Enhanced features of the latest revision of Wi-Fi.
It has never been easier to expand service areas and aggregate capacity from the access points back to the central POP.
Over the past several years, WISPs have benefited significantly from innovation in the Wi-Fi vendor ecosystem, using adaptations and advancements in RF transmission technologies from the cellular world that have substantially improved the limited range of Wi-Fi technology — replacing omnidirectional antennas with higher-efficiency directional cone, horn, and panel types. Vendors such as Ubiquiti, Mimosa, Cambium, and RF Elements have advanced the state of the art in antenna design for long-range, commercial-grade Wi-Fi.
With recent developments from these and several other vendors, it has never been easier to expand service areas and aggregate capacity from the Access Points (APs) back to the central POP — a link that is no longer limited to conventional (and often costly) fiber solutions such as 10 Gbit Ethernet delivered over a PON network via GPON or EPON. Most of these high-capacity wireless backhaul solutions utilize point-to-point connections, typically implemented with proprietary radios operating between 11 GHz and 36 GHz and offering between 1 Gbit and 20 Gbps of capacity.
Far more than a bump in the aggregate and per-user capacity, the latest revision of the Wi-Fi standard is the critical enabling technology allowing WISPs to build faster networks with far fewer radios.
In addition to greatly improved RF components, the vendor ecosystem has responded to the WISPs by offering standalone software tools — sometimes bundling this software with their products — aiding the SP in the planning and installation of their equipment, as well as developing deployment scenarios that allow a WISP to grow their footprint with cost efficiency in mind. Combined with the latest specifications, the WISPs have never been in a better position to grow their networks aggressively while maintaining or increasing the bit rates offered to users.
Far more than a bump in aggregate and per-user capacity, the latest revision of the Wi-Fi standard is the critical enabling technology allowing WISPs to build faster networks with far fewer radios — providing a price/performance jump unlike any previous iteration of the 802.11 specs. The new standard also makes better use of investments WISPs have already made in deploying improved antennae, vertical assets, and the rest.
The new version of Wi-Fi has been marketed under two interchangeable monikers: "Max Wi-Fi" to indicate its increased performance, and "Wi-Fi 6" to indicate the iteration of the standard. A short list of its improvements:
| New or improved functionality |
|---|
| Increased effective range from the access point — extending range up to four hundred percent. |
| Improved battery life of portable electronics using a technique called TWT (Target Wake Time). |
| Wider channel bandwidths of 160 MHz. |
| MU-MIMO (Multi-User, Multiple Input, Multiple Output) — a capability many APs already incorporate, now standardized. |
| A new OFDMA modulation technique using LDPC for enhanced performance in the presence of noise. |
| Inclusion of a faster standard modulation rate of 1024 QAM, increasing from 8 to 10 bits per symbol. |
| Spatial reuse and transmission scheduling to better manage the available Wi-Fi spectrum and share it equally among a larger number of clients. |
| Up to 1.2 Gbit per client with 9.6 Gbit max theoretical aggregate capacity per AP — a substantial increase over previous versions. |
The convergence point between cable and Wi-Fi.
The cellular providers are already busy deploying equipment that supports the latest "5G" standard developed by 3GPP — Release 15. Release 15 was a remarkable achievement: for the first time in the history of cellular, it established a singular technology in the form of LTE, replacing the menagerie of options that existed previously. During the same time period, the cable industry and the Wi-Fi industry (via the IEEE) were moving ahead with their own higher-capacity, increased-efficiency, reduced-latency initiatives.
Given the reach and breadth of the cable footprint within North America, there are clear synergies between the WISPs and cable operators.
For the cable industry, enhanced services fall under the "10G" initiative. While somewhat derivative in its title, it's an apt marketing term for the latest iteration of the DOCSIS 3.1 specifications — a standard that includes the new Full Duplex (FDX) and Low Latency DOCSIS (LLD) enhancements to the protocol, plus a host of other minor changes to the DOCSIS Security (SEC) specifications. DOCSIS FDX is a technology designed to deliver roughly 10 Gbit on both the downstream and upstream direction of the cable plant — providing operators with the ability to provide symmetric data services at multi-gigabit data rates. Previous versions of DOCSIS were better suited to asymmetric services, with upstream bit rates considerably lower than downstream due to significant differences in available spectrum.
The cable industry is leaving money on the table with the WISPs — wireless providers dependent on cost-effective, high-capacity Internet solutions to grow their business.
While the vast majority of residential customers simply won't need or be able to cost-justify a multi-gigabit symmetric link into their homes for the foreseeable future, what the "10G" DOCSIS FDX system provides is a broadly available, lower-cost, latency-sensitive business service — providing a competitive advantage in cost-effective backhaul to both cellular providers and WISPs. The lower cost of delivery over DOCSIS relative to dedicated fiber links providing similar 1 to 10 Gbit capacity could prove essential to the WISPs' expansion plans in scaling up their service footprints in rural and suburban markets.
Given the reach and breadth of the cable footprint within North America, there are clear synergies between the WISPs and cable operators that are as great — perhaps even greater — than the opportunities presented to the cable industry by the cellular providers. These extend to peering agreements and other arrangements of mutual benefit to both industries.
While there is significant work to be done in establishing relationships between the cable industry and the Wi-Fi industry, the opportunity for forging new alliances is ripening as new "Max Wi-Fi" or "Wi-Fi 6" equipment becomes available. Client chipsets and associated fixed-wireless CE devices are being introduced this year and next, while many commercial-grade APs are already available.
The cable industry is leaving money on the table with the WISPs — wireless providers dependent on cost-effective, high-capacity Internet solutions to grow their business. In exchange, the WISPs not only become lucrative Internet capacity customers and peering partners, they directly bear the risks of offering services to rural, underserved markets — the kinds of risks operators have been unable or unwilling to take themselves.