohol, Bacolod, Davao del Sur, Tagaytay and Ilocos Norte – thus reaching 50% of the population. In addition, the P32bn ($714m) of planned capital expenditures for 2014 will include expanding Smart Communications’ 3G coverage from its current coverage of 71% of the population to 100%.
Globe Telecom, too, is widening its networks. In November 2011, it launched a $790m programme to modernise its services, including the roll-out of a 4G LTE network in Makati, Manila, Pasig, Muntinlupa, Mandaluyong, Cebu City, Boracay and Quezon City. The company’s president and CEO, Ernest Cu, told OBG that the existing network infrastructure in the Philippines was built primarily to handle SMS traffic, which requires considerably less backbone capacity than data-intensive services. Now, in addition to expanding the company’s fibre optic network, Globe Telecom is seeking to standardise the communications protocols used for voice, SMS and data in order to further improve network capacity and help in future proofing the system. In 2014, capital investment in excess of $200m has been earmarked to further expand the data network and build additional capacity, which is becoming more important given high-end customers' growing mobile data needs.

Globe narrowly leads for LTE download speed, with an average speed of 6.1Mbps., slightly faster than Smart's 5.9Mbps. Internationally, however, both speeds are comparatively slow – with Australia ranked as the fastest country for LTE in the world, averaging 24.5Mbps earlier this year.

For upload speed the results are again very close, with Smart edging ahead of Globe with speeds of 7.2 Mbps. With speeds this close, as with the close download speeds above, most mobile users will not notice a significant difference unless they are downloading particularly large files, or using some other data-intensive service.


costofplans    

Smartphone penetration

The smartphone penetration rate in the Philippines is still at a low fifteen percent according to a recent study by On Device Research. That pales in comparison to the total mobile penetration in the country of 101 percent.Smartphone penetration in the Philippines is also the lowest of all the countries in Southeast Asia, including Malaysia (80 percent), Thailand (49 percent), and Indonesia (23 percent).

Smartphone penetration is expected to more than triple to 50 percent by 2015. Another positive: 88 percent of the total mobile internet population is below the age of 34. 

The battle for smartphone supremacy will be fought (and won) largely on price, given that 20 percent of the population lives on less than US$1.25 a day (54 PhP). For example, local brands Cherry Mobile, My Phone, and Star Mobile offer Android phones priced between US$50 and US$250 (2191 PhP to 10,958 PhP). This range is expected to be the sweet spot that will drive further adoption of smartphones.

International brands are also getting in on the action. Chinese brands Oppo and Xiaomi plan to expand into the Philippines, while Huawei is already offering their Ascend G6 to Filipinos. Priced at US$228 (9,994 PhP), which is half the cost of the previous model known as the P6, the Ascend G6 represents the Chinese firm’s bid to capture 10 percent of the market for mid-priced smartphones.


The race to be the cell phone brand that dominates the Philippine market is wide open. At the moment, Samsung leads at 43 percent. No other cell phone manufacturer has larger than a 10 percent market share. Sony and Cherry Mobile each have seven percent, Lenovo has five percent, and LG, Alcatel, and MyPhone each have three percent.

Samsunglead


The rising prevalence of smartphones will likely be the main driver of mobile revenues going forward, as consumers alter their preferences by reducing voice and SMS usage and increasing reliance on alternatives such Skype and instant messaging. While this may cause revenue losses with respect to these more traditional offerings, the wider range of data-driven services, such as applications, video-streaming and mobile gaming, will likely compensate over the longer term.

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