Connected cars surge as 5G enters the scene

A 5 year forecast  looking at the adoption of C-V2X

Wireless Research Paper – Next Generation Technology 5G and 6G

Key Takeaways –

• MWC will provide many clues about the next generation of mobile platforms
• What will be the real-world impact of an AI-native 6G
• Docomo leads in new materials and haptic platforms on path to 6G
• NGMN and Samsung in steps to sustainable supply chain transparency
• 5G-Advanced raises bar for smartphone testing
• NSF 5G testbed posits open source RAN but acknowledges challenges

Spectrum Debates Key Takeaways –

• New year, but the same thorny spectrum debates continue
• Millimeter wave regains momentum with Mexican wave of deployments
• Australia blocks mobile asset sharing deal between Telstra and TPG
• French regulator’s plan to revitalize industrial 5G slowly blossoms
• India seeks spectrum compromise between enterprises and operators

Produced by The Wireless Team (Caroline Gabriel, Phil Hunter and Luc Braun

Key Takeaways:
• In the biggest markets, the 5G contracts are staying with the incumbents
• Samsung and MIT are the latest to push the 6G accelerator
• NEPs will retain power if they can make 5G release 18 truly meaningful
• Nokia and Ericsson announce mixed results, overshadowed by margin drop

Produced by:
Caroline Gabriel, Phil Hunter and Luc Braun

5G Network Slicing Forecast to 2029

The forecast shows there are growing opportunities in enterprises, within private networks, and with operators, within public macro networks.  Growth is also shown via the consumer side through the provision of services dedicated to use cases such as UHD video delivery, conferencing and mobile gaming.

Early growth will be concentrated in the enterprise, led by six key sectors that will propel revenues associated with slicing almost from a standing start to $16bn by 2029.

Network slicing is a work in progress in three primary stages from a technological and functional standpoint. These Rethink defines as static, targeted and dynamic slices, which are three categories forecast separately for traffic levels and revenue in this report.

Rethink conducted extensive stakeholder interviews of operators, vendors, infrastructure service providers and cloud companies and used this information together with 15 years of refined data from operator surveys as a foundation for this report.  The global panel of MNOs discuss their network adoption plans, technologies and economics in relation to RAN automation, including vRAN and Open RAN.

The report and forecast dives into operator strategies, and discusses key drivers, and barriers to automating the RAN, and predicts the intensity with which MNOs will reduce OPEX in the next two years, as recession looms and inflation rises.

The report investigates the many challenges, both organizational, and cultural, that MNOs face to make the decisions needed. Which new RAN architectures will be deployed and when, and the RIC use cases. The report puts you in the room with the operators to understand their strategies.

“Rethink forecasts that MNOs will spend $32bn from 2022 to 2026, and of that $7bn will go on RAN automation. Of that forecast amount $3bn will be spent on components related to vRAN or Open RAN, showing that most MNOs’ RAN automation strategies will be closely linked with vRAN and/or Open RAN.”

MNOs are looking at automation, not just as a necessary step for vRAN, but as a way of reducing OPEX, especially those with a large NOC. Some MNOs aim to reduce NOC operating cost by a factor of up to 20%, and some have already taken these steps.

But automation of the RAN delivers more than just reduced OPEX, it also allows MNOs to deploy an agile and responsive cloud-based network that will allow introduction of new services, whilst adapting to changes in traffic and customer demand.