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Tag Archives: Mobile Backhaul
Are We Expecting Too Much from WiFi?
Over the weekend I spent a little time digging into O2′s plans to offer a free citywide WiFi blanket across London. As any regular readers of the blog will know, I’m a huge supporter of WiFi blankets. In 2011 we saw some encouraging signs that rollouts were starting to grow in size and frequency. New York had a number of interesting projects deployed and some European cities also moved forward with rollouts in parks and other public places.
If successful, O2′s network will be a first for the U.K. and for Europe and will hopefully stimulate similar developments in other cities. There can be no question that the U.K. needs to start driving forward with mobile connectivity. However, while I was reading about this project, I was reminded of an article in Gigaom from last year. This article discussed whether our WiFi expectations are simply too high and misaligned with service providers’ plans. Read more
How Much Ethernet OAM is Appropriate?
Another year, another Light Reading Ethernet Expo Americas. This show is the premier event covering the hot topic of Carrier Ethernet network technologies and services in the Americas. It was a must-attend Carrier Ethernet networking event also this year, where dozens of experts from the service provider, supplier and analyst community met in New York City.
The two-day event saw a series of informative presentations and panel discussions. Not so much on technology evolution and innovation anymore. Much more focused on how Carrier Ethernet is used and will be used in future networks. And a lot of discussions exploring how Carrier Ethernet will enable new applications including cloud services and how these applications will influence Carrier Ethernet equipment.
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The Human Cloud and IT’s Arab Spring
I’m fascinated by the human cloud. I believe it represents a seismic shift in the way we work and in the very way we live. The notion that we can use the rapid advancements in global networks to build an online workforce not bound by office locations, able to work effectively from anywhere, at anytime, is tantalising. For many companies, the human cloud is already a critical part of business operations. Indeed, as the global recession continues to bite and the demand to find a greener existence deepens, the human cloud presents a unique and unchallenged opportunity.
However, there are still critical barriers to overcome before we can truly embrace the possibilities of a global human cloud. Some of these barriers are technological, while some are more ideological. In fact, it may well be the latter that are the most difficult to overcome. As the Economist highlighted in a recent article, we’re in the midst of an IT Arab Spring. Yet it’s not governments that are being overthrown here but the old guard of corporate IT. Read more
Two Critical Hurdles to 4G Success
Amid last week’s media huddle over the iPhone 4S and the rollout of iOS 5, a report gently crept past the radar attracting little to no attention. The report detailed the speed at which U.S. carriers are rolling out LTE: A speed so rapid that the U.S. is now the global leader in LTE deployments. The country can now claim 47% of all LTE subscriptions. This figure is further strengthened when you consider that Americans will own 71% of LTE handsets by the end of 2011. Verizon, AT&T and MetroPSC please take a bow.
These are incredible figures and highlight just how serious U.S. carriers are at pushing mobile broadband across the country. Special mention should be made of Verizon here. It’s moving forward at incredible speeds and is fuelled by impressive revenues. Read more
Can 100G Tame the Network?
Barely a week passes without new analyst figures announcing the continued fierce growth in bandwidth and the concern that our networks may soon run out of capacity. This week it was the turn of IDC to release its findings on the state of the networking industry. IDC’s figures confirmed previous studies that show the dramatic growth in broadband connectivity. It expects to see Internet users to reach 2.7 billion by 2015. This represents over 40% of the world’s population and nearly a billion more users than in 2010.
Growth on this scale is phenomenal. What’s more, IDC expects most of this growth to be in mobile broadband, especially as tablets become more affordable (check out an earlier post on this: Mobile Data and the Ticking Tablets). In many respects, this echoes Cisco’s Virtual Networking Index study that predicts a 26-fold increase in mobile data between 2010 and 2015. What’s clear is that mobile usage will overtake PC usage and that mobile data is only going in one direction. Read more
