LTE and the 1800 Mhz opportunity

This Northstream white paper examines the take-up and status of LTE two years after the first commercial launch and analyses the key aspects that will determine its future success.

It is widely recognised that mobile data usage growth, whether on smartphones, laptops or tablets, will continue. In such a market situation, there are a number of challenges for the main stakeholders to cope with, operators, equipment suppliers and regulators alike. Mobile networks will need to accommodate significantly different volumes and types of traffic than today, adopt continuously evolving technologies and make more flexible use of the scarce resource of radio spectrum.

Previous Northstream white papers have discussed the generic opportunities and challenges LTE technology brings to operators and how to adopt a suitable migration strategy. Two of the major concerns have been how and when voice services could be offered and the availability of ample device portfolios. Voice over LTE will indeed happen soon, and could bring a boost to operators’ dwindling voice business, but that is a topic for another white paper. In this paper we instead put our focus on analysing the critical availability of suitable and plentiful LTE spectrum and how that can enable, or inversely prohibit, a continued strong growth of mobile communication.