By: Jim Schakenbach

Although spring officially started at the end of March, the telecommunications industry was showing signs of growth all month long across all geographic regions, business areas, and technological sectors.

It’s not the medium, it’s the message

As mobile technology and channels have matured, content delivery continues to be where a lot of the dynamic activity is. Mobile operator EE, which was recently acquired by BT, announced it will be partnering with MTV to offer a prepaid music subscription service that will compete with over-the-top (OTT) services. This move is following the growing trend of mobile operators partnering with content providers to attract subscribers and win back revenue being siphoned off by OTT competitors.

AT&T went a step further and announced that it was simplifying subscriber access by enabling customers to access DIRECTV content on whatever internet connection and whatever fixed or wireless device they choose, including non-AT&T devices. Later this year AT&T plans to launch the ability for subscribers to access and stream DIRECTV video services over a wired or wireless Internet connection from any provider and from virtually any device – smartphone, tablet, smart TV, streaming media hardware or PC.

AT&T continues to push the envelope for content and delivery by announcing it will deliver the first live 4K Ultra HD broadcast on DIRECTV next month with the Master’s golf tournament at the Augusta National Golf Club.    

Rethinking video delivery platforms seems to be a key initiative for video service providers lately as marketplace realities are forcing video distributors to evaluate how they deliver video. Right after unveiling its plans for streaming DIRECTV over any internet connection and device, AT&T, along with CenturyLink, announced separate plans for new middleware platforms that would underlie their video content offerings. 

Further south, Spanish telco Telefonica announced plans to significantly expand its Latin American video-on-demand (VOD) service in the coming months, premiering in April its OTT platform Movistar Play in Uruguay, followed by similar operations in Peru, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Panama within the next few months.

Spectrum speculation

All this increased content delivery is putting ever-increasing pressure on bandwidth. A newly released J.D. Power wireless network quality report revealed that more customers are using 4G smartphones and are becoming less tolerant of slow network connections and data speeds.  According to the study, the number of customers using a 4G-enabled smartphone has risen sharply over the past two years, as have customer expectations for data speed and network quality as technology has improved. More than three-fourths (78%) of smartphone owners indicate using a 4G-enabled device, compared with 59% just two years ago.

As a result, companies are stepping up efforts to carve more capacity out of various regions of the spectrum.  Students at NYU Wireless, along with Samsung, Nokia, and Ericsson engineers, have been conducting pioneering research to prove that millimeter wave frequencies can and will work for mobile communications. The researchers are trying to determine whether the spectrum is suitable for a cellular-like system with mobility rather than just point-to-point applications.

Satellite services provider Echostar is pushing an alternative approach to high-band spectrum sharing. Echostar, Hughes Network Systems and Alta Wireless representatives met with FCC officials to present their alternative approach to spectrum sharing for the three gigahertz of spectrum between 37 and 40 GHz.The company is proposing to share the 37-40 GHz range, with 37-39 GHz for mobile services and 39-40 GHz split between mobile services as primary users and fixed satellite service gateway earth stations as co-primary in all areas outside the urban cores of the largest 30 or so U.S. cities .

Back on earth, 5G development continues to pick up steam as Wells Fargo analysts speculate that T-Mobile’s 28-39 GHz spectrum, acquired in 2012 from MetroPCS, could give it an advantage in 5G trials. T-Mobile is currently involved in several 5G trials and, while there's still healthy debate around the timing of 5G, most analysts agree that high-band spectrum would play a key role.