Opportunities for WiGig in Fixed Wireless Access

60 GHz WiGig (802.11ad and 802.11ay) technologies are increasingly being leveraged in the Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) space as a much more cost-effective alternative to fiber deployments. These solutions can provide multi-gigabit wireless Internet access that is easier and less costly to deploy, can scale flexibly and incorporate additional endpoints over time, and can leverage uncongested 60 GHz spectrum, take advantage of existing street or rural infrastructure, and expand high-speed Internet access to areas where fiber infrastructure is not possible or simply too costly or complex to implement. Recent trials and partnerships are increasing, demonstrating the viability and value of 60 GHz band to provide much faster broadband across a variety of environments.

As WiGig struggles to gain traction in the consumer environment, many 60 GHz vendors have shifted their focus to the fixed wireless market. For some time, WiGig vendor Peraso has promoted its X Series 802.11ad chipsets as a multi-Gbps outdoor wireless solution, with customers to date including IgniteNet. In addition, in February 2019, Peraso announced that it had raised an additional US$42 million in financing from strategic investors, including Roadmap Capital. The new funding seeks to expand existing business in fixed wireless, mmWave backhaul for 5G, and WiGig-based consumer electronics devices. In September 2019, the company announced the launch of its X720 pre-802.11ay WiGig chipset targeting FWA and small cell backhaul applications.

In October 2018, Qualcomm announced the industry’s first pre-standard 11ay chipsets for infrastructure and FWA applications, the QCA6438, and QCA6428. A few months earlier, Qualcomm announced that it would be integrating these chipsets with Facebook’s Terragraph technology, a 60 GHz multi-hop wireless network for gigabit broadband access. Since then, several trials and commercial deployments of 60 GHz Wi-Fi for fixed-wireless access have taken place:

• In February 2019, wireless broadband provider RADWIN announced a pilot deployment with Agile Networks in Canton, Ohio, leveraging Facebook’s Terragraph technology. The company also announced that it was deploying Terragraph in multiple trial sites around the world.
• In the same month, wireless networking provider Cambium Networks announced that it was working with Facebook to embed Terragraph in its upcoming cnWave 60 GHz multi-node wireless system to bring high-speed gigabit connectivity to urban areas.
• Startup Common Networks, which raised US$25 million in funding in August 2018, also announced that it was leveraging Terragraph in a deployment in Alameda, California in May 2019.
• In February 2018, Nokia announced a partnership with Facebook as part of its Wireless Passive Optical Network (WPON) for both 802.11ad and 802.11ay. In September 2018, Nokia announced the first WPON service in Jakarta, Indonesia with telco operator XL Axiata for a regional sporting event. The company was able to extend the reach of its fiber network by connecting to WPON Access Points (APs) and subsequent endpoints. By leveraging beamforming, reliable connections of up to 1 Gbps were delivered to end users and XL Axiata was able to bring fiber to a street corner and extend the network wirelessly instead of needing to deploy additional and more costly fiber.
• In May 2018, Deutsche Telekom partnered with Facebook to trial Terragraph with its Hungarian subsidiary in Mikebuda, Hungary. In just two weeks, more than 100 households were provided with potential high-speed Internet coverage. Customers are now able to experience speeds up to 10X to 100X faster than their previous Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) connections, increasing from 5 to 10 Mbps to up to 500 Mbps with Terragraph. Initial results from the trial and commercial deployment projections estimate that Capital Expenditure (CAPEX) per home covered will be as low as 30% of that of an equivalent buried fiber build in some markets

In August 2018, IgniteNet deployed its MetroLinq 60 GHz solution to provide wireless connectivity to The Bonnaroo Festival in Tennessee. Its solution passed more than 2.5 Terabytes (TB) of data throughout the show and the wireless backhaul part of the network was responsible for more than 40% of the total traffic generated during the festival. The solution was easy to deploy and is best suited for temporary setups like festivals or disaster recovery scenarios.

Using 60 GHz for FWA has a number of limitations. Terragraph, for example, can only transmit to distances up to 250 m between nodes and requires Line-of-Sight (LOS) without any obstacles. This can add to the complexity of initial configuration and setup, with the need for careful site surveys and the reduction or removal of obstacles that could interfere with performance. Harsh weather such as rain or snow can impact also performance, so many solution providers offer an additional 5 GHz radio for redundancy purposes. However, some solution providers, like Peraso, are working on 2 km—and potentially even further—links between nodes using 802.11ad. Their recently announced pre-ay chipset can also support 1.5 km links in FWA applications. 

Of course, 60 GHz is not the only method of sending these data. Starry leverages alternative mmWave solutions to transmit Wi-Fi signals over long distances and has partnered with Quantenna and Marvell for 802.11ac and 802.11ax chipsets. Mimosa, which has leveraged chips from Quantenna in the past and was recently acquired by Airspan Networks, provides fixed-wireless access leveraging conventional Wi-Fi standards, such as 802.11ac in the 5 GHz band, combined with beamforming for high-speed fixed wireless links over long distances. Wi-Fi 6 and 6 GHz could provide even higher throughput, resulting in more opportunities for Wi-Fi within FWA.

While most deployments are still small in scale, ABI Research believes that 802.11ad, and eventually 802.11ay, have considerable potential within wireless backhaul applications. With most 60 GHz chipset vendors targeting this space, in addition to strong backing from key industry implementers, ABI Research believes that 60 GHz technology is fast becoming an increasingly viable technology for wireless infrastructure and fiber replacement and expects to see considerable growth over the next 5 to 10 years. The main challenge facing vendors at the moment is building awareness of the technology and making it more cost effective. However, 60 GHz solution provider IgniteNet now has solutions available for less than US$250, while MikroTik has pushed the price down to less than US$100 for certain devices. Vendors expect strong growth over the next 12 to 18 months as both 802.11ad and 802.11ay technologies continue to develop. While today’s market size is difficult to determine precisely, ABI Research estimates that the market is currently around 5 million units and anticipated to grow over the next 2 to 3 years to around 20 million per year. If Terragraph and other solutions gain additional traction, this could potentially accelerate further. The deployment of 5G mmWave solutions by big carriers is also helping the credibility of 60 GHz and building market awareness.