‘FWA pricing to be similar to broadband in the long run’
2 min read . Updated: 26 Feb 2023, 11:38 PM IST
PremiumIndia offers a massive opportunity for telcos to monetize their investments in FWA
New Delhi: Fixed wireless access (FWA), which offers high-speed internet without fibre or cables, will have over 300 million connections worldwide by 2028, and 80% of it will be on 5G, John Yazlle, head of fixed wireless access at Ericsson, said in an interview. India offers a massive opportunity for telcos to monetize their investments in fixed wireless access. Though a key challenge is the prohibitive cost of routers that will be addressed as prices go down due to a steep rise in scale of deployment. Edited excerpts:
What is the outlook for FWAs, globally?
We track 310 operators in over 100 countries, of which 75% have FWA and, of those, one-third are on 5G so far. For half of our 5G live networks and FWAs, we see more FWA launches. Last year, 40% of the new 5G wireless launches was in emerging markets as we saw more spectrum auctions. For the long term we expect the 5G fixed wireless installed base to grow. We have closed 2022 with about 100 million connections, majority of which were 4G. By 2028, these numbers are expected to grow three times to 300 million and 80% of those will be on 5G.
How will demand shape up in India?
In India, we see a very good opportunity for FWA. India is very large and Indians are willing to use technology. We saw strong adoption of 4G, and expect similar strong adoption of 5G. Less than 10% of homes are connected, so there is a large market of unconnected homes and we know digitisation is important in India, and people want fast and reliable broadband. So, FWA will be one key for closing that digital divide and we expect communication service providers to monetize on that opportunity. I expect FWA to take a share of the broadband connections, of say, 300 million homes across India. There will be a migration to get reliable broadband from either Wi Fi or 5G FWA. Also, we feel that in the coming years, more and more homes will be able to afford broadband. These factors will define the market in the long term.
The high cost of routers is a key prohibitive factor for launching FWA in India and use cases may not be viable as of now. Can this be addressed?
We expect the cost of FWAs to fall. First, because the 5G ecosystem is growing and it is so far the fastest mobile generation. By the end of the year, we will reach 1 billion 5G connection globally, which will be two years faster than 4G. As devices became affordable as a result of global scale for 4G, I expect similar type of development on 5G at a faster clip. On cost you may have different flavours of fixed wireless with diverse demands on high- and low-end FWAs.