For 5G, Haste Makes Waste

“Slow is smooth; smooth is fast,” special operations personnel always say. And that is not a new thought. The Latin phrase festina lente might be translatd as "hurry slowly" or "hasten slowly."

Festina lente suggests that trying to do things too fast often means people and organizations waste time because they go back to correct mistakes. "Haste makes waste," in other words. 

In other words, the fastest way of accomplishing something is to work carefully and methodically. It still works. Consider the ways 5G is being built.

You might assume, given all the hype about 5G, and the rival marketing claims, that mobile operators are throwing money at network construction in a mad rush to build out full networks as quickly as possible.

Actually, operators seem to be proceeding rationally, deliberately and at a measured pace, with significant results.

Just a few years ago, projections of 5G infrastructure cost were so high that many argued the networks could not be built. In fact, some speculated that 5G networks would cost 10 times that of 4G.  Others only expected 5G costs to double or triple. 

Capital investment levels, though, seem not to be skyrocketing, even as 5G is built. In fact, there is growing evidence that 5G can be built within existing capex budgets. 

There are several reasons. First, mobile operators are being deliberate in their spending and build rates. Also, capital expense is shifted from 4G to 5G, as always happens when a next-generation network is under construction. 

Also, network architects, working with better radios, have found that 5G mid-band signal coverage is almost identical to that of 4G, meaning less physical infrastructure actually turns out to be necessary. Also, low-band spectrum is being used for 5G rollouts, limiting capacity growth, but also requiring fewer new tower or radio sites and backhaul construction.

Better technology, allowing lower cost builds, also is at work. 

But even at the height of concern, some forecasts suggested reasonable levels of spending on 5G optical fiber backhaul. 

source: CIR

So the worst fears about 5G infrastructure cost have not been realized. In substantial part, that is because mobile executives are rational about 5G revenue gains, which will be slight, initially. The business model therefore requires a deliberate approach to investment, all hype aside. 

source: McKinsey

Some might say the early alarm was based to a too-literal extrapolation from past experience with macrocell infrastructure. Analysts basically took the legacy costs and inflated by the expected number of new cell sites. That has proven to be incorrect. 

A higher degree of infrastructure reuse has proven possible. Deployment is being carefully phased. Better technology means capex demands are less than expected. Perhaps most important, operators are evaluating investment in light of expected financial returns, and behaving accordingly. -

How Mobility Drives Industry Growth and Value

With the caveat that the data is about 15 years old, the evolution of end user nodes on communications networks is clear enough. While fixed nodes represent most of the actual data consumption, mobile nodes increasingly drive the subscriptions and user base. 

In this illustration, the blue and purple  lines show fixed network broadband lines. The light blue line shows cable TV broadband lines. 

The lines in yellow show total telco lines of any type. The red lines show mobility customers. 

source: International Cablemakers Federation

More recent data through 2012 shows the trends in perhaps clearer perspective. By 2012, fixed line teledensity (lines as a percent of population) remained virtually flat and in the very-low single digits.

Mobile teledensity had climbed up to a bit below 70 percent overall, and hit 40 percent even in rural areas. 

source: ITU

Looking at global data to 2019, mobile internet users had the highest growth rate, while mobile subscriptions flattened. Fixed broadband connections grew slowly, while use of traditional voice lines (narrowband) continued to dip slightly. 

source: ITU

And while each country’s development is different in some ways, the general pattern also is clear. Mobile adoption has been faster than fixed network service adoption. Historically, on average, it has taken any specific country up to 50 years to reach adoption levels near 50 percent. 

In the mobile era, it often takes less than 20 years to reach 50 percent adoption. So the difference between the “best” growth rates and “average” growth rates is mostly dependent on whether we look at mobile services or fixed services. 

source: ITU

Is Mobile Internet Access "More Valuable" than Fixed?

Looking only at the cost per bit, one might conclude (incorrectly, perhaps) that mobile data access is deemed more valuable than fixed network access. One might also argue that the value of mobile bits is in some sense "greater" than fixed access precisely because it represents "access at any time, anyplace" instead of "at one place."

It is somewhat impressionistic, but mobile service adoption rates do suggest there is something consumers consider quite valuable. Consider adoption rates: mobile got adopted explosively, compared to fixed network service. That suggests a clear and strong sense of value on the part of consumers.

source: Our World in Data

It also is suggestive that mobile cost per bit has been 10 times higher than that of fixed access.

On the other hand, most surveys show relatively balanced levels of data consumption--mobile or fixed--on a global basis. Some consumption is mobile-only; some is fixed-only.

About half of consumption is untethered devices using fixed network resources (Wi-Fi in particular). 

source: Cisco

Nor is it easy to compare the value of fixed access compared to mobile access. Mobile access costs more, per bit, but consumption also is far less than on a fixed network. Fixed network consumption costs less per bit, but consumption levels are higher than on a mobile network.

Basically, 80 percent of device traffic demand is from fixed networks, though roughly half of all device traffic demand is from mobile devices. In part, that might be because mobile users know they can save money by offloading to Wi-Fi.

It is difficult to say how much that disparity is driven by perceptions of value and how much from the sheer disparity in transmission network bandwidth. Mobile bandwidth is highly restricted by the amount of spectrum available for mobile networks to use. Cabled networks have virtually unrestricted capacity upside.

Still, to the extent that value and price are directly related, mobile access might be deemed to be more valuable than fixed bandwidth, per-bit, when consumed "on the go," where fixed connections are not possible. The high use of Wi-Fi as a mobile network offload mechanism speaks to the cost differences between mobile and fixed networks.

The value of data access is not necessarily directly proportional to the volume of data consumed. A relatively small amount of data used for a navigation app or social network might have high value, while a large amount of data consumed by a video might have relatively lower value.

So the value of mobile internet access is not directly related to the volume of consumed bits.

Some might argue that “most” consumers will have little need for internet access on their phones. Many of us would strongly disagree with that notion. Some even have argued that only about 35 percent of phone users would be willing to pay for internet access on their devices. 

source: Mobile Opportunity

It is safe to say many of us believe a standard Bell curve of demand is the more likely outcome, where nearly every user buys some mobile data access. 

source: Mobile Opportunity

All internet access seems to be deemed valuable by consumers. It also is possible to argue that mobile access "anywhere" continues to enjoy a cost premium compared to fixed network access, as important as that is.