5G Fixed Wireless Broadband Launch Getting Closer with Samsung’s Hardware Launch

Samsung Electronics unveiled its 5G fixed wireless access (FWA) equipment at Mobile World Congress 2018. Samsung’s 5G FWA equipment uses a 28 GHz frequency band, and the product line includes indoor and outdoor 5G home routers; 5G radio access network (RAN), including radio access unit and virtualized RAN (vRAN); next-generation core; and radio frequency planning services and tools. Samsung has been contributing to 5G development since 2012, and its 5G FWA equipment has undergone field trials in multiple markets, including the United States and Europe. In February 2018, Samsung’s 5G FWA products received regulatory approval by the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

Samsung’s launch of 5G FWA equipment and its achievement of FCC approval bring the commercial launch of 5G fixed wireless broadband access one step closer. Many operators now support 5G use cases for fixed wireless broadband access. U.S. telcos AT&T and Verizon have already announced the launch of 5G fixed wireless broadband service in 2018. Samsung’s 28 GHz FWA equipment will be deployed by U.S. operator Verizon for its commercial launch of 5G fixed wireless broadband service in California in the second half of 2018. Other than the United States, Samsung has carried out 5G fixed wireless trials in the United Kingdom in partnership with Arqiva in 2017. French telco Orange has also stated it will carry out a 5G fixed wireless access trial in Romania, starting from second half of 2018 in partnership with Samsung and Cisco. Samsung will provide 5G home routers, RAN units, and 5G radio frequency planning services for the trial.

While Samsung and its partner operators are focusing on mmWave 5G, some operators are working toward 5G FWA in the sub-6 GHz band. Finnish operator Elisa also tested 5G fixed wireless access in April 2017 using 3.5 GHz. O2 Czech Republic has also completed 5G FWA trials and is targeting commercial deployment in 2018. U.S. cable operator Charter Communications recently announced 5G FWA trials in six cities with the plan to expand high-speed broadband service by deploying 5G FWA in the last mile connectivity. Charter has not disclosed the commercial launch date yet, but  based on the 5G FWA trials conducted by service providers, consumers can expect to see the first 5G fixed wireless service commercial launch in 2018 in North America followed by Europe in 2019.

There have been government initiatives and regulations to improve fixed broadband coverage and capacity. The FCC has set a nationwide broadband target to provide minimum 100 Mbps of affordable broadband to 100 million U.S. homes by 2020. Fixed wireless broadband is one of the options to expand high-speed broadband access to households in remote areas where fixed line network is poor. Similarly, other countries including Australia and New Zealand have also set national broadband plans with fixed wireless broadband as one of the technologies to achieve 100% broadband coverage.

Fixed LTE has been deployed in many markets such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia to provide broadband access to rural households. It is also an important technology to provide fast speed broadband to residential households in the markets such as the Philippines or Indonesia, where many small islands make wireline network deployment difficult. Deployment of fixed LTE saves time and capital expenditure (CAPEX) to provide broadband access to the areas where fixed broadband network deployment is not economically feasible. Fixed LTE has also been a good wireline alternative for residential and business customers although it has some limitations, for example, higher cost per engagement (CPE) prices compared to fixed broadband, data caps, and costs associated with high data usage.

5G technology offers better connectivity with 30 to 50 times the speed of 4G and latency as low as 1 ms. The capacity supported by the 5G network is perfect to deploy in last mile connectivity replacing fiber-optic lines. Currently, most of the operators are focusing on deploying 5G FWA as last mile connectivity in dense urban areas with some plan for rural broadband expansion. The choice of technology by operators will mainly depend on deployment cost and return on investment. LTE networks, which already achieved high coverage, are likely to enable service providers to offer faster and less costly deployment of FWA broadband access to residential homes, especially in less dense areas. While telcos are working toward 5G FWA for higher capacity broadband access, we expect fixed LTE to remain the major fixed wireless broadband technology in the years to come.