Analysys Mason has conducted a study, on behalf of Qualcomm and Ericsson, on the status, costs and benefits of 5G millimeter-wave (mmWave) in Europe, but the conclusions are easily translatable to the North American market. The study concluded that 5G mmWave spectrum will be used to help deliver consumer-based enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) use cases, as well as support the use of 5G fixed-wireless access (FWA) to the home and bandwidth where significant volumes of data are generated, such as airports and train stations, music halls and other major event locations.
“What the 26 GHz band might provide for MNOs over and above 3.5 GHz deployment is the capability to accommodate eMBB traffic in high-use locations plus the potential to deliver, in specific locations, the multi-gigabit peak speeds, ultra-low latency and high-reliability connectivity needed by some of the 5G use cases, for example, gaming, industrial automation, augmented and virtual reality, immersive tourism experiences, and next-generation transport applications,” the study said.
Analysys Mason performed economic modelling that suggested several benefits to deploying 5G mmWave across many use cases.
“For each of the use cases modelled, the estimated benefit is between 5 and 20 times greater than the estimated cost,” the firm wrote. “Aggregating across all the use cases modelled, 5G mmWave deployment would generate an estimated GDP uplift (up to 2040) of more than €140 billion (cumulative) (US$170.4B) across thirty European markets, for around €21 billion (US$25.5B) of additional cost.
Operators interviewed for the study expect to use mmWave to address FWA, smart factory and other industrial applications, connected vehicles and venue-specific coverage.
“Stakeholders highlighted that mmWave spectrum can be used to maximize capacity within mobile networks (since frequencies can be re-used more intensively without co-channel interference occurring) as well as to allow for more flexibility to adapt time division duplex (TDD) frame structures to cater for local variations in traffic profile,” the firm wrote.
5G mmWave technology is relatively young, but it has shown the capability to provide high capacity in trials and in commercial systems deployed to date.
“As the capabilities of mmWave technology continue to improve,” Analysys Mason wrote, “MNOs expect that quality of service within deployments can be ensured even as traffic levels increase.”
Although multiple commercial mmWave networks have now been deployed globally, Europe is behind in its deployments. Each country is in a different stage of allocating spectrum in the 26 GHz band for 5G. For example, in October 2018, licenses in the 26.5–27.5 GHz range were auctioned on a nationwide basis in Italy, while France began trials in October 2019 in the 26.5–27.5 GHz band. But Germany has made licenses available in the 24.25–27.5 GHz band only as recently as in January of this year.
S&P Global Market Intelligence wrote that the 26 GHz band was the “most popular mmWave spectrum as of year-end 2020.”
“While the 28 GHz enjoyed wider support in the early phase of 5G trials, the 26 GHz band gained the upper hand after the International Telecommunication Union or ITU officially sanctioned it for 5G in November 2019,” the publication wrote.
Stateside, the United States auctioned allocations for 5G in the 24 GHz and 28 GHz bands in 2019. 5G spectrum in the 37 GHz, 39 GHz and 47 GHz bands was auctioned in the Spring of 2020.
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