According to data from Cisco, global IP traffic will hit the zettabyte-per-year mark by 2016, and increase another 60% by 2018. What's more, the number of devices connected to networks is predicted to almost double the world's population in the same time frame. The...
Current state of 5G trends
What is "5G?" Many organizations and entities with a stake in the outcome are attempting to answer that question. A useful example is the push by the GSMA for international, industrywide agreement on a 5G definition and a set of...
The need to be connected to the “smarter world” is ever increasing with the rise in the number of mobile devices. LTE is now a global reality for millions of subscribers and the age of the “Internet of Things” is well and truly upon...
You’re running late, you’re lost, you need directions. Today, all you need is your smartphone to get you where you want to go, not a dedicated GPS device. Take a look around and you'll notice professional surveyors who used to rely on clunky GPS...
We’re all familiar with the big cell towers we see around town that house the antennae and communications equipment connecting our ever-present wireless devices. But we are much less familiar with the technology that provides the compute power for these cell towers: the baseband...
Launching a new application in the market is always a risky business. The app should respond to user needs, and be innovative and easy to use. Still, through the development and testing processes, engineers often tackle issues that are beyond their expertise. Seeking a beneficial...
Last week, a post on GetVoIP discussed an important trend in the hosted telecom carrier arena: The unified communications sector is more directly targeting small and midsize businesses. This has given rise to arrangements in which the heavy lifting is done away from the...
We are in the midst of the mobile age, a time in which consumers are continually connected through a series of mobile phones, tablets, smart watches and other devices. It’s hard to believe we have gone from using mobile phones only “in case of an emergency”...
For communication service providers searching for new revenue streams, direct carrier billing opens the door of opportunity as it enables them to directly participate in the over-the-top market by providing a payment option for consumers to charge their mobile phone bills. This also means...
The future really is in the palm of your hand. Mobile is everything, and today mobile is at the core of communication between businesses and consumers. In today’s 24/7 always-on culture, consumers are not only plugged-in to work at all times, but more often...
On my first day at Aviat Networks 6 years ago, I met one of the company’s most insightful and interesting employees – a certain sales director of Irish descent for those who think they can figure it out – which turned out to be a...
They say “communications is a close-knit industry” and I think that’s a pretty accurate description after taking the 08.40 FGC train from Plaça d’Espanya to the Fira Gran Via – temporary home to the massive Mobile World Congress conference. Fortunately for me, impersonating a...
Hackers have been featured on the news recently as credit cards and passwords have been obtained in breaches, leaving millions to worry about whether their bank accounts or e-mail addresses are secure. However, there is another area that unethical hackers are targeting that isn’t...
Let’s begin with what we, the industry, accept as a truism: Sometime in the near future, the gadgets we see today that control and automate our homes will form the basis of an enormous market. Most people will be able to say that their...
As today’s sports and music fans post data-hungry tweets, selfies and text messages from live events, stadium and large venue facility managers are struggling to manage wireless data capacity to keep their systems up and running during peak times. During the 2015 Super Bowl,...
Sensors are vital to smartphones today
We use the sensors embedded in our smartphones every day, often without even realizing it. The screen flips as you hold your phone in a landscape position because an accelerometer has detected the change. When there’s an arrow pointing...
In most cases, the management structures of mobile network operators have yet to grasp the value proposition of the "Internet of Things" as they have been historically hyper-focused on competing according to who can offer the lowest price for handling megabytes. But in the...
Most smartphones these days come standard with some kind of off-the-shelf fitness application. My iPhone, for instance, tracks my steps and tells me how far I walk each day. If you combine that data with more accurate and updated information from a Fit Bit...
For years we have been hearing about how virtualization has revolutionized the enterprise data center, providing a wide range of benefits from both a business and technology standpoint. With the advent of network function virtualization, the movement has moved to the mobile network, allowing...
There are going to be more mobile phones than people on the Earth by end of this year. Can you imagine? The planet will have over 7 billion smartphones! We are witnessing the biggest technological turn in history where the very human is involved....
In my Generation Wireless columns I generally share the viewpoint of the post-Internet generation, colloquially called “millennials,” on the emerging trends and the ebbs and flows of wireless technology. Sometimes I find myself drawn from the purely business or technological implications of the rapidly evolving...
As we settle into our post-festive lull, with Christmas and New Year celebrations firmly behind us, maybe we can look to China to lift our spirits a little.
The country is gearing up for its own festivities – with its annual Chinese New Year celebrations...
As field-based work becomes increasingly complex and time-sensitive, more businesses are focusing on mobile solutions integrated with back-end field-service solutions to help manage field operations and provide their mobile workforces with the real-time knowledge to make better, more intelligent decisions in the field.
Recent research...
It’s no secret that this was the year of the wearables and “Internet of Things” at CES. From new smartwatches, to baby monitoring teddy bears, app-controlled hearing aids and smart collars for Fido; it seems that everyone’s trying to take a bite out of...
