Wither Terrestrial Broadband?

Broadband internet access for residential homes has been growing over the past 3 decades. For wireline access, the main options are copper wires (DSL/ADSL) and coaxial cable (DOCSIS). Despite efforts to improve DSL data rates and reliability, cable won the battle against DSL and telcos tried to move toward fiber. More recently, telcos started to deploy fixed 5G wireless access services to complement the limited reach of fiber. However, a new access option has emerged in the form of low-orbit satellite broadband. While this is the most expensive option ($120+), 4 million subscribers have signed up for the Starlink service in the past 3 years. Driven by advanced solar technologies and reusable rocket technologies, the service has become the gamechanger for pervasive broadband. Finally, there is an effective solution to bridge the digital divide and unleash the mobile traveler.

A powerful advantage of the Starlink service is its portability, which is not possible with fixed wireless access or any wire medium. The service offers 25 to 200+ Mbit/s data rates supplemented by Wi-Fi for connectivity to multiple user devices, but experiences less downtime than cable. Because the speed of light in an optical fiber or cable is only about two-thirds of its speed in a vacuum, intersatellite communications in Starlink is faster than any terrestrial ground system. Additionally, the Starlink system is easier to launch, maintain, and upgrade than any terrestrial system, with newer satellites to be located even closer to the earth to guarantee network latencies below 1/50th of a second to support the most time-sensitive applications like video gaming and self-driving cars.

The emergence of Starlink illustrates two important facts. First, high data rates above 1 Gbit/s are not necessary, even when supporting mixed reality applications or 4K/8K video resolutions because advanced media compression methods are available. For example, 4K videos can be compressed to under 2 Mbit/s with good quality using advanced codecs such as VVC and AV1. Second, subscription cost is not a factor. There has been reports that fiber access service is only available in wealthy neighborhoods where people can afford the service. The Starlink subscription fee is more than 2 times higher than fiber subscription but the number of Starlink subscribers has surpassed the number of fiber subscribers and this gap is expected to grow exponentially in future.

What will happen to 5G mobile cellular technologies? 5G rollout has been slow, in spite of all the hype. The initial deployment was impeded by Covid. As a result, 4G-LTE formed the basis of 5G deployment. For example, many operators still use a non-standalone (NSA) 5G network, with 5G radios based on a 4G-LTE core. Now, 5G is facing stiff competition from low-orbit satellite systems such as Starlink, which has recently introduced direct connectivity to the smartphone. Additionally, the FCC adopted rules to preserve spectrum between 12.2 to 12.7 GHz for satellite services in 2023, rejecting requests from mobile network operators to use the band for 5G. 5G technologies such as massive MIMO and network slicing can be complicated to implement, and the standard can be hard to read and understand. In addition to the limitations imposed by base station coverage, installation, signaling, handovers, and terrestrial RF obstructions and reflections, other "innovations" such as bringing network edge closer to user to reduce latency can be totally eliminated using low-orbit satellite broadband. Just like Wi-Fi in 1999, 5G is at the crossroads.