Mobile operators need 300-500 MHz of spectrum by 2015: Report

Canadian mobile operators will need between 300 MHz and 500 MHz of mobile spectrum by 2015 to accommodate Canadians’ increasing use of mobile broadband devices and services, RedMobile Consulting said in a new report released by Industry Canada. The report, entitled “Study for Future Demand for Radio Spectrum in Canada 2011-2015,” said the increasing demand for cellular spectrum over the next five years will be driven by a steady increase in newer and more powerful devices and the continued rollout of data-intensive, third-generation HSPA and fourth-generation LTE mobile networks. “In fact, the cellular market in Canada has grown so quickly in 2010 and 2011 that the approach of the Study had to be modified to monitor the actual shifts in traffic over several recent months, and to revise the original projections,” RedMobile said in the report commissioned by Industry Canada. RedMobile said Canadian mobile subscriptions will grow to 34.6 million devices and will be equal to 96 per cent of the Canadian population by 2015. It said approximately 60 per cent of those devices, such as smartphones, dongles, tablets or netbooks, will have mobile broadband capabilities. “This represents a growth in mobile broadband devices of 2.7 times over the period from the end of 2010 to 2015,” the report said. The report said that data-intensive “high-end” smartphones will outnumber “entry-level” smartphones by the end of 2015, and that 57 per cent of all non-smartphone mobile broadband devices will be tablets “or an equivalent type of device” by this time. “Also noted ... is that 2015’s feature phones will be far more sophisticated than those of today and may, in fact, see the data usage that entry-level smartphones had experienced in 2010,” the report said. The firm analysed the demand placed on mobile networks by different categories of services including voice; messaging and instant messaging; and video, web browsing, downloading, emails and content sharing, the report said. It said voice usage will remain at an average rate of 300 to 400 minutes of monthly use per subscriber while other types of traffic will continue to experience “rapid growth.” “The current forecast for Service Demand show a growth of 30 times in data traffic between the period 2010 to 2015, and the overall cellular traffic, including voice, data and messaging, is seen growing from approximately 4 Petabytes (PB) to almost 75 PB in this same period,” the report said. The study accounted for a series of factors that it said could impact how much spectrum Canadian carriers will need to accommodate increasing mobile data demand. Those factors include the spectral efficiency of cellular technologies; the number of cell sites and the rate at which those sites are established; how much mobile traffic will be offloaded onto WiFi networks; the need to accommodate peak traffic levels during “the busy hour;” quality of service; spectrum pairing; and traffic routing, among others, the report said. It said Canada’s mobile spectrum will become more efficient as more mobile subscribers retire second-generation GSM and CDMA devices in favour of those that operate on HSPA and LTE technologies. It said “substantial growth” in traffic “translates into considerable growth in the demand for spectrum” by 2015, predicting that demand will rise to 190 MHz to service Canadian mobile traffic in 2015, up from 55 MHz in 2010. RedMobile said spectrum demand will climb higher due to the need for an additional spectrum “overhead” to accommodate minimum channel widths. “This typically adds a requirement for a further 100-150 MHz of spectrum to the current demand, increasing by 150-200 MHz once LTE is launched in the 2012-2013 timeframe,” the report said. It said Industry Canada has licensed 270 MHz of spectrum for cellular services since 1985, including 50 MHz in the 800 MHz band, 130 MHz in the 1900 MHz PCS band, and 90 MHz in the 1700 and 2100 MHz AWS band. The Industry Department has announced its intention to auction off 60 MHz of spectrum in the 700 MHz band in the first half of 2013 and 200 MHz in the 2500 MHz band in 2014. RedMobile said its main estimates were calculated on a “Business as Usual” basis that assumes mobile operators will continue to invest in their networks at a pace similar to recent years, and that Canada will not move increasingly to a “Wire-Free World” in which less traffic is delivered over wireline networks. In a “Low Investment” scenario, the report said, mobile traffic levels will mirror those seen under the business-as-usual model, but delivery of that traffic will be slowed by a delayed rollout and expansion of more efficient LTE networks, “slower growth in the number of base stations and sectors” and reduced churn among consumer devices and technologies. “This translates into much higher spectrum demand, with a figure for spectrum demand in 2015 that is … 50% higher than the figure in Scenario 1,” the report said. “The cumulative effects of the lower degree of investment are significant even over the 2010-2015 period,” it said. Under a wire-free world scenario, the report said, spectrum demand would be 25 to 30 per cent higher than the business as usual estimates. RedMobile said demand for mobile spectrum could continue to increase after 2015 as data traffic continues to grow while mobile networks reach the limits of their spectral efficiency. “It is certainly possible to construct a scenario where the demand for spectrum does not continue to grow rapidly beyond 2015,” the report said. “However, those outcomes seem far from certain, and it seems possible that demand for spectrum beyond 2015 will continue to grow, fuelled by traffic growth.” news@thewirereport.ca

Mobile operators need 300-500 MHz of spectrum by 2015: Report

News | June 12, 2012

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Mobile operators need 300-500 MHz of spectrum by 2015: Report

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