Trends in LTE voice & personal communications

LTE Summit, 18th May 2011

dean.bubley@disruptive-analysis.com

About Disruptive Analysis

Analyst house & strategic consulting firm Founded by Dean Bubley Blog at disruptivewireless.blogspot.com

Twitter @disruptivedean & also on LinkedIn and Quora

Covering mobile VoIP since 2004, pico/femtocells since 2001 Regular focus on the links between innovative mobile network technologies & the impact on devices and applications Partnered with Telco 2.0, Diffraction Analysis & Martin Geddes Consulting Coined the term Happy Pipe to describe profitable broadband strategies

Also Tyranny of the SIM card, Mobile data offload & Under the floor player

Recent reports on Mobile Broadband Traffic Management & RCS Upcoming study on Telco-OTT services Masterclasses on Future of Voice.

SF event June 30th, London event on July 14th

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May 2011

The big picture

VoIP needed for cost & competition Well-defined wholesale models Centralised & standardised services Attempts to evolve telephony to APIs

2000-2010 Fixed broadband & VoIP, QoS

2010-2020 Power & bandwidth to fit comms tech to human needs, not vice versa LTE, cloud, web 2.0, social networks, smart Many two-sided business models Fragmentation of voice into 1000 apps devices, apps, QoE

May 2011

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Future telephony economics 101

Supply of basic telephony (or close substitutes) rising Regulatory pressures (eg termination fees) Lower perceived value in phone calls vs. other communications channels Accounting rule changes

More users Possibility to distribute telephony via APIs & embedded applications New use cases? Extra functionality & quality?
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May 2011

Three basic uses cases for communications

Presence is sensuous More than on/offline Includes context & emotion

Source: Martin Geddes Consulting

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A dirty little secret.

Humans dont really interact with each other in sessions

but sessions are easy to control & bill. The challenge is to package sessions in a way to compete with more natural options that are emerging
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Voice Telephony
Now: 2G & 3G
Voice Voice Telephony

Future: Smartphones & LTE

Telephony

Voicemail Conferencing PTT

Video

Gaming, CEBP, surveillance, social voice, TV voice etc

Video, context, sense

Significant risk that basic telephony & messaging services fall prey to alternatives that fit better with human psychology. Moving to supply >> demand for voice
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LTE era vs 50bn devices: How many with voice?

Possibly 50 billion+ (maybe 1 trillion+)
Billion devices
35
30 25 20 15 10 5 0 2010
May 2011

Other
LTE phones 3G phones 2G phones Most devices not for primary voice. Scope for secondary IP comms services Full mobile VoIP not #1 priority
2020

Most devices for primary voice

Still a lot of CS mobile voice

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Will future operators all support voice? How?

Full IMS + VoLTE Partial IMS / NGN VoIP Integrated voice & data operators Cloud voice (nonaccess) Partner Skype / Google etc
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Velcro GSM or CSFB or VoLGA

2020 Straw Man 1bn LTE handsets Comms services ARPU $20 / mo [but 50% carried on 2G/3G/WiFi] $120bn revenue = equivalent to 2010 SMS market
May 2011

Data only & BYOVoIP

+ need for continuity at LTE / 3G / 2G /WiFi boundary

IMS: dead, but now nailed to the perch of LTE?

(With apologies to Monty Python)

3GPP & GSMA

LTE

Mobile IMS
http://disruptivewireless.blogspot.com/2009/08/mobile-ims-and-lte-networks-dead-parrot.html May 2011 Copyright Disruptive Analysis Ltd 2011

Fjords, aka RCS

Revisiting the VoIP timeline

10% of fixed global PSTN based on 10m IP-phones st SIP spec Skype launched Vocaltec 1 carrier VoIP shipped by released Internet VoIP (about 110m SoftBank / Cisco Cisco starts Yahoo VoIP software subscribers) AT&T VoIP ITU develops selling IP-PBXs launched Skype gets launched H323 1m Cisco 124m monthly IP-phones users shipped

8 years to get 10% penetration for fixed-carrier VoIP against background of old switches, all postpaid (recurring revenue). No issues of mobility, battery or RF. 12 years after ITU release SIP specifications OneVoice (later VoLTE) specs announced late 2009 First VoLTE launches 2012/2013 (?)
May 2011 Copyright Disruptive Analysis Ltd 2011

LTE voice & VoLTE challenges

Too many spectrum bands

Poor optimisation in efficiency, yield, cost & performance All sorts of policy-management / steering challenges

Not all operators will deploy VoLTE, even long-term

Some will be data-only/primary & not need own voice platform Some may partner / encourage / optimise Skype & other 3rd party voice

Offload / multi-bearer scenarios No likelihood of MNOs switching off CS voice before 2020 Unknown need for optimisation & tuning of RAN for VoLTE High probability of OSS / BSS headaches Lack of clarity around network-sharing / wholesale scenarios Indoor coverage problems, esp. with MIMO Massmarket handsets a long way off Where is SMS???
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May 2011

Most likely outcome for LTE Voice

Solution
VoLTE

2011-2012
Some trials. Many problems found Few rollouts. Likely not good user experience

2013-2014
Patchy rollout, more in 700-900MHz networks May be fixed, but not likely

2015 onwards
Slow growth but not universal. Used for roaming Fades out as mainstream option

Notes
If it works, OK for basic telephony, not for Voice 2.0 Political choice by GSMA / 3GPP

CSFB

VoLGA

Unlikely to be used, maybe OTT

Used on laptops & tablets. Some smartphone use

May come back if other solutions as bad as feared

Common on LTE wholesale networks

Good option for those with long CS legacy ahead

May be 2nd voice service along with operators own

Could be revisited by 3GPP under another name

Some operators will take fixed bband approach

No operator voice. User picks 3rd pty

Optimised 3rd-party VoIP

Dual-radio Velcro

A few renegade operators

Use for SVLTE in CDMA 1x + LTE

Depends on Skype, Google etc

Replacement for CSFB in 3GPP?

Important in specific pockets but not universal

Probably superseded

Could be provided from other telco as wholesale

Battery impact but better overall QoE

May 2011

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Towards two-sided business models?

Media & content Other Telco Brands & adver -tisers Web players Possible payment for QoS, voice API access, ads, customer info etc $ $$$ Telco End users

Wholesale

$ But a risk of reversal telcos paying for Web QoS, APIs, data, content Govern -ment IT shops And also not as easy as it looks to achieve. Platforms, SLAs, IT, sales

Developers
May 2011

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Some technology gaps?

Telephony & messaging model for wholesale LTE networks VoIP and messaging in complex offload scenarios Prioritisation & QoS engines for complex scenarios Solution for SMS on LTE that works

Signalling management for VoLTE, comms apps & MBB

On-device measuremen t of userperceived QoE

Advanced acoustic technology optimised for mobile VoIP

Dual-radio GSM / LTE devices and chipsets

May 2011

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Next steps: participate, analyse & collaborate

May 2011

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www.disruptive-analysis.com disruptivewireless.blogspot.com @disruptivedean dean.bubley@disruptive-analysis.com

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May 2011

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