Sue Marek

The stay-at-home orders that were widespread in April due to the Covid-19 pandemic resulted in a surge in data traffic for regional operator US Cellular. The company reported that data traffic on its network increased 20% to 25%. 

Wireless internet service providers (WISPs) have long offered fixed wireless broadband services in rural areas where cable or wireline broadband is lacking. But now fixed wireless is seeing a bit of a revival in some urban markets thanks to Verizon’s 5G Home service and newcomer Starry’s fixed wireless 802.11-based service. But not everyone is convinced that these new attempts at delivering fixed wireless broadband will be a success.

In one year mobile Video Experience has significantly improved in 59% of 100 countries analyzed. Top-ranked countries for mobile download speed were far from top in Video Experience. South Korean users’ experience ranked first for download speed yet 21st for video, while Canadians’ were third fastest for download speed in Opensignal’s State of Mobile report, but just 22nd for video.

Verizon and AT&T have waffled on their timelines and business strategies for fixed 5G vs. mobile 5G. In 2018, Verizon pushed hard to be the “first” operator to launch 5G and it was going to do so by offering a fixed wireless service. The company fulfilled that goal with its prestandardized fixed 5G service, called 5G Home, that it launched in four markets in Oct 2018. However, it appears Verizon will be moving more quickly to a mobile 5G offering, while the expansion of its fixed 5G Home service may be delayed to later in 2019. 

Although the growth in the middle mile has created opportunities for incumbent carriers, incumbent local exchange carriers (ILECs) and upstarts, it also has some inherent challenges -- such as labor costs and citing issues.

Not surprisingly, much of the demand for middle mile capacity is coming from wireless providers that are trying to keep up with escalating mobile broadband growth.

"We have confounding bandwidth challenges," said Scott Mispagel, vice president, network planning and engineering at Frontier Communications. "Everyone is using more bandwidth and we are adding quite a few new customers because of the markets we acquired from Verizon that were underpenetrated and underserved. This makes modeling difficult."

Frontier isn't the only carrier feeling pressure on the middle mile. According to Curt Frankenfeld, director, access strategy and development at CenturyLink, mobile broadband growth is forcing CenturyLink to upgrade its network to accommodate the demand.

"It forces us to modernize our network and gives us capital to do that." However, he noted that it's difficult for companies like CenturyLink to predict growth. "It creates stress on the middle mile. Cell providers don't necessarily want to go in that middle mile. It's a challenge because it almost becomes a custom middle mile for the cell providers."

The demand from mobile is so great that some are predicting that the middle mile fiber networks may soon be handling a lot of the mobile broadband traffic. Frankenfeld said that CenturyLink is seeing a big push for getting the traffic from mobile devices to the fixed network.

"In the next few years, we might see half of the mobile broadband traffic switched to our network. That means a rapid increase in bandwidth," Frankenfeld said.

Although members of the CableWiFi Alliance have said repeatedly that the primary incentive behind their growing Wi-Fi hotspot portfolio (which now stands at 250,000 nationwide) is to complement their customers' broadband service in the home and differentiate themselves from their telecommunications competitors, there are signs that a bigger agenda is afloat.

At the recent Cable Show, Wi-Fi was part of nearly every discussion. NCTA Chairman Michael Powell positioned the cable industry's Wi-Fi footprint as a competitor to wireless carriers when he spoke with Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler. And Chairman Wheeler agreed, noting: "Wi-Fi offers new opportunities in broadband and high speed data as well as voice service."

Likewise, Comcast Chairman and CEO Brian Roberts claimed that his company is the "biggest wireless provider in the country already," and said that the convergence of Wi-Fi with the cable network is a powerful tool that will be very important in the future. "It distinguishes us from the competitors and gives us a better business," he said.

Cable operators have invested a lot of time and money into growing their Wi-Fi networks. It's only a matter of time before they come up with a way to monetize this important asset.