We may not yet have a firm definition of Metaverse but that hasn't stopped operators launching their own Metaverse. Sri Lanka's Dialog is the latest operator to announce their 'Futureverse'. The press release noted:
Continuing to spearhead technology firsts in the country and the region, Dialog Axiata PLC, launched ‘Futureverse’ – Sri Lanka’s first fully immersive, interactive and experiential Metaverse where people can shop for Dialog products and services, socialize, attend events, and play games in one persistent virtual world.
Futureverse is an immersive and interactive virtual world where users can create their own custom avatars. This virtual world will enable visitors access to all Dialog products and services available at any Dialog Experience Centre, socialize with friends, watch movies, take part in workshops, visit exhibitions, and more. Powered by immersive technologies such as virtual reality (VR) and extended reality (XR), the Futureverse, from Sri Lanka’s premier connectivity provider, extends a seemingly borderless digital realm that delivers endless experiences and possibilities, where visitors can experience a unique virtual world filled with abstract landscapes and objects. Futureverse is a fun way to spend free time while interacting with friends virtually through voice or chat.
If you do not know the difference between AR, VR, MR and XR, we suggest you check out our short video here. The following is a video of Futureverse from Dialog:
With MWC just around the corner, we will see a lot more of Metaverse action in the coming weeks and months.
With 2022 coming to an end, here are the top 10 most viewed posts from 2022. These posts were not necessarily posted this year, so I have added the month and year it was posted.
Due to its economy being so heavily dependent on tourism, the Maldives has suffered heavy economic as well as health casualties during the pandemic. The country had a relatively short period of lockdown and was willing to welcome visitors back as early as July 2020. But the effective shutdown of international air travel for most of the year resulted in the bottom falling out of the Maldives’ tourism industry, taking GDP down 32% in the process. The economy fared better in 2021, with a return to growth, yet it may still be a few years before the country’s key industries can return to the same level of prosperity that they previously enjoyed.
The Maldives’ telecoms market is experiencing a similar level of pain because of the pandemic, due to being overweight in the mobile segment. That is because, historically, the country’s high number of tourists and expatriate workers has inflated the penetration rate for mobile services, making it one of the highest in the world. That rate crashed in 2020 as demand for SIM cards (primarily prepaid) dried up. However, the number of contract subscribers increased as locals took advantage of competitive pricing offers from operators.
Everything now rests on a fast return to normality, with tourists helping to boost the nation’s coffers as well as buying up those prepaid SIM cards. With commercial 5G services already launched and fibre networks rapidly expanding around the country, the Maldives is primed to deliver world-class telecommunications services to its domestic and international customers.
The Maldives has two network operators: Dhiraagu and Ooredoo
2G/GSM is on 900 MHz, 3G on 2100 MHz up to (DC-)HSPA+ speed, 4G/LTE had started in 2013 on both providers on 1800 MHz (3) and added by 2100 (1) and 2600 (7) MHz. 5G started on Dhiraagu in Male in 2019 and is available without surcharge. Both networks have shops next door to each other at Male international airport.
The recent Open Signal report on mobile network experience in the Maldives, saw a tightly-fought competition between the two national operators across all the categories. Ooredoo won three awards outright, both Consistency awards and 4G Coverage Experience. In the remaining categories, including speed metrics, experiential awards and Availability, there were six statistical ties between Dhiraagu and Ooredoo, which resulted in six joint wins for both of them.
Ooredoo was taken over and rebranded 2012 from Wataniya. It's the second mobile provider in the Maldives. LTE has started 2014 on 2600 MHz (band 7) in Male, now available to prepaid customers to be added by 2100 MHz (band 1).
In August 2022 Ooredoo Maldives announced that its 5G network was now available across Greater Male. Mobile and ‘AirFibre’ home broadband customers are able to access 5G services in areas including Male, Villimale, Hulhumale and Hulhule. According to TeleGeography’s GlobalComms Database, Ooredoo launched commercial 5G services in select areas of Male in December 2020, targeting key business hubs, hospitals and public spaces. Ooredoo claims that average speeds of 400Mbps-600Mbps can be achieved, with peak speeds reaching above 1Gbps. At the same time, the firm introduced its AirFibre 5G fixed wireless service for home broadband customers.
Dhiraagu is the leading and the largest provider of telecommunications and digital services in the Maldives. It's mostly owned by the Batelco Group from Bahrain and the Government of the Maldives. They have linked the Maldives from north to south through a 1,253 km long fibre optic submarine cable network which supports the nation's largest 3G and 4G/LTE and fixed broadband networks. 4G/LTE started in Male on 1800 MHz (band 3) frequency band and has been expanded in 2015 to a few more islands and the 2600 MHz (band 7).
Dhiraagu was the first operator to launch the first 5G commercial service in Maldives and South Asia.
More recently they have announced the launch of their fibre broadband service in Kandoodhoo, an inhabited island of Thaa Atoll. The latest expansion brings the operator's fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) coverage to a total of 100 islands of the Maldives, representing coverage of 85% of households.
Back in August, the Indonesian government launched its own metaverse platform called MetaNesia as an effort to adapt to the fast-changing digital ecosystem. XinhuaNet reported:
The virtual world, launched Sunday, is developed by state-owned telecommunications company PT Telkom Indonesia, and will be the place for Indonesia's small and medium enterprises to promote their goods on an equal footing with larger foreign businesses.
Organizations will also be able to offer crucial social services like online health consultations to more people on metaNesia, according to the State-owned Enterprises Minister Erick Thohir.
"Don't let our country be left behind other countries. We have to balance the changes in this ecosystem, one of the answers for this is MetaNesia," Thohir said in a written statement.
He also said that MetaNesia services include a Metaverse Mall to feature shops, service centers and entertainment, as well as a Metaverse Concert for events. Furthermore, it will also be made able to host a non-fungible tokens marketplace, virtual meetings, and sport events.
PT Telkom Indonesia is aiming to create a platform that features many services such as Metaverse Concert for events and a Metaverse Mall with stores, services, and entertainment. Later this year, the state-owned enterprise hopes to hold a non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace, online meetings, and even yoga and e-sports events in the second-life world.
Gemini's latest "Global State of Crypto Report," in which 20 countries were surveyed, concludes that 41% of Indonesians aged between 18 to 75 years old with an income of more than $14,000 per year own crypto assets. In addition, 61% of Indonesian respondents agree with the notion that crypto is the future of money, Gemini said.
Indonesia's MetaNesia truly captured the spirit of Indonesian and the metaverse. Not only is it not a replacement for reality, but it also aims to improve equality, inclusivity, and accessibility.
However, PT Telkom Indonesia needs to plan carefully to really achieve this ideal world.
At Telecom Infra Project's Fyuz 22 conference, Muhamad Fajrin Rasyid, Chief Digital and Innovation Officer of Telkom Indonesia gave a talk on metaNesia. His talk is embedded below:
Zimbabwe’s mobile operators continue to be affected by the country’s poor economy. This has been exacerbated by the significant economic difficulties related to the pandemic. Revenue has also been under pressure from a number of recent regulatory measures and additional taxes imposed by the cash-strapped government. Inflation has become so high that year-on-year revenue comparisons since 2019 have been difficult to assess meaningfully.
The three MNOs Econet Wireless, NetOne and Telecel Zimbabwe continue to invest in network upgrades, partly supported by government efforts and cash released from the Universal Service Fund. As a result of these investments, LTE networks have expanded steadily, though services remain concentrated in urban areas.
2. Mobile Data Speeds Zimbabwe is placed at 135 / 140 with an average speed of 13.71mbps. In comparison at no 1, is the UAE with download speeds of 195.5mbps. https://t.co/FkiUoTqqfypic.twitter.com/G14wSfRJto
International bandwidth has improved since fibre links to several submarine cables were established via neighbouring countries. The expansion of 3G and LTE-based mobile broadband services has meant that most of the population has access to the internet. The government has started a national broadband scheme aimed at delivering a 1Mb/s service nationally by 2030. Investment in fixed broadband infrastructure has also resulted in a slow but steady growth in the number of DSL connections, and also fibre subscriptions. During 2021, most growth in the fixed broadband segment has been with fibre connections.
Econet is the market leader in Zimbabwe with over 12.4 million connected customers they have invested millions of US dollars in deploying the widest and most robust 2G, 3G,4G and now 5G networks in the country.
Econet Wireless Zimbabwe has teamed up with Ericsson to launch 5G services in Harare. The Swedish vendor is providing RAN and 5G evolved packet core equipment, while also providing a Network Functions Virtualisation Infrastructure (NFVI) platform to ensure a smooth upgrade from 3G and 4G technologies. Econet plans to deploy 22 5G base stations during 2022.
We're delighted to have scooped the 1st runner up award for The Best Mobile Telecoms in Zimbabwe. Thank you our valued customers for making this success possible.@CCAZ2pic.twitter.com/SVZqz5HMWF
NetOne is the 2nd provider in Zimbabwe by user numbers, but they started even before Econet. The state-owned company is co-managed with TelOne, the national landline operator.
In 2021 they announced they were looking to deploy more than 260 new base stations under the third phase of its mobile broadband expansion project, with a focus on rural areas. A report from The Herald quotes Deputy ICT Minister Dingumuzi Phuti as saying that NetOne had already upgraded 75 base stations from 2G to 3G and a further 60 to 4G. The government has also revealed that the operator is expecting to install the country’s first 5G equipment as part of its network expansion. The project is expected to increase the operator’s population coverage from about 75% to 85%, though a completion date has not been given. NetOne was also working with Huawei on the USD71 million rollout, which is described as a ‘strategic cooperation between China and Zimbabwe’. According to TeleGeography’s GlobalComms Database, NetOne is the second largest of Zimbabwe’s three mobile network operators (MNOs), with around 3.75 million subscribers and a 29% share of the market at the end of June 2021.
Telecel is the smallest operator in Zimbabwe. It is expected to be placed under corporate rescue, a form of bankruptcy protection, due to ‘serious financial distress’. According to a report from The Herald, David Mhambare, the secretary general of the Communication and Allied Service Workers Union of Zimbabwe, is cited in a high court application as saying: ‘The … conditions indicate the existence of a material uncertainty that may cast significant doubt on the company’s ability to continue operating as a going concern. If the solvency position of Telecel does not receive prime attention, it will inevitably go under liquidation.’ At 31 December 2021 Telecel’s liabilities outweighed its assets by a factor of sixteen to one.
TeleGeography’s GlobalComms Database notes that Telecel, by far the smallest of Zimbabwe’s three mobile service providers, has been struggling financially and facing a declining subscription base for some time.
At the Annual Brooklyn 6G Summit (B6GS) last month, Robert Jakubek, Vice President of Engineering and Network Operations for U.S. Cellular, presented deployment strategies for the next generation of wireless communications.
Speaking at the 2022 Brooklyn 6G Summit, which is jointly hosted by Nokia and NYU Wireless, Robert Jakubek, VP of engineering at US Cellular called for the industry to figure out how to get more functionality out of mmWave. “CPEs [customer premises equipment] need to get more sophisticated,” Jakubek said. “Help us solve some of the challenges of mmWave fixed wireless and make it more effective.”
The request is notable because Nokia, which is a sponsor of the event, is a key supplier to UScellular and provides 5G radio gear for the company’s low-band and mmWave networks. Nokia also is working with UScellular on its deployment of standalone 5G (SA). Jakubek said that UScellular is moving “full speed ahead” with its SA core. Nokia has said previously that it should be deployed by year-end.
Jakubek added that UScellular has had success with a couple of extended range trials where its FWA signal used mmWave spectrum. In 2020 the operator and its partners Ericsson and Qualcomm completed an extended range 5G mmWave data call over a distance of more than 5 kilometers (around 3.1 miles) at speeds over 100 Mbps. And in 2021 the company set a record of 10 km (about 6.2 miles) in tests with Nokia and Qualcomm.
UScellular has deployed a Home Internet+ product that uses 5G and mmWave spectrum to deliver FWA to customers in more than 10 cities. It launched that product last April. In addition, the operator offers a FWA product over the company’s LTE network to its entire footprint. At the end of 2Q, UScellular said it had 57,000 FWA customers, but it doesn’t break out those on mmWave vs. those on the LTE network.
Besides FWA, Jakubek said that the company is looking ahead to deployment 5G voice over new radio (VoNR) but that isn’t likely to happen until 2024 or later.
And of course as it is a 6G summit, you couldn't do a presentation without talking about what is needed from 6G. The talk is embedded below, courtesy of IEEE TV.
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.
2 of 2: "The only real 5G that is available to the Korean public is basically glorified WiFi in the subways" - https://t.co/dFa8lS84ob
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.
Norway still (narrowly) No 1 in median mobile download speed in September according to @Speedtest. China improving quickly. China, Netherlands and Denmark for the first time ahead of South Korea. #Top10pic.twitter.com/xX67u6CTaT
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.
