Fixed wireless access (FWA) is taking off – big time. Forecasts suggest around 165 million homes and businesses will be connected by FWA by 2027, up from 70 million in 2021. Today, most service providers have FWA in their broadband offer, recognizing the benefits it brings in quickly and easily providing high-speed internet access where it is currently too costly or time consuming to deploy fiber.
5G has enabled FWA to truly compete with traditional fixed broadband technologies with services in the 100s of Mbps. Operators started with 5G mid-bands (sub-6 GHz) because it was a relatively easy upgrade to their existing 4G networks giving them up to 10x capacity over 4G. These upgrades were made for mobile users but exceeded demand: a mobile user only consumes about 20 Gb per month and, what’s more, they’re not overly inclined to pay a premium for 5G over 4G.
This is where the stellar growth of FWA comes in. Operators soon found that mid-band upgrades could be used for new revenues with FWA broadband services. However, success in FWA brought its own challenges and those operators with larger FWA deployments found fixed subscribers consuming 20x the data of mobile users. Moreover, multiple FWA users in a single location, gaming or working from home, would put additional pressure on a mobile network’s capacity. Nokia data suggest that mid-band 5G can only support around a 15% FWA take rate in suburban areas before it starts to impact mobile data.
But there’s a major factor that’s commonly overlooked for capacity management, and that’s the relationship between the FWA device in the home and the 5G radio. While quality of connection is difficult to control with a mobile device, the opportunity exists with FWA to ensure that you have the highest possible signal quality at all times. A low-quality connection essentially wastes radio resources by forcing the radio to transmit and retransmit to a device that can barely hear it.
With this we can see how important the user device is for preserving radio resources. Nokia studies of large-scale FWA networks have shown that operators can save as much as 60% of potentially wasted network capacity simply by placing the right device in the right location of the customer premise. This means using outdoor devices where signals are weaker, indoor devices where signals are strong, and intelligent smartphone applications to pinpoint the ideal location. In all cases, the FWA device should utilize high-gain antenna to ensure the best possible connection to the network. Devices with MIMO (multiple-in, multiple-out) can double (2x2 MIMO) or multiply by 4 (4x4 MIMO) the bitrate, also contributing significantly to 5G FWA performance.
So, FWA CPE capabilities and positioning are major contributors to capacity management. Granted, devices with high-gain antennas and MIMO represent a premium product, but this premium is clearly worth it.
These benefits are realized in two new additions to our portfolio of Nokia Fastmile 5G FWA solutions: a new outdoor receiver with high-gain antennas (up to 10 dBi) that’s perfect for areas with weak signals; and an indoor high-gain (up to 8 dBi) gateway with dual-band Wi-Fi 7 that ensures the 5G speeds delivered to the home are extended throughout the home. Wi-Fi 7 is an important evolution, coming at a time when Gigabit and even multi-Gigabit broadband services are gaining traction. Wi-Fi 7 ensures those speeds to the home are extended throughout the home. But just as importantly, Wi-Fi 7 is also a capacity play, ensuring the increasing number of connected devices in a home are well-served.
As FWA continues to gain favor with service providers and customers alike, effective capacity management is increasingly important for FWA to fulfill its potential.