4G Wireless Gets Serious With LTE
Reinhardt Krause, Yahoo! News, 1/20/2010
Look for LTE, a leading-edge wireless data technology, to go live across the globe in 2010.
Wireless phone companies worldwide have been testing LTE, which stands for long-term evolution.
This next-generation 4G wireless technology will boost data speeds from four to 15 times over existing 3G networks, analysts say, depending on how much radio spectrum wireless companies have available.
In late 2009, Norway’s Telenor and Sweden’s TeliaSonera turned on their LTE networks in a few Scandinavian cities. In 2010, Verizon Wireless in the U.S. and Japan’s NTT DoCoMo plan to start deploying LTE networks in some markets.
China Telecom, Telefonica, Russia’s Mobile TeleSystems, Chunghwa Telecom, AT&T, Metro PCS Communications and some 50 other wireless firms have also committed to LTE upgrades.
Still, analysts say it’ll take a few years for the technology to impact competition in a big way, so it’s impossible to predict winners or losers. Users will be charged more for 4G, but that will mean such things as faster video downloads.
The first devices capable of accessing LTE networks will be laptop computers equipped with small modems, known as dongles. LTE-ready smart phones and other products wo
“We don’t see LTE reaching critical mass globally for three or four years,” said Thomas Wehmeier, an analyst at U.K.-based Informa Telecoms & Media. “We’ll see a wave of launches this year, including Verizon and DoCoMo. But actual deployments will be limited.”
While some LTE smart phones could appear in late 2011, Wehmeier says 2012 is “more realistic.” One reason for the delay is that many wireless companies will want dual-mode phones that work on both LTE and 3G networks, as LTE coverage will expand only gradually.
Verizon, co-owned by Verizon Communications and U.K.- based Vodafone, says it’ll construct LTE networks in 25 to 30 U.S. markets in 2010. But it won’t have national LTE coverage until 2013. In the meantime, Verizon customers will need dual-mode devices that also connect to its older 3G, CDMA network.
WiMax Other 4G Flavor
LTE provides faster data speeds at lower cost than WiMax, the other major 4G technology. Clearwire is building a WiMax network in the U.S. Sprint Nextel owns 51% of Clearwire and will use its network to offer 4G. And WiMax services have been rolled out in Japan, Russia, Taiwan, India and nearly 150 countries. Most providers, though, have used a “fixed-point” version of WiMax. LTE is widely viewed as a better mobile broadband technology. Even Clearwire has left the door open to migrating to LTE in the long run.
The other major U.S. carrier after Verizon, AT&T and Sprint, T-Mobile USA, recently upgraded to what’s the fastest 3G technology. It will eventually upgrade to 4G, but has no specific plans yet.
By 2013, Pyramid Research forecasts there will be at least 100 million subscribers to LTE services worldwide. Even then, though, there will still be many more users of 3G networks, which are becoming increasingly clogged by heavy data usage.
For wireless firms, there’s more to LTE than speed. They also need it to boost network capacity.
LTE networks will transmit data — such as e-mail, music and video — at a lower cost than 3G networks, analysts say. That’s important because while wireless data revenue has been growing at a high double-digit rate, the amount of data traffic carried on networks has been exploding even more.
At Least Four Times Faster
Verizon has said its LTE network will at first provide average data speeds of 5 to 12 megabits per second. That’s at least a fourfold improvement over Verizon’s CDMA data speeds of 1.4 mbps.
But speed claims vary. TeliaSonera says its LTE network will offer data speeds of 20 to 80 mbps. At the Consumer Electronics Show this month, South Korea’s LG Electronics touted a laptop data card that it says whisks data at 100 mbps.
Much depends on how much spectrum wireless firms own, says Julien Grivolas, an analyst at U.K.-based Ovum.
“LTE speeds will be very different depending on bandwidth,” he said. To reach speeds of 20 mbps to 50 mbps, wireless firms will need plenty of bandwidth, he says.
Airwaves don’t come cheap. Verizon Wireless spent $9 billion to acquire a 20 MHz block of airwaves it’ll use for LTE services. Wireless firms need a minimum of 20 MHz for LTE, analysts say.
In many countries, regulators have yet to set aside spectrum for LTE services.
In Europe and Asia, wireless firms will need to cobble together LTE spectrum from as many as five different frequency bands, Informa says. The use of multiple bands could slow down LTE development by mobile phone and device makers, analysts say.
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In: Mobile Technology · Tagged with: 3G, 4G, AT&T, CDMA, Clearwire, EDGE, LTE, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon, Vodafone, WiMax