Mobile World Congress 2023: Among the areas the mobile industry needs to address is investing in 5G technology innovation, as it drives digital transformation across sectors.
So said Mats Granryd, director-general of the GSM Association (GSMA), delivering the keynote address to kick-off this year’s MWC Barcelona on Monday.
The GSMA-run global mobile connectivity conference returned for the second year in a row as an in-person event, following the COVID-19 pandemic.
Granryd addressed a wide range of mobile industry themes and trends. He told the audience that when considering the future of the industry – Web 3.0, the metaverse and intelligent connectivity – there’s new excitement and conviction that anything is possible.
“I believe we are in the new era of exploration. Those that dare can lead the way; those that dare can build new business models for consumers, businesses and societies. And those that dare can go where no one has been before.”
Speaking about the new era in the industry, he explained it’s making everything digital – from personal lives, business goals and everything in-between.
“Everything connects and the world becomes our screen, enhancing our lives in ways previously unimagined. The metaverse will enable immersive 3D experiences across gaming, surgery training and education.
“Applied AI will affect every area of economic activity, and blockchain ledgers will bring seamless global collaboration on everything from finance to food security.
“While today’s connectivity is defined by speed security and mobility, tomorrow’s connectivity will also be defined by processing capabilities, capacity reliability and customisation.”
He noted the industry is poised for a transformation to future-facing tech communication corporations.
Practical issues
Despite all the opportunities, Granryd pointed to some issues that need to be addressed in the industry: investments, spectrum and the usage gap.
He said between now and 2030, operators will spend roughly $1.5 trillion on their mobile capex, to keep up with customers’ demand on the network.
“Over 90% of this [capex] will be towards 5G. I think this is quite remarkable. We’re exploring innovative financial models to make sure we can achieve these investments.”
Fifth-generation technology connections have already breached the one billion mark and continue to grow, so partnerships are really key, Granryd added.
Turning to spectrum, he said it is well-known that affordable spectrum is vital to the industry. “This year is a critical year, with the World Radiocommunication Conference (WRC) taking place in Dubai. 5G needs capacity to grow, and as we know, speed and quality are directly linked to spectrum.
“We are working very hard so that the issues raised at this year’s conference will increase harmonisation, allowing us to deliver fast and affordable mobile services to more people.
“We need this year’s WRC to deliver low-band spectrum to decrease the usage gap, 3.5GHz harmonisation to drive affordability and the 6GHz band for the crucial expansion of 5G.
“If we can achieve this, we have an opportunity to put mobile services into the hands of billions more people across the world and ensure no one is left behind.”
He said the usage gap is one of the biggest challenges the industry must overcome. “We need to work across the whole ecosystem to eliminate the barriers, which are handset affordability and digital skills and literacy, and create relevant content in local languages, to ensure everyone can safely access mobile internet.”
New gateway
At the conference, the GSMA announced its new industry-wide initiative. The GSMA Open Gateway is an effort to harmonise access to operators’ application programming interfaces (APIs), states the mobile industry body.
In addition, the GSMA Open Gateway aims to help developers and cloud providers enhance and deploy services more quickly via single points of access to operator networks. This is achieved via common, northbound service APIs that expose mobile operators’ network capabilities within a consistent, interoperable and federated framework.
The initiative is made up of 21 mobile operators, including America Movil, AT&T, Bharti Airtel, China Mobile, Telefónica, MTN, Orange, Verizon and Vodacom.
The GSMA has already started engaging companies like Microsoft, Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud, to build this specific ecosystem.
Speaking via video broadcast during the keynote address, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said his company is bringing the Open Gateway initiative to Microsoft Azure.
This will be achieved in partnership with AT&T, Deutsche Telekom, Singtel, Telefónica and others, as part of the Azure programmable connectivity that provides a unified interface across all operative networks, Nadella explained.
Granryd highlighted that 35 years ago, 13 countries came together to harmonise mobile voice services through the GSM standards, creating the foundations of today’s mobile connectivity.
“The GSMA Open Gateway will deliver an impact similar to that first harmonisation. We have heard about open APIs, but the difference is that this time they will be universal, providing access to the world’s largest connectivity platforms through a single point of access.
“One can just imagine the possibilities that will open up, allowing developers and cloud service providers to improve and build new digital services, and accelerate the development of immersive technologies.”
José María Álvarez-Pallete López, GSMA board chairman and CEO of Telefónica, stated: “Telcos have come a long way in developing a global platform to connect everyone and everything.
“And now, by federating open network APIs and applying the roaming concept of interoperability, mobile operators and cloud services will be truly integrated to enable a new world of opportunity. Collaboration among telecoms operators and cloud providers is crucial in this new digital ecosystem.”
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