So Why Would AT&T Acquire Time Warner?

As has been widely reported in the media, AT&T and Time Warner announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement under which AT&T will acquire Time Warner. But what are the reasons for the acquisition? They could include, among other things:

• Ability to combine AT&T’s networks with Time Warner’s content library (which includes e.g. HBO, Warner Bros. and CNN) and its ability to create new content. This will bring AT&T customer insights across TV, mobile and broadband and will allow AT&T to offer more relevant and valuable ads, innovate with ad-supported content models, achieve better informed content creation, and make products smarter and more personalized. AT&T has been previously lacking content to advertise on. Going forward, AT&T might gain new growth from content and advertising.

• The company might also be planning to bundle content with its wireless service so that the customer only gets one monthly bill

• The acquisition provides financial benefits. It is for instance expected to diversify AT&T’s revenue mix and lower capital intensity. The combined company will be less dependent on wireless service and TV distribution, both of which are difficult businesses. And the rise of OTT players like Netflix has shown that content can be more powerful than distribution.

• The acquisition will create a stronger competitive alternative to cable and other video providers. Owning content such as the Game of Thrones would give AT&T an advantage, attracting users to AT&T’s DirecTV Now streaming service, and bringing income from licenses. With attractive content, AT&T would be in a better position to compete with the likes of Netflix and Amazon Prime. In fact, AT&T has been losing video subscribers from its DirecTV satellite business and U-Verse pay-TV.

• AT&T might also be reacting to the trend where content companies like Google, Facebook and Amazon are showing interest to expand into the telecom space (examples include Google’s Project Fi, undersea cables financed by the companies, Facebook’s Telecom Infrastructure Project, Google Fiber, drones, high-altitude balloons, etc.).

It will be interesting to see how much AT&T will be investing in creating original content going forward. As an example, Netflix might be spending $6 billion on original content in 2017.

Nokia Demonstrates 4K VR Video Streaming Using “5G-ready” Network

Nokia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) based operator du demonstrated 4K 360 degree Virtual Reality (VR) video streaming. In the demo, VR content created with Nokia’s OZO VR camera was streamed to VR goggles over Nokia’s “5G-ready” AirScale radio access on the 4.5GHz frequency using a bandwidth of 400 MHz and MIMO.

Even if AirScale is branded as “5G-ready”, one could consider it as an advanced 4G base station.

Nokia claims that AirScale supports Mobile Edge Computing (MEC), but it is not clear based on the press release whether MEC capabilities were used in the demo. It is also not clear whether the 4K VR video was live or on-demand.

Qualcomm Announced Its First 5G Modem Called Snapdragon X50

This news is already a few days old but here it is in any case: Qualcomm introduced its first 5G modem, called Snapdragon X50 at its 4G/5G Summit. Here are some details about the modem:

• Engineered to support download speeds of up to 5Gbps
• Utilizes very wide bandwidths available in the 28GHz  millimeter wave band combined with advanced signal processing technologies
• mmWave is not confined to fixed wireless applications. The modem relies on multi-element antenna arrays designed to work together intelligently using beamforming and beam tracking, which extend mmWave’s mobility and reach to non-line-of-sight scenarios. X50 can direct the energy of the mmWave beam, bouncing off obstacles to reach the mmWave 5G small cell with which it is communicating
• Qualcomm also announced, together with Telstra, Ericsson, and Netgear, the first commercial Gigabit Class LTE device and network. The company believes that Gigabit Class LTE will be coexisting and interwork with 5G deployments. X50 can be paired with a Snapdragon processor with an integrated Gigabit Class LTE modem. The 4G/5G multi-mode platform can provide dual-connectivity so that a mobile device can connect simultaneously over both generations of technology (similar to 3G/4G multi-mode devices which were able to fall back to 3G when 4G coverage was not available).
• Qualcomm expects X50 to start sampling in the second half of 2017 and the first products integrating it are expected to surface throughout 2018

It is certainly good news for 5G that we can expect first 5G devices appearing to the market in 2018.

The 5G New Radio (NR) standardization is still work-in-progress so Qualcomm will have work to do to add full support for it to X50.

Nokia F-Cell – Drone-based Delivery of Self-Building Small Cell Capacity

Nokia Bell Labs announced an experimental LTE small cell called F-Cell, with which the company promises to revolutionize small cell deployment by removing the need for power and backhaul cables, thus making it possible to deploy small cells on demand with drones.

Bell Labs showed a demo where an F-Cell was delivered by a drone to the roof of an office building. The F-Cell wirelessly self-powered, self-configured and auto-connected to the network and began to stream HD video.

The F-Cell architecture is comprised of closed-loop, 64-antenna massive MIMO system that can be placed in a centralized location that is used to form 8 beams to 8 energy-autonomous, solar-powered F-Cells. The  architecture supports non-line-of-sight wireless networking in FDD or TDD mode and the parallel operation of up to 8 individual 20 MHz channels allowing a throughput of around 1 Gbit/s over existing LTE networks.

According to FCC, there are about 200,000 cell towers in the US today. However, with 5G, there may be millions of small cell sites added. Thus, a solution like F-Cell might prove out to be handy.

LTE Equipment Market Could Decline at a CAGR of -13% by 2020

According to a study by IHS published back in Q1 2016, LTE has peaked and 2016 will be its first year of decline. This is because China has reached the end of its massive LTE rollouts, LTE rollouts in Western and Central Europe are very close to completion, and also the Middle East 3G upgrades are complete.

In 2015, the worldwide macrocell infrastructure market totalled $48 billion and quarterly LTE revenue was $2 billion higher than 2G and 3G revenue combined.

IHS forecasts that the LTE equipment market will decline at a CAGR of -13% until 2020, going down from the $48 billion in 2015 to around $28 billion in 2019.

However, IHS expects the market for the software that runs on carrier hardware to continue to expand, driven by LTE-Advanced upgrades. The market will grow from $15.2 billion in 2015 to $23 billion by 2020.

As of January 2016, 480 commercial LTE and 116 LTE-Advanced networks had been launched. GSA (Global Mobile Suppliers Association) forecasts that by the end of the year, the figure will be 550. Furthermore, around 25% of 4G operators have launched LTE-Advanced systems. Some of the most mature 4G markets by the end of 2016 will be South Korea where the 4G market share is 90%, Japan, where the share is 82% and North America, where it is 79%. As an example, in Japan, the mobile infrastructure market fell 19% year-over-year in 2014. In the first half of 2016, the year-over-year decline was 16%.

5G is expected to fuel the next round of growth for the mobile network infrastructure market, but that growth is not expected to take place until after 2020. Thus, a CAGR of -13% for LTE equipment until 2020 would mean rough times for network equipment vendors.

Strategy Analytics predicts that by 2020, there will be 2 million 5G subscriptions. By 2022, there will be 116 million. As a comparison, Strategy Analytics forecasts there to be 5.6 billion 4G subscriptions by 2022.

When it comes to telecom infrastructure services, TBR is forecasting that also that market will continue to decline between 2015 and 2020 as operators accelerate legacy decommissioning and realize cost savings from the use of SDN and NFV, driving down the product-attached services (i.e., deployment and maintenance) market.

SNS Research has a bit more positive forecast, estimating that the global 2G, 3G, and 4G infrastructure market will decline at a CAGR of 1% by the end of 2020. Despite of the decline in the wider market, operators are expected to increase their spending in areas such as small cells, carrier Wi-Fi, Distributed Antenna Systems (DAS) and Centralized-RAN (C-RAN). Small cell and carrier Wi-Fi is expected to represent a market of $3 billion in 2016.

Yet another forecast comes from Custom Market Insights, which expects the 2G, 3G and 4G wireless network infrastructure market to decline at a CAGR of 2% by 2020.

AT&T Aims to Open Source Its ECOMP NFV and SDN Automation Engine by Q1 2017

AT&T stated in a blog post that it is hoping to launch ECOMP, the engine for NFV and SDN automation that powers its software-centric network into open source by Q1 2017. AT&T will be working with the Linux Foundation to open source ECOMP.

According to the Linux Foundation, ECOMP is disruptive to the telecom industry and the most complete architecture for VNF/SDN automation they have seen.

AT&T says that its goal in open sourcing ECOMP is to harmonize the telecom industry, creating a common approach to the entire VNF/SDN lifecycle process, and make ECOMP the industry’s standard automation platform for managing VNFs and software-centric networks. The company believes that open sourcing within the Linux Foundation is the best way to achieve this. In the best case, ECOMP might help jump-start an ecosystem, creating enough critical mass to attract commitment from others and to build a vibrant community.

AT&T has had two years of production experience with the ECOMP code. The ECOMP code base consists of 8.5 million lines of code.

ECOMP, which stands for Enhanced Control, Orchestration, Management & Policy, was originally described in an AT&T white paper. It was created in the context of AT&T’s Domain 2.0 program that is focused on leveraging cloud technologies and network virtualization to offer services while reducing capex and opex and achieving significant levels of operational automation. AT&T believes that ECOMP will be crucial to fulfilling the potential of 5G networks.

In September, AT&T announced that Orange has started testing ECOMP for building SDN capabilities. Orange is the first telecom company to join the ECOMP effort.

It will be interesting to see what kind of a traction ECOMP will get in the market compared to NFV and SDN automation frameworks from the major telecom vendors.

Executives Who Have Left Cisco since the Beginning of 2016

SDxCentral published an article listing executives who have departed from Cisco since the beginning of 2016:

• Zorawar Biri Singh, CTO and SVP of cloud services and platforms will leave Cisco at the end of October
• Rob Soderbery, SVP who ran Cisco’s enterprise business
• Kelly Ahuja, SVP of the service provider business
• Pankaj Patel, Chief Development Officer
• Mario Mazzola, Prem Jain, Luca Cafiero, and Soni Jiandani who were responsible for three successful spin-ins, including Insieme (that developed Cisco ACI)

Volvo and Ericsson Will Launch Car-to-Car Communication

Volvo will launch car-to-car communication in Europe for all new cars in its 90 series before the end of the year. The system will allow vehicles to exchange information in order to give drivers warnings for example about poor road conditions or obstacles on the road.

Volvo co-developed the system with Ericsson. The system is cloud-based and does not thus require a direct link between the vehicles. It relies on a data connection to the Internet.

As an example, the system can activate a slippery road alert based on road friction information from the car’s steering, braking, and acceleration sensors.

China Mobile to Start 5G Trials in over 100 Cities

South China Morning Post writes that China Mobile has started conducting 5G trials that will span over 100 cities across more than 20 provinces.

According to Bernstein Research, China wants to get a head start in the race to lead in 5G and ensure a significant amount of Chinese technology is embedded in the 5G standard. Bernstein Research also says that China’s vision of 5G is the most revolutionary; China is less focused on 5G residential broadband than for instance AT&T and Verizon.

China Mobile has previously stated that it plans to roll out a 5G network service in 2020. The company is currently conducting its own 5G research and preparation, albeit at a low investment level at this early stage.

China Mobile and Ericsson conducted what the companies claimed to be the world’s first 5G-enabled drone prototype field trial in August 2016. Furthermore, China Mobile and Huawei showed among other things a 5G 3.5GHz prototype, a 5G above 6GHz high band prototype, a 5G network slicing solution, and 5G smart car use case solution at Mobile World Congress Shanghai in June 2016.

Also other Chinese operators are naturally active in 5G. In the case of China Telecom, Daiwa Capital Markets expects that its 5G investments could happen from 2019 and 2020. China Unicom has signed a cooperation agreement with ZTE in August 2016 for 5G research.

A report by Bernstein Research says that 5G standardization will happen in a more concentrated industry than 3G or 4G. Ericsson, Nokia, and Huawei will be the main contributors for the networks, whereas Qualcomm is likely to continue to lead in chip design. When it comes to operators, there is of very restricted pool of them than can take leadership in 5G, including China Mobile, NTT DoCoMo, AT&T, Verizon, and perhaps Vodafone and Deutsche Telekom.

Deutsche Telekom Lauches a Multi-IoT Platform that Addresses IoT Fragmentation

Deutsche Telekom has developed a multi-IoT platform, which will launch at DT’s “House of Clouds” data center in Biere.

DT’s platform aims to address the mass fragmentation in today’s IoT market. It will unite different vendor platforms under one roof, enabling device-independent use of IoT solutions. The first platform that is supported is Microsoft’s Azure IoT Suite. The next ones will be Cisco Fog and Huawei’s IoT platform.

DT cites a study by PAC, according to which only 5% of the potential of IoT has been captured so far. One major reason for this is the highly fragmented market, which requires users to manage many different specialist suppliers. DT’s scalable, pan-industry platform, together with plug-and-play starter packages will help companies start using IoT. In the near future, DT plans to add a data analytics service to its platform.

DT’s multi-IoT platform acts as an interpreter and distributor, collecting data from a variety of hardware, including sensors and machinery, translating it to the correct format, and routing it through gateways to the preferred platform for processing.

The data collected by the platform will be housed in Germany, subject to strict German data protection laws.

DT’s platform could turn out to be rather attractive to customers as it addresses the problem with IoT fragmentation and concerns over data privacy.

AT&T Teams up with Both IBM and AWS on On-Demand Networking

AT&T and IBM announced that they are extending their partnership to help businesses manage their networking services with agility and the support needed to respond to today’s demands.

IBM will take advantage of AT&T’s new FlexWare offering (formerly known as AT&T Network Functions on Demand), which, according to AT&T, makes it easy to set up and manage Virtual Network Functions (VNFs). AT&T’s software-centric network architecture enables companies to dynamically order, change, and provision network services and functions.

The partnership will take advantage of IBM’s sales and marketing teams. AT&T will be able to run applications on IBM’s cloud, cognitive, analytics, and security infra. IBM has also begun to roll out AT&T FlexWare in many of its sites.

AT&T also announced a new multi-year strategic partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to integrate cloud and network capabilities. The companies will initially focus on delivering a suite of cloud solutions spanning on-demand cloud networking for businesses, threat management, and IoT (including combination of AT&T’s global network with AWS IoT). The collaboration is designed to help both existing and new customers more efficiently migrate to and utilize the AWS cloud with the AT&T network. The solutions will span cloud networking, mobility, IoT, security, and analytics.

AT&T says that together with AWS, it can help streamline the leap to the cloud for enterprises, and help them connect anything to the cloud in a simple, scalable, and highly secure way.

IoT is the Top Use Case for 5G

At the end of August, IHS revealed some highlights from its "5G Strategies Global Service Provider Survey":

• 54% of respondents see 5G as evolutionary, that is, an extension of LTE, LTE-Advanced* and LTE-Advanced Pro**
• 75% of respondents think 5G should be codependent with LTE and LTE-Advanced
• 79% of operator respondents rated IoT as the top use case for 5G
• The ongoing 5G race is leading to a marketing battle around what 5G truly is, similar to what happened with 4G vs. LTE in 2010
• Ultra-low latency is the survey participants’ main 5G upgrade driver and toughest technology challenge
• Industry will drive 5G and thus 5G networks should be designed to enable vast IoT connectivity

Even if IoT may be the top use case for 5G, one of the first use cases for commercial 5G deployments is likely to be fixed wireless broadband connectivity. This is because it can be done cost effectively and thus operators are expected to replace plans for fiber-to-the-home broadband services with the use of 5G to enable connectivity from a central location to a building or neighborhood.

Verizon has stated that they think 5G initially as wireless fiber that allows the last mile to be a virtual connection, dramatically changing their cost structure. They are looking at models showing deployments at roughly half of the cost of current fiber-based Fios (Verizon’s Fiber Optic Service) deployments to the home.

*The main LTE-Advanced features include carrier aggregation, higher-order MIMO, relay node and heterogeneous networks, enhanced inter-cell interference coordination, and coordinated multipoint (CoMP).

**The main new features of LTE-Advanced Pro include LTE-WiFi Aggregation (LWA), Licensed Assisted Access (LAA), Device-to-Device (D2D), Massive Carrier Aggregation (CA), Dual Connectivity (DC), Machine Type Communication (MTC) enhancements, 3D/Full Dimension MIMO, and multi-RAT joint coordination. 

Samsung to Acquire the AI Platform Startup Viv

Samsung announced that it has agreed to acquire Viv, a startup that has developed an AI platform that enables developers to build and use conversational assistants and integrate natural language based interface into applications and services. 

Viv’s goal is to provide an “intelligent interface to everything”, including for instance IoT devices.

Samsung says that the deal shows its commitment to virtual personal assistants and its vision to deliver an AI-based ecosystem across all of its devices and services. Viv’s natural language interface could be integrated for example with Samsung’s home appliances and wearables.

Conversational assistants appear to be a hot area right now. Google recently announced its Google Assistant, an extension to Google Now, at Google I/O. Apple has Siri and Microsoft has Cortana. Even Cisco is working on its own digital assistant called Monica.