"6G" wireless is technology that is beyond "5G." Minister Wei Leping has already called for China to be the 6G leader, although no one quite knows what it is. Technologies moving from the lab to deployment should improve capacity by 5-15X over "5G." Three technologies will almost certainly be included, with more to come:
T-Mobile's main focus for 2018 was to be LTE-LAA, Mark McDiarmid, VP of network engineering told Monica Alleven at Fierce. In December, 2017, CTO Neville Ray promised they "will give customers even greater access to near gigabit speeds in 2018." They had just demonstrated speeds of 1.1 Gbps with Ericsson. (At end.) In February of 2018, T-Mobile proudly announced
Speeds of 1.3 Gbps were achieved by aggregating LTE carriers in licensed and unlicensed bands using five-component carrier aggregation, 256QAM, 4x4 MIMO and LAA on 14 antenna layers.
Pulmonary embolism at age 52 strikes down master of software-defined radio and low power rural wireless. How can you bring mobile to the hundreds of millions of Africans who live away from the power grid? Vanu Bose for a decade has been working to build inexpensive wireless systems that can run on solar power. His company, Vanu Inc., has developed extremely low power radios now deploying in Rwanda. They were the first to achieve FCC certification for software-defined networks.
Vanu played a crucial role in the White House PCAST report, which set sharing as the primary goal for U.S. spectrum policy. With backing from Craig Mundie of Microsoft and Eric Schmidt of Google, PCAST destroyed the myth that monopoly spectrum was still necessary. It was also influential at OFCOM and the EU.
Timotheus Höttges of Deutsche Telekom, Sunil Mittal of Bharti, Gavin Patterson of BT, and Qualcomm’s Steven Mollenkopf are making wild claims obvious from 3,000 miles away. Ajit Pai of the U.S. FCC, as well as Andrus Ansip and Roberto Viola of the EU, need to hire staffers who know enough to catch the bosses' errors. I could add a dozen more. It is time to shout about the Emperor's wardrobe. We all make mistakes and perhaps the ones here will be corrected.
Höttges, the first MWC Emperor without Clothes, wants $10’s of billions in subsidies and other favors. To get them, he wildly exaggerates the cost of building 5G. Verizon expects a U.S. (pop.326M) 5G cover will cost $50-$80B; the latest data suggests it will be less. DT's $400B to cover Germany (pop 83M) is something only a politician would believe. Another unlikely claim is that 65% of Germany will have 100 megabit fiber. 50% of the customers on a similar network in Australia (less 35b) don’t get 100 megabits and 20% don’t even reach 50 meg. http://bit.ly/NBNVector (Side note: Höttges told investors DT will have 14M lines of 250 meg DSL by the end of 2018, only a year or two behind schedule.)
Verizon 5G reach is perhaps twice as far as expected, including with obstacles (NLOS.) That's the independent conclusion of Michael Thelander and team testing two live Verizon cells in Houston,
"Who would have thought a millimeter wave signal in an area 100% blocked from the serving cell tower by the surroundings would still be capable of supporting good data speeds?" they exclaim. "Millimeter wave signals are far more resilient than we expected, even at distances exceeding several thousand feet. Tree foliage, passing school buses, buildings, parked cars, balding heads, and glass impacted the received signal, but the resultant signals were still capable of delivering meaningful data rates – thanks in part to the 400 MHz radio channel. Verizon can deploy 800 MHz channels in some markets." The results were generally good up to 1,000 meters and behind buildings.
At MWC Barcelona next week, there will be dozens of analyses on mmWave costs and buildout requirements. Nearly all of them will assume reach of 200-300 meters. That would require at least hundreds of thousands of cells to cover the U.S. and probably millions.
They probably are wrong.
The Snapdragon X24 LTE modem has a theoretical peak of 2,000 MHz using ?140 MHz of spectrum and 4x4 MIMO.
In the real world, expect 100-600 megabits typical. This is a heckuva chip, one of the first 7 nanometer chips produced. While none of us require more than 100 megabits 99% of the time, but the total capacity is also important. The speed will be divided among the many users of the cell.
Real world speeds vary from lab speeds because cells will have more than one user, greater distances, varied topology, and other interference. There will be times when you are the only user and in the exact right spot and can get close to the peak speed. It's likely that users at the edge of the cell will see the greatest improvement.
140 MHz is very rare outside of the laboratory. Verizon and AT&T only have about 100 MHz, total. They expect to take over the Wi-Fi spectrum
Typical speeds: 100-600 megabits down, much less up.
The new "2 gig peak" chips from Huawei and Qualcomm deliver about the same speed with a similar number of antennas and the same spectrum. You can't get much more speed without breaking the Laws of Physics, whether you call it 4G or 5G.
The real 5G uses perhaps ten times as much spectrum for practical speeds over a gigabit. You can only find 800 MHz free at millimeter wave ranges, mostly 26-30 GHz. I and most others consider Massive MIMO, 64-256 antennas, also 5G.
Early in 2017, the marketing people started to call 3.5 GHz "4G" TDD LTE "5G" even though the speed was almost the same. The result is what Dan Jones calls Faux 5G and I call Fake 5G.
The software tweak (NR New Radio) did little for the speed although NR offers other features. The marketing people love the name 5G and stuck it on everything.
Don't believe the hype.
4G LTE with Massive MIMO as fast as 5G 3.5 GHz
Qualcomm's simulations are respected and the most accurate predictions available. They are consistent with other data. I've come to similar conclusions from expectations of the technology. One possible update to come: The results from Verizon's tests at 28 GHz are very good so far, and may raise performance estimates for millimeter wave.
Topologies vary. There's no way to predict perfectly the number of users, distances, window and tree interference, and trees, window glass, trucks passing by and other crucial factors. Simulating wireless networks is an art, not a science, and requires great skill.
Good models are crucial for planning actual deployments. I've used the actual Alcatel and Ericsson deployment models, which are very rich. Everyone in the business has learned models will never get everything right, but are an essential starting point.
Large wireless networks take two years to get started and more than five years to substantially complete.
On Oct 1, Verizon will turn on the first $20B 5G mmWave network, soon offering a gigabit or close to 30M homes. The estimates you hear about 5G costs are wildly exaggerated. Verizon is building the most advanced wireless network while keeping capex at around 15%.
The Koreans, Chinese, and almost all Europeans are not doing mmWave in favor of mid-band "5G," with 4G-like performance. Massive MIMO in either 4G or "5G" can increase capacity 4X to 10X, including putting 2.3 GHz to 4.2 GHz to use. Cisco & others see traffic growth slowing to 30%/year or less. Verizon sees cost/bit dropping 40% per year. I infer overcapacity almost everywhere.
The predicted massive small cell builds are a pipe dream for vendors for at least five years. Verizon expects to reach a quarter of the U.S. without adding additional small cells.
In the works: Enrique Blanco and Telefonica's possible mmWave disruption of Germany; Believe it or don't: 5G is cheap because 65% of most cities can be covered by upgrading existing cells; Verizon is ripping out and replacing 200,000 pieces of gear expecting to save half.
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5G Why Verizon thinks differently and what to do about it is a new report I wrote for STL Partners and their clients.
STL Partners, a British consulting outfit I respect, commissioned me to ask why. That report is now out. If you're a client, download it here. If not, and corporate priced research is interesting to you, ask me to introduce you to one of the principals.
It was fascinating work because the answers aren't obvious. Lowell McAdam's company is spending $20B to cover 30M+ homes in the first stage. The progress in low & mid-band, both "4G" and "5G," has been remarkable. In most territories, millimeter wave will not be necessary to meet expected demand.
McAdam sees a little further. mmWave has 3-4X the capacity of low and mid-band. He sees an enormous marketing advantage: unlimited services, even less congestion, reputation as the best network. Verizon testing found mmWave rate/reach was twice what had been estimated. All prior cost estimates need revision.
My take: even if mmWave doesn't fit in your current budget, telcos should expand trials and training to be ready as things change. The new cost estimates may be low enough to change your mind.