Page 98 - Trends in Telecommunication Reform 2016

streetlight management, video surveillance and requirements from a typical mobile telephone
environmental monitoring. Using application- customer. They need comprehensive network
specific networks, though, can increase costs and status information to determine whether a non-
reduce the opportunity to improve security and communicating device or its network connection
reliability when compared with multi-purpose is faulty. They want a single subscription for the
networks . Where mobile phone network whole system, not on a per-device basis. And
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coverage is available, 2G and 3G networks can in many cases, the intended device lifetime will
be used for most IoT applications. The increasing be much longer than the time during which
coverage of 4G cellular networks, meanwhile, individuals typically own a mobile phone – perhaps
provides a high-throughput and low-latency option a decade or more. Replacing a device -- or even
for higher-value IoT applications such as video a communications module within it -- will require
surveillance. either an expensive service visit or a complicated
process for customers that may cause faults. Not
The development of 5G cellular networks, all mobile network operators can yet cope with
expected to be deployed in the early 2020s, will these requirements, although many have set up
provide considerable benefits for IoT applications, business units specifically to address them .
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especially high-bandwidth ones such as video
sharing. It will bring significant improvements in IoT systems are built on fixed and wireless
wireless communications, using smart radios and communications standards, but it can still be
spectrum-sharing with 1,000 times higher spectral difficult to connect systems in different industry
efficiency than current standards. 5G will support sectors or to reuse system components. The
cooperative relays and femtocells, enabling great heterogeneity in application programming
low-power sensors to communicate farther interfaces and middleware (software components)
while reducing the possibility of interference makes it difficult to write applications that will
between communicating devices. It will include run on different systems. So, users often have to
specific features to support device-to-device rely on a single set of applications for a single set
communication (such as traffic offloading) and of IoT components. More standardization would
explicit support for IoT/M2M systems . enable more innovation, allowing information to
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flow between different industry sectors such as
The industry association GSMA identifies sub-1ms consumer electronics and automobiles. There is
latency and greater than 1 gigabit per second a need for interoperability, connectivity, access
(Gbit/s) bandwidth as defining features of 5G. control, service discovery, and privacy services, all
Many of the other 5G goals can be met gradually built on IoT-optimized protocols where necessary .
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using existing protocols. Meanwhile, autonomous Greater configurability allows components to
driving, augmented-reality and virtual-reality be used in a wider variety of systems, but it can
systems, and tactile Internet interfaces are the increase complexity and price.
main technologies today that would require such
low latency and high throughput. These could be Because IoT applications have strongly
used in gaming, telemedicine and manufacturing . heterogeneous requirements, there is a need to
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fit different communications protocols to different
5G likely will also support Software Defined applications – for example, using IoT-specific
Networking, allowing operators to run production protocols such as the Constrained Access Protocol
and test networks over existing physical networks. (CoAP) in resource-constrained systems. Most
These will feature separate IP control and data applications will be built around Internet Protocol,
planes, increasing security while reducing except on very constrained devices. M2M devices
expenditures. And it could provide support for can connect directly to other machines, but
running cloud computing in core networks, moving frequently there are gateways connecting IoT
analytics closer to IoT edge devices . SDN and devices, which provide added-value services such
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femtocells are already being deployed in some 4G as protocol conversion, filtering, caching, and
networks. back-end hubs – which can run on smart phones,
gateways, or in the cloud (for global scale) .
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When a company such as a smart meter operator
is managing thousands or millions of M2M devices Even if integration of infrastructure and networks
via mobile data networks, they have very different can prove challenging between organizations

80 Trends in Telecommunication Reform 2016