Carrier-grade Wi-Fi AP installations to reach 15 million units by 2018

Berg Insight has reported telecom operators had deployed more than 7 million carrier-grade Wi-Fi access points worldwide at the end of 2012. Other findings and analysis by Berg includes: Growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 13.5 percent, the installed base is forecasted to reach 15 million units by 2018. Making use of Wi-Fi in unlicensed spectrum is an increasingly attractive solution for mobile operators. Virtually all new smartphones now have Wi-Fi connectivity as standard and a majority of smartphone owners already use Wi-Fi at home and at work. The installed base of Wi-Fi enabled handsets is forecasted to grow from nearly 1.5 billion units at the end of 2012 to more than 4 billion units in 2018. Mobile network equipment vendors and mobile operators are now quickly reversing their scepticism towards Wi-Fi as the rise in mobile data traffic necessitates investments in network capacity solutions. A number of strategies regarding Wi-Fi network deployments are possible. Many mobile operators that own wireline network assets have already offered free Wi-Fi services to PC users for several years and now start to include Wi-Fi access for smartphone subscribers as well. Operators that currently lack their own Wi-Fi infrastructure can acquire capacity from existing Wi-Fi network operators and aggregators. “The challenge for mobile operato...