Tiago Rodrigues, CEO Wireless Broadband Alliance, talks about the big issues to be addressed at the events
The conversation is ahead of the Wireless Global Congress EMEA. It is part of the Network X event being held in Paris, 23-26 October. There the WBA will celebrate its twentieth birthday and the diversity of its member organisations.
The International Telecommunication Union’s (ITU) World Radiocommunication Conference (WRC) is takes place in Dubai in November. These conferences are held every three to four years to review, and, if necessary, revise the Radio Regulations, the international treaty governing the use of the radio-frequency spectrum and the geostationary-satellite and non-geostationary-satellite orbits. Revisions are made on the basis of an agenda determined by the ITU Council, which takes into account recommendations made by previous world radiocommunication conferences.
Annie Turner: You have a programme to promote Wi-Fi6E [launched in 2020] and Wi-Fi 7 [whose launch is imminent] to ensure that industry needs are addressed globally as Wi-Fi and 5G standards are ratified. Two of the most important events in the global wireless calendar are coming up, which issues are you focusing on?
Tiago Rodrigues: One of the priorities is OpenRoaming. We want to bring and accelerate the adoption of this standard which makes connection to public Wi-Fi completely automatic. If you have the right identity on your device, you don’t need to select the SSIDs [service set identifiers], you don’t need to input your email or personal data. You just enter on the venue and if you have the ID, your device will connect and you are online. That’s a big pillar of the work by the Alliance.
Also, are launching a think tank, called Enterprise Connectivity Forum, in Paris. We want to bring retail brands into the discussion because they play a very important role as the voice of the customer: they are the ones that have the final interaction with the consumers. We’re talking about shops like Adidas or supermarkets – anyone who normally runs a public Wi Fi that’s free. We see a lot of investment in those areas but also lot of doubts and questions about what are the best practices? What should I do to ensure my Wi-Fi network provides a more secure and simpler experience for consumes coming to our shops? AT:
AT: What about spectrum issues?
TR: The two events are linked because they’ll cover some of the spectrum topics relevant to Wi-Fi 7 and Wi-Fi 7’s importance. For example, it will benefit from having additional spectrum for unlicensed use. That will be a core topics at the Congress in Paris.
Another, related topic is automatic frequency coordination (AFC). We believe in a shared model whereby the 6GHz frequency can be used by different players, for Wi-Fi as well fixed wireless links and other uses. But we need to implement safeguards to prevent interference between the different users. We are working with the US’ Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on certification that will guarantee if anyone is already using the 6GHz, Wi-Fi will not interfere and they can continue with whatever operations they have on it.
AT: Why is 6GHz so important to Wi-Fi and what obstacles is it facing?
TR: Wi-Fi is still operating in 2.4G and 5GHz, and has been very successful but there are limitations in…terms of the number of channels for more speed. If we would like 10Gbps – or 15 or 20Gbps – in our homes, we need more spectrum. In my residential area, I capture 50 other access points from my neighbours so my spectrum has a lot of noise.
So Wi-Fi needs more spectrum. As consumers, we all want the benefit from that. The majority of the world agrees to allocating part of the 6GHz band for Wi-Fi. The discussion that is now happening is should we give the entire band or part of it to Wi-Fi. The topic will be discussed at the WRC meeting in Dubai with the ITU in November. There will be a recommendation – do we give the entire band for licensed use of just half of it?
AT: Which countries are for and against giving 6GHz over to Wi-Fi?
We have agreement mainly in America, Canada, US and others – including Japan, South Korea and Saudi Arabia – to allocate the entire 6GHz span. Europe has allocated half the band and that’s where the discussion is. Should Europe give the other half to Wi-Fi or not?
Others are a case of watch of wait, such as India and China. They have no publication position on whether to allocate any of it or all of it, of half. We don’t know although they jointly account for something like one third of the world’s population. I think they are taking a very conservative approach, waiting for the [WRC] meetings in Dubai to make a decision. We have been talking to the Indian government and regulators. They understand the benefits of using 6GHz for Wi-Fi but give us no indication of their position.
AT: Do you think some countries or regions are waiting for WRC and the opportunity to apply pressure for what they want?
TR: No, I don’t think so. I think the issue is there is huge pressure from the mobile industry sometimes that says, “Don’t allocate all the spectrum to Wi-Fi as we might need it at some point in the future”.
AT: But in the meantime, that spectrum, which is such a scarce commodity, isn’t used?
TR: That’s one of the Wi-Fi industry’s arguments. We understand you might to do something later, but why not get immediate benefits now, when we have devices and products that are ready to be announced? The mobile industry arguments might influence some governments, perhaps including China.
AT: Yes and China has so much influence on the African continent, so this could also have an impact there? What about India?
TR: I can’t comment on that, I have no idea what the thinking is, but the Indian government is putting in a huge effort to accelerate its digital agenda. It is building out a lot of FTTH and fibre backhaul to the cities. They understand that for citizens to benefit from this, they need Wi-Fi, whether to connect to a cellular or fixed network. There is no other broadband technology they can use.
So even if all the fixed wireless access is via 5G mmWave technology, they need a Wi-Fi antenna for their laptops or TVs or other devices to connect to it. So I feel confident in India’s digital strategy. They are betting a lot on fibre, which tells me Wi-Fi is important to them.
AT: What will be the impact if some countries don’t agree to give at least some of the 6GHz spectrum over to Wi-Fi?
TR: Let’s imagine a situation where Canada, the US and other countries give it all over to Wi-Fi so they can get 20Gbps at home, then we have countries like where I live in Portugal and we only get half the bandwidth, so I can only get 10Gbps at home. So there will potentially be a differentiation of services in different places.
Also, equipment manufacturers will need to optimise Wi-Fi antennas or maybe all the devices to work on different bands. That definitely will not optimise the cost like having a single product that works everywhere, and the same chipset with the same processing power. Instead they have to tweak those things, depending on the geography. That may increase the cost of the equipment.
AT: Is part of the issue the tension between two competing technologies, 5G and Wi-Fi?
TR: I don’t see it like that. From a consumer’s point of view, I use 5G and Wi-Fi every day. I cannot work and live without both of them…Each of these technologies have their strengths and weaknesses. The agenda the Alliance has been driving is that Wi-Fi is the incumbent technology for indoor coverage and 5G is the incumbent for outdoors.
We have been working with many mobile operators [to help] them understand, “You don’t need to deploy small cells for indoor coverage. You can do it if you want, but Wi-Fi offers all the possibilities and capabilities that you can leverage either to offload or do voice calls over Wi Fi.” We just need to work together to make sure that all those techniques, those technical capabilities are there.
Wi-Fi is the most universal and cost-effective technology for broadband connectivity from the consumers’ point of view. Me and my whole family can access whatever we need over Wi-Fi, easily.
AT: What about the evolution from Wi-Fi 6 to Wi-Fi 7? We are still mostly using Wi-Fi 5 and some 6, I think. When will the migration to Wi-Fi 7 begin?
TR: We have launched a lot of new standards. We have jumped, in a period of four years, from 2019, we’ve had Wi-Fi 5, 6 and 7, because of the opportunity to use additional spectrum and growing usage. Wi-Fi is the natural evolution of the standard.
AT: Were the benefits of Wi-Fi 7 mostly developed with consumers or industrial use in mind?
TR: Both. There are many consumer-centric device manufacturers, but then there are the big enterprise-orientated ones too, like Cisco and HP Aruba so industry can enjoy the lower latency of Wi-Fi 7 and higher speeds, but also better traffic management and traffic scheduling.
There are also new techniques for IoT sensors, like target wake time – a mechanism that will allow the sensor to be mostly dormant to save battery. There is a tonne of new techniques and possibilities with Wi-Fi 7, beyond what it has already.
So private cellular networks and Wi-Fi will co-exist, and in some scenarios, it’s likely we’ll have both, for example in a manufacturing company, or it might be I’m happy with just one of them. They are tools you can use together or one at a time, depending on what you want to achieve.
Source: WBA