 | Issue: | Asia-Pacific I 2013 |
| Article no.: | 6 | |
| Topic: | Connecting the globetrotting digital nomad | |
| Author: | Allen Pan | |
| Title: | Director of Asia Pacific | |
| Organisation: | Boingo Wireless | |
| PDF size: | 215KB |
About author
Allen Pan is Boingo Wireless’ director of Asia, stationed in the company’s Shanghai office. Mr Pan joined Boingo in April 2005. Prior to his current position at Boingo, Mr Pan was with MCI as the regional director for the International Strategic Ventures and Alliances (ISV&A) organization, where he was responsible to expand MCI’s International Partnering and Alliance Strategy in the Asia Pacific regional. Before joining MCI, Mr Pan served in Beijing as the vice president of global strategy and GM of North America for China Networks International Co. Ltd., a start-up ISP, where he guided the company’s global product and marketing directions. Mr Pan also oversaw Capital Networks’ entire North American operations. Mr Pan began his career in sales engineering for several pioneering Internet companies including PSINet and Exodus Communications.
Allen Pan is a native speaker of English and Mandarin Chinese. He has a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from Drexel University in Philadelphia, PA.
Article abstract
Asia-Pacific is the fastest growing wireless region in the world. It has three billion mobile subscribers, 45 per cent of the world’s Internet users and one of the world’s lowest penetration rates, so growth will be strong for years to come. To handle the traffic mobile operators are partnering with WiFi network providers to offer Wifi access throughout the region and the world. In addition to offloading mobile traffic, WiFi can drastically cut subscriber costs for domestic and international roaming.
Full Article
Today, Asia-Pacific is the Wild West of wireless: the market is developing rapidly, opportunities for mobile ecosystem players, from device manufacturers to carriers, seem endless and the challenges are many.
The statistics are staggering. Asia-Pacific is the fastest growing mobile market in the world, with three billion mobile subscribers , and with smartphones outnumbering non-smartphones in major markets, such as Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan. China alone has more mobile subscribers than the entire population of the U.S. The region is home to 45 per cent of the world’s Internet users , and it’s estimated that in one month alone (June 2012), Internet users in Asia watched 45 billion online videos.
And that’s just the beginning. The Asia-Pacific region actually has the second-lowest market penetration for mobile phones after Africa and the Middle East regions , and smartphone penetration is estimated at just 22 per cent. With nearly half of world’s population living in the region, and half of those people under the age of 30 , continued explosive Internet and mobile data growth is assured. The Cisco Visual Networking Index estimates that by 2016, IP traffic in Asia-Pacific will reach 41.1 exabytes per month – a CAGR of 31 per cent – and the region will have the world’s largest amount of business IP traffic. Travel to and within Asia-Pacific is also on the increase, further adding to overall data usage and network traffic.
Though many countries in Asia-Pacific are among the most technologically advanced in the world, there are many underdeveloped areas with old or limited wireless infrastructure. As a region, Asia-Pacific is technologically 12-18 months behind more developed areas of the world. Though LTE is beginning limited roll out in a few major cities, and carriers like China Mobile are planning to deploy millions of WiFi hotspots , demand is set to continue to outpace carrier capacity region-wide. Further, fragmentation in spectrum, roaming standards and pricing can prevent mobile users from even connecting at all.
More in-depth collaboration between carriers, wireless providers and industry groups is necessary to not only meet today’s mobile demand, but to prepare for the future avalanche of mobile data usage.
International roaming partnerships – addressing the fragmentation challenge
Essential to meeting mobile data demand and ensuring customer satisfaction in Asia-Pacific today is the development of international roaming standards. The Asia-Pacific wireless landscape is a fragmented mosaic of various wireless plans, tariffs and spectrums, resulting in unpredictable international roaming fees and connectivity.
The vast differences between Asian countries have limited the opportunities to set international cellular roaming. The countries vary widely in economies, regulations and foreign exchange rates, generating red tape and adding to costs for carriers, which they pass along to consumers roaming outside of their home network. Intercontinental and international travellers have frequently experienced ‘bill shock’ after they return to their home countries. Though pan-Asia-Pacific roaming regulations have been explored, the Asia-Pacific Telecommunity (APT) International Mobile Working Group reported in May 2012 that the lack of a ‘supranational regulatory framework’ across all countries makes standards similar to the EU Roaming Regulation ‘almost not possible.’
With the proliferation of hotspots in urban areas and leading business travel destinations, WiFi is the best alternative for cellular mobile roaming in the region. The technology is relatively low cost, it uses unlicensed spectrum, it’s easy to deploy, and WiFi’s integration into mobile devices is nearly ubiquitous. The WBA’s Industry Report 2012 highlighted WiFi roaming as ‘a major opportunity for operators to stimulate usage’ through ‘agreements with foreign operators and ease of access to hotspots.’
Integrating WiFi into carrier plans ensures a better, more consistent customer experience and helps operators manage network capacity. The WBA Industry Report 2012 highlighted NTT DoCoMo’s commitment to offering WiFi to customers as part of their services, reporting that the company had plans to expand its WiFi hotspot network to 150,000 by March 2013. The report also highlighted changes in WiFi usage behaviour when offered as part of operator services – China Mobile reported a 102.5 per cent year-on-year increase in customer traffic on their WiFi network in the first half of 2012.
International roaming and platform service partnerships with WiFi providers offer Asia-Pacific carriers a solution for the fragmented wireless experience, increasing customer satisfaction and reducing attrition. Leading South Korean carriers LGU + and KT both have partnerships with a worldwide roaming network of more than 600,000 hotspots which their customers access as part of their self-branded service packages. Carriers have full control of this extended roaming network, and can market it and include it in service packages as they desire, allowing them a new customer retention tool and revenue generator. The roaming network can be carrier-branded and provides a seamless experience to customers as they travel the globe while helping them save on exorbitant international roaming fees.
Toward a seamless future: preparing for Next Generation Hotspot, introducing ‘HetNets’
As device penetration and demand for mobile data increase, international roaming partnerships will extend carrier networks, and will also lay the groundwork for the upcoming roll out of the Next Generation Hotspot protocols that will introduce seamless roaming and offload to the region.
In worldwide trials in fourth quarter 2012, the WBA’s Next Generation Hotspot standards, and the WiFi Alliance’s complementary Hotspot 2.0 device certification standards, will enable seamless authentication to WiFi networks with no user action needed. Today, WiFi offload is a largely manual process; this results in lower mobile customer WiFi usage and increased roaming fees. A WBA survey reported in November 2012 that “three-quarters of industry survey respondents had less than 10 per cent of their overall user base connecting to negotiated WiFi hotspots while travelling”. Next Generation Hotspot’s seamless offloading will enable automatic authentication between carrier handset and hotspots, helping carriers manage network capacity and providing customers with the best possible experience.
To pave the way to this future of seamless offload, mobile operators first need to have a WiFi footprint their roaming clients can use. Though WiFi is available in many Asia-Pacific regions, the WBA has recommended that operators renegotiate WiFi roaming agreements now to prepare for the coming Next Generation Hotspots protocols and data onslaught.
Urbanization is also a compelling factor in the need for collaborative WiFi and cellular offload standards. As urban areas grow more densely populated, Pyramid Research reports that, “it will be especially important for operators to integrate WiFi into their networks” to manage capacity.
Asia-Pacific operators are following the global trends of mobile data bandwidth throttling and eliminating unlimited data plans to keep their networks from being overwhelmed, and many are already taking aggressive steps toward seamless offloading. Informa Research reported in 2011 that tier one carriers reported offloading up to 20 per cent of their data traffic. Korea Telecom has claimed to offload up to 60 per cent of its traffic onto WiFi networks , much of it likely Korean domestic offload. LGU+ has also embraced offloading, outsourcing an Asia-Pacific and global network to seamlessly offload its customers when possible.
The foundation of the ‘basics’ for the future of wireless connectivity is infrastructure. To enable seamless Next Generation Hotspot offloading, infrastructure must be Passpoint-certified, supporting the IEEE’s 802.11u, 802.11i and 802.1x standards. Leading WiFi operators are updating their infrastructure worldwide in preparation for the offload roll out as carriers make plans to leverage the long-awaited industry standard offload protocols.
Beyond upgrades of existing infrastructure, heterogeneous networks combining macro and small cell technologies like WiFi will be necessary to manage network capacity. Using a neutral host platform, third-party providers operate multi-carrier Distributed Antenna Systems and complimentary WiFi networks to manage carrier customer traffic in many large-scale venues in North America, including airports, convention centres and stadiums. The implementation of these heterogeneous networks, or ‘HetNets’, is accelerating worldwide, by necessity, as carriers seek cost-effective solutions for providing a quality customer experience – and small cells in combination with WiFi provide an optimal balance of resources for data delivery.
As mobile connects more of the world, and advancing technologies aim to make these connections even quicker, it is imperative that network and service providers cooperate through international roaming agreements, and collaborate on new standards – like Next Generation Hotspot – to remain competitive, deliver value to partners and economies, and put customers first.
