Qualcomm made many wireless-related announcements today from its San Diego, CA headquarters, in place of making a presentation at #MWC20 in Barcelona.  Top announcements included its FSM100xx 5G small cell chips customer announcements, RF-chip availability, Wi-Fi 6E demonstrations, and 5G smartphone customer announcements.
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FSM100xx 5G RAN endorsements.  Qualcomm announced its FSM 5G RAN platform in May 2018, targeting small cells and remote radio heads and enabling bothmmWave and sub-6 GHz spectrum using 10 nm process geometry.  The company listed multiple vendors and operators in its press announcement relating to FMS100xx chips.  Each of the vendors shared some interesting statistics, the most important of which we share here:

• Airspan is using FSM products in developing its small cell products and base stations.  The company’s CEO said, “we are on track to deliver tens of thousands of 5G base stations in [the] field in 2020.”
• Altiostar, an Open vRAN software maker well-known for its win at Japan’s competitive mobile operator, Rakuten, announced a year-ago at #MWC19, said that the performance of its vRAN and Qualcomm’s 5G RAN platform will allow operators to build carrier-grade high performance RAN. 
• Baicells plans to use Qualcomm’s 5G RAN platform chips to serve “vertical industries” using small and easily deployable infrastructure.
• Corning has a working relationship with Qualcomm on 5G mmWave RAN and plans bring “open platforms” to indoor spaces.
• Radisys, Rakuten, Small Cell Forum endorsed Qualcomm, as well, without too many specifics.
• Samsung has expanded its 5G product set, using Qualcomm 5G RAN platform, to “in-building and outdoor hotspots.”
• Sercomm plans to use Qualcomm 5G RAN platforms in its products to serve mobile network operators with 5G small cells.
• T&W has used the FSM90xx and FSM99x to deliver “over 100,000” 4G RAN small cells for leading operators.  Using FSM10xxx, T&W expects to provide Tier 1 operators with its 5G small cells on both sub-6 GHz and mmWave bands.
• Verizon endorsed the use of Qualcomm based small cells, as well as the “incorporation of virtualization and open interfaces.”

​Qualcomm ultraSAW Filter.  Expect availability in 2H20.  Hit parity in performance in 2019 and now claims that its ultraSAW Filter will exceed performance of competitors, especially in high-bands.

​Wi-Fi 6E.  Qualcomm demonstrated 6 GHz operation between its Networking Pro Series (Wi-Fi 6 chips for Wi-Fi infrastructure like access points and routers).  Qualcomm was not specific about the timetable for delivery of 6 GHz systems, but the company hinted that the 6 GHz demonstration “underscores Qualcomm’s readiness to extend its successful Wi-Fi 6 portfolio into the 6 GHz band for a transformative Wi-Fi 6E performance, pending regulatory approval.”  The company expects that mobile devices using its Snapdragon 865 Mobile chips (intended for user devices like smartphones) can operate more than 3 Gbps when using the new 6 GHz spectrum, or 1.8 Gbps when using existing 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz available today.  Qualcomm said its Networking Pro Series (Wi-Fi 6 chips) have been “deployed in more than 200 designs shipping or in development.”

Qualcomm Snapdragon 865 Mobile Platform.  The company announced that its chip system for mobile phones that features its second-generation 5G Modem-RF system, the Snapdragon X55, has been “announced or are in development” in over 70 designs, including those from top vendors such as OPPO, Samsung, Xiaomi and ZTE.

​Additionally, the company made VR devices and Personal Computer (PC) announcements including partners such as Facebook (VR) and Microsoft (PC).

​We attended the CBRS Alliance event in Washington DC today, and by our rough estimate, about 350-400 people were in attendance representing groups such as regulators, legislators, lawyers, technology vendors, property owners, service providers, investors, media and analysts.  We were impressed with the widespread interest in the new shared spectrum technology and services running in the 3.5 GHz band that is now called “OnGo.”  We have researched CBRS for many years and found several acronyms and CBRS-specific terminology to be blossoming.  We found several themes at the CBRS Alliance event and a follow-on event at Federated Wireless, a SAS service provider, of special note: a) the OnGo experience will serve as a mold for regulators, operators and other interested parties not just in the US, but also the rest of the world, b) Tier 1 operators and WISPs appear focused on Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) deployments in CBRS spectrum, at least initially, c) many presenters focused on the “OnGo backhaul to gateways” use-case, at least as an initial opportunity, d) interested parties have a concern that PAL licenses may become very expensive when the auctions occur, and e) there were a very large number of devices supporting OnGo at this event.

Acronym soup.  The CBRS Alliance did its best to explain the various acronyms and how the various players work together.  It would take at least six pages to cover just the top-level details.  The idea here is that the 150 MHz of spectrum in the 3.5 GHz range was previously used exclusively by the US Department of Defense and is now going to be shared using a three-tier process, where the military (the incumbent) will have use of it when it needs, then private license holders will get next dibs (PAL), followed by general users (GAA).  Starting today, GAA users will begin use of the spectrum in the Initial Commercial Deployment (ICD) that was announced today, starting at 9 AM Eastern.  A group of service providers called Spectrum Access System (SAS) providers have been authorized to install radios on the US coastline that sense when the military is using the spectrum and send channel-use information to equipment that is operating in the CBRS spectrum.  These SAS providers will, therefore, coordinate the frequencies between incumbent, PAL, and GAA users.
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Our view on why OnGo and “Shared spectrum” matters.  We expect that by sharing spectrum amongst various parties, more traffic can move across a smaller range of frequency than by using the more common method of auctioning off frequency bands to be used exclusively by one entity.  We estimate that shared frequency will carry ten-times more traffic than frequency bands licensed for the exclusive use of single entities.  Thus, it is for the greater good that this OnGo / CBRS experience go the distance and allow a public demonstration of whether multi-tiered shared spectrum can succeed or not.  Already, we have the experience of shared spectrum in the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands used by WiFi – there is no doubt this has been successful; in fact, most public estimates show about 80% of smartphone traffic is carried by WiFi rather than cellular systems, all of which as of yesterday was carried on licensed spectrum.  At the CBRS Alliance event, guest speaker, US FCC Commissioner Michael P. O’Reilly said that based on the success of OnGo, he expects similar models could be applied to additional spectrum (and he implied this might the sequential order of launch): C-band (3.7-4.2 GHz), 3.45-3.55 GHz, 3.1-3.45 GHz and 7 GHz (which we understand is meant to be the same thing as what is being discussed at 6 GHz by the WiFi community).

FWA opportunity is front and center.  Charter and AT&T focused their comments on their plans to deploy fixed broadband systems.  AT&T shared some impressive statistics about the performance of recent trials using Massive MIMO cell sites using distributed RAN over CBRS spectrum, which is connected to indoor baseband over fiber optics to the radio sites and then connects wirelessly to customer premises equipment mounted at the roofline: it said it achieved 140x12 Mbps at slightly over one mile over line of sight using 20 Mhz channels. Charter discussed it had deployed its first commercial FWA in Davidson City, NC to rural locations.  It also discussed how it uses dual SIM systems to allow customer coverage to Verizon’s cellular network. Charter also discussed private LTE, neutral host, and Industrial IoT use cases.  The Wireless Internet Service Provider’s Association (WISPA) President spoke about its members’ enthusiasm for OnGo and explained that 100’s of WISPs used the 3.65 GHz spectrum and expects more will use the 3.5 GHz / CBRS spectrum.  Currently, WISPA says WISPS in the US have 6 million customers.

OnGo as a backhaul.  We detected a theme that seems durable: CBRS spectrum can be used by enterprises with far-flung operations to save costs by reducing the installation of wired / optical cables and associated infrastructure.  There was an impressive list of vendors who had equipment at the show, a number of which were gateway devices that made connections between CBRS and other well-known protocols such as Ethernet and WiFi, to name a couple.  While OnGo/CBRS support is not as widespread on devices today, IoT devices supporting other wired and wireless systems certainly are, the list of which includes WiFi, Zigbee, Bluetooth, Ethernet and more.  We were taken by how compelling some presenters made a case for using CBRS simply assuming a reduction in new cabling to enable new systems such as kiosks, surveillance, digital signage, farming, and so on.  Many of these examples would increase the deployment of existing protocols like WiFi, Zigbee, Bluetooth, and Ethernet, instead of reducing their demand.  The idea that OnGo/CBRS competes with existing systems may be incorrect.

PAL auctions.  Commissioner O’Reilly said PAL auctions are scheduled for June 25, 2020.  In our formal and informal interviews, we understand there is a growing concern that CBRS spectrum auctions could be aggressively pursued not only by existing Tier 1 mobile operators but also by other players, not least of which could include MSOs and maybe even “Big Tech” companies.  Since the 3.5 GHz spectrum is where many countries besides the US have begun deploying 5G services, making equipment in these frequency bands commonplace, there is ample reason to want to use this spectrum in the US.  Bidders may raise the price high enough that enterprises will choose not to compete, and won’t view the CBRS spectrum as attractive as they had hoped.  In this case, PAL would look quite a bit more like a typical licensed spectrum, similar to other auctions.

OnGo devices abound.  At the show, the following vendors had devices on show (see pictures):  Sercomm, MultiTech, Sierra WIreless, Zyxel, Encore, Cradlepoint, AMIT Wireless, Commscope / Ruckus, Accelleran, Bai Cells, Cambium, Samsung, Google, LG Electronics, Sequans, Telit, JMA Wireless, Motorola Solutions, Cisco, BEC Technologies, Ericsson, ip access, BLINQ, Comba Telecom, and Westell.

​We attended media briefings at the Keysight World conference held near San Francisco, California, yesterday.  Keysight World San Francisco showed a more integrated Ixia as well as a further push towards 5G, automotive and energy, and data center and telecom.  Much of the companies conversations during the event related to synergies between these technologies.  Such as how to push the automotive industry forward using 5G and the need for edge computing in 5G.  As Keysight is involved at the beginning of the launches of many new cellular technologies, it has good insights into the timeline and progress of the 5G market.

One of our key takeaways from the show is the increased pervasiveness of Ethernet in the telecom and automotive industry as well as the significant increase in constant data creation.  All this data will need robust, and more intelligent networks to transport it.  We were also impressed that Keysight World will actually take place in 10 cities around the world, with San Francisco being the first.

Another interesting observation was just how global Keysight was in looking at products, for example in one session that we attended, much of the automotive effort in the company was located in Germany.

Juniper Networks announced plans to acquire Mist Systems for approximately $405M in cash.  We think this deal makes sense for Juniper, who can now sell a key technology - WLAN - into its customer base of large and medium enterprises.  Valuation of the deal probably fell a bit short of the expectations of some, but the vendor landscape has already seen significant consolidation between Ethernet Switch and Enterprise-class WLAN vendors, with now just a few potential buyers and sellers.

The companies just had a call to discuss the announcement and share the following messages:

• Slightly dilutive to non gaap F19, accretive F20. 
• Verticals discussed on the call: h/c, retail, mfg and distribution segments
• Key wins discussed:  Large healthcare organization, Verizon Mgd SP, Walt Disney Orlando, Dartmouth College
• Business model will remain as current (60% hardware; 40% services at time of acquisition)
• No revenue numbers share
• $405M in cash; closes F2Q for JNPR
• Avoided saying who Mist competes with, other than to say Mist sees “the usual suspects”
• Mist should continue to grow because its channels will expand when Juniper acquires it
• Juniper will expand the “AI for IT” technology from Mist across the Juniper portfolio of campus switch, security and SD-WAN
• Will imminently begin 802.11ax pilots
• Last time new technology was developed for WLAN industry was over a decade ago; Mist is microservices / container based; all new
• Juniper has seen its campus switch business grow in recent times
• Will share more numbers in the future

We attended Mobile World Congress Americas (MWCa) in Los Angeles, CA this week, as well as the AT&T Spark event in San Francisco.  Since 5G is launching first the US, these two events became the public events where significant 5G-related announcements happened.

• Verizon.  Will launch 5G Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) on October 1 in four markets: Houston, Indianapolis, Los Angeles and Sacramento.
• AT&T.  The company reiterated its own 5G plans (mobile 5G by year-end 2018 in cities such as Atlanta, Charlotte, Dallas, Indianapolis, Oklahoma City, Raleigh, Waco, Houston, Jacksonville, Lousville, New Orleans and San Antonia), plus it made some announcements like that it is beginning 5G-ready CBRS equipment testing (using Samsung CBRS equipment and CommScope as SAS provider).  Also, at the Spark event on Monday, the company announced three strategic telecom equipment suppliers, Ericsson, Nokia and Samsung. 
• T-Mobile.  Announced that it had completed a Cisco vEPC system (upgradeable to 5G Core) carrying traffic for 70M users that was from Cisco.  It also announced that it signed a $3.5B 5G agreement with Ericsson.  This is in addition to the July 30 announcement made earlier with Nokia for $3.5B, as well.  Generally, the company has set expectations as recently as September 10 that it will provide nationwide 5G by the year 2020.
• Sprint.  Announced that it had demonstrated a 5G NR connection of Massive MIMO with Nokia equipment.

Additionally, discussions about spectrum in the US market were very active discussions.  Some points we picked up on:

• No new mid-band auctions will occur in the US market for another 2-3 years, so this means that new capacity is going to come from LAA (just announced on the iPhone Xs this week, as well) and from CBRS (discussed above).
• The "who has the fastest 5G throughput" battle will be won at the millimeter wave.  In other words, using millimeter was, speeds as high as 10 Gbps are possible, but with mid-band (1-6 Ghz), where LTE is currently deployed, cannot go much over 2 Gbps.  So, to beat the Ookla Speed Test, the mobile operators who deploy mmWave early will get a leg up.  However, in order to deploy mmWave, these have to be small-cells that are within 100 meters of users.  Since it is so difficult to get real-estate rights and backhaul for small cells, this is going to be a big challenge.  Nevertheless, this is how the battle will be won.
• T-Mobile's 600 Mhz rollout is now in 1,250 cities.  The company will eventually enable 600 Mhz 5G.  600 Mhz should dramatically improve T-Mobile coverage because it is low-band spectrum.