The proliferation of smart devices means more people are using data on the move; however, the question is how do you target this market and make data affordable?
This is a question posed by executive network strategy and engineering at Telkom Mobile, Zoltan Miklos, who notes that part of the solution is the integration of WiFi to the mobile demand.
According to Cisco statistics, in SA the mobile subscriber penetration rate reached 133% of the population in the first quarter of 2013, with 67.2 million mobile subscriptions.
This growth, however, will create two primary challenges for regional mobile operators, says Cisco. The first is ensuring the availability of high-speed packet access (HSPA) and long-term evolution (LTE) spectrum and, secondly, securing funding for investments in security and service quality.
Globally, mobile operators are expected to drive WiFi growth through accelerated technology adoption, adds Cisco. Because of this, operators in SA must consider WiFi a key pillar of their broadband strategies.
Miklos concurs, stating that carrier WiFi penetration presents mobile operators with a tremendous opportunity to optimise capital and operational expenditures, as well as improving the user experience.
"Offloading mobile data from HSPA and LTE to WiFi networks is an attractive concept to mobile operators, but realising it depends highly on their technical and strategic abilities," he says.
"We didn't do WiFi strictly for the mobile phone; we've implemented it as a bigger broadband value proposition so that our customers can also distribute it to the bigger market."
WiFi is a short-range technology that works best in defined spaces, particularly indoors, observes Miklos. This makes the location where online activity occurs critical to carrier WiFi and makes the venue owner an important actor in any network deployment.
"In deciding to roll out its WiFi network, Telkom took into consideration certain points of interest that should be targeted. For example, food, health and beauty, retail locations, public rest areas in malls, anywhere where someone can open a laptop," he says.
Another key consideration was the data distribution in Telkom's own network and being aware that data traffic patterns around SA are not the same."
To heed the mobile call, Miklos shares that Telkom looked at SIM integration where SIM credentials or certificates are stored on the device.
"This makes 'no touch' authentication and connection management possible and, to the user, it appears seamless," he says. "We've also deployed a device authentication model where devices are able to discover and prioritise WiFi access points based on various criteria before associating to the network. This also means that devices will be offered the appropriate extensible authentication protocol method to authenticate with."
Investments projections
Based on its analysis, Cisco determined that South African mobile operators would have to invest $108 million between 2013 and 2017 to provide WiFi coverage to 564 buildings with total indoor
space of 2.55 square kilometres and total outdoor space of 25 square kilometres for busy locations across Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban, Germiston, Pretoria, Port Elizabeth,
East London and Bloemfontein.
It adds that after determining the rate of mobile data traffic offload, mobile operators will need to add additional WiFi infrastructure costs to the reduced HSPA and LTE infrastructure costs.
If mobile data offload is applied, Cisco predicts that the overall WiFi, HSPA and LTE infrastructure costs over five years will be $2.5 billion with 30% offload, $291 billion with 20% offload, $323 billion with 10% offload, $341 billion with 5%offload and $3.5 billion with 0% offload.
Miklos concludes that mobile operators who provide high-quality mobile data services, particularly in a massively growing market, will lead the change in the South African mobile industry.
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