Month: October 2015

LTE for bandwidth and GSM for voice are a match made in heaven for subscribers.

But as subscribers and operators race for bandwidth, many remote and rural areas remain underserved, and a range of applications (like IoT, evidently) continue to depend on coverage rather than bandwidth. And the technology to best provide it is GSM.

Our approach to making ends meet is a mixed base station (SatSite) which can provide GSM (using YateBTS software) and LTE (using YateENB) at the same time, in the same spectrum, and using the same radio hardware.

The software-defined 2.5G/4G LTE base station will be showcased during ITU Telecom World 2015, where SS7ware Inc. will exhibit for 4 days.

Using software-defined radio and off-the-shelf hardware, SatSite provides access for both GSM/GPRS and LTE from the same equipment. A live demonstration will be held at our stand P13 on October 14, at 11:00.

The technology behind SatSite was achieved by designing a software-defined base station that supports mixed 2G/4G spectrum allocation, and which is based on Yate telephony engine.

Software-defined BTS

In Satsite, we replaced commonly used FPGA and DSP boards with a generic Intel chipset. Both the GSM and the LTE layers are implemented in software, allowing the base station to be reprogrammed or reconfigured to support new protocols. A base station can run GSM at first, and then be software-upgraded to LTE, running multiple air interface protocols using the same radio, at the same time.

Mixed 2G/4G spectrum allocation

Based on the subscribers’ activity (data or voice), operators can assign in software the spectrum priority for either LTE or GSM, so LTE gets a higher priority if there is a lower use of voice services. This optimizes the resources allocation in the network and supplies better access to users.

YateBTS and YateENB – Yate modules

Yate telephony engine is an underlying part of the software architecture of our mixed 2G/4G RAN. It has a highly expandable architecture that provides unified management and monitoring. Both YateBTS and YateENB are software modules based on Yate.

Using off-the-shelf hardware and a generic operating system (Linux), SatSite facilitates an easy adoption of new standards or technologies, like 5G as it becomes available.

More details can be obtained during ITU Telecom World 2015 in Budapest, October 12 to 15, at stand P13 in the exhibition area.

Enabling more of the world’s population to access and participate in the digital economy – and all the socio-economic benefits it entails – is critical to ITU’s mission. Finding the best approach to do so is an ongoing process of discovery, trial-and-error and collaboration. It calls for understanding and adapting to the changing realities of information and communication technology (ICT) and its ecosystem – an ecosystem which has undergone radical transformation over the past decade.

Major international carriers and long-established national organizations with their homogeneous working culture and traditions are no longer the only players in town. The ICT industry today consists of a complex and diverse amalgamation of ideas, technologies and stakeholders, of new partnerships, new markets, and new cross-sector engagement with fields as diverse as health, education, transportation or agriculture.

Increasingly, it is also an industry driven by local entrepreneurship at the grassroots level, creating local solutions for local challenges, addressing local needs within specific local contexts. Impactful ideas are no longer just born in a few global centres, but spring from a wide variety of places.

At the forefront of both industry disruption and economic growth in both developed and developing markets, entrepreneurs and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) play a vital role in this new ecosystem.

Whether established micro-businesses or fresh start-ups, already operating at optimal capacity to fill a specific niche, or with a high-growth potential to scale, replicate and move from local to national or international, SMEs are a major economic force-  representing more than 95% of enterprises and ensure up to 70% of jobs globally, and providing two-thirds of all formal jobs in developing countries and as much as 80% in low income countries.

The fundamental shift in technologies, user behaviour and business models in the ICT sector, in particular the significant growth of mobile and open source culture, along with repositioning the locus of innovation from the centre to the edge of the network, have fed into and enabled the rise of SMEs developing and delivering ICT products and services. At least in theory, anyone anywhere in the world with effective connectivity and the necessary skills can innovate with potentially global significance.

Supporting local development, digital entrepreneurs, start-ups and SMEs throughout the world is therefore critical not only to address local challenges, but to power growth in the ICT industry, help bring online more of the 60% of the global population that remain unconnected, and share the benefits of the digital economy, enabling social and economic development. Local context is paramount, but local solutions may often be fit for purpose elsewhere in the world – globally scalable and replicable – if they can first be discovered.

Recognising the importance of fostering ICT entrepreneurship and local innovation in driving job creation and the digital economy, many national governments have created and facilitated initiatives such as innovation hubs, accelerators, incubators and tech parks. But a huge gap in skills, funding, tools and knowledge remains – a gap between good ideas and good investors, between local solutions and established players eager to uncover unexplored potential.

ITU is ideally positioned to contribute to closing this gap, promoting digital entrepreneurship in collaboration with other major international stakeholders. As the UN specialized agency for ICTs, it combines the necessary authority, expertise and convening power to bring together ministers, regulators, industry leaders, academia, innovation hubs and accelerators, as well as start-ups and SMEs themselves from emerging and developed markets around the world to share knowledge, break down silos, encourage new partnerships, and make valuable connections.

By bringing in SMEs digital entrepreneurs, and supporting the governments of Member States in promoting initiatives such as hubs, accelerators and incubators, ITU is responding to the realities of the new ICT ecosystem and the expressed needs of its Members. Recognising the importance of this sector in creating innovative, sustainable economic and social impact, ITU is actively working to support it.

ITU’s flagship event, ITU Telecom World, has drawn high-level representatives from private and public sectors from all over the globe for more than 40 years to showcase innovation,  network and exchange knowledge-. ITU Telecom World 2015 will continue to be both a meeting place and a market place, a platform for debating core industry issues, exhibiting innovative solutions and making valuable connections. But the event will also bring SMEs, start-ups and supporting initiatives to the table, to the meeting rooms, panel discussions, networking occasions and exhibition floor, as important stakeholders in the new ICT ecosystem.

Exploring experiences, solutions and approaches from new players around the world will open up new routes to the funding, knowledge, expertise, technical, business and marketing skills which are sorely needed. It also promises exposure to the most promising innovative ICT ideas – sometimes in surprising places – opening up a two-way dialogue with and between emerging markets.

Meeting face to face, discussing key industry issues, discovering hands-on the solutions, projects and applications with the potential to make a huge difference, enriching the industry through networking and knowledge exchange: these have always been the core activities of ITU Telecom World, and indeed of ITU itself. Encouraging the active participation of ICT-related SMEs and their support networks, actively striving to accelerate innovation in the ICT sector and thereby stimulate industry growth and socio-economic development – this is the logical and necessary next step towards achieving global access to, and participation in, the digital economy.

This blog was previously published on the ITU Blog: https://itu4u.wordpress.com/2015/10/07/why-smes-are-at-the-heart-of-itu-telecom-world-2015/

With the UN’s SDG goal to “significantly increase access to information and communications technology and strive to provide universal and affordable access to the Internet in least developed countries by 2020”, the debate reopens on whether access to the internet is a human right. And furthermore, the exact definition of what the access includes, and what is “affordable”?

We know that solving the challenge of internet for all will require innovative approaches; new forms of collaboration; and ultimately, a new business model, if the changes are to be sustained and scaled. We know that an ecosystem approach that looks at challenges and opportunities related to infrastructure, affordability, content, and skills/capacity (to name just a few) will be required. But how can innovation and new business models be encouraged if internet access is a right that every person on this planet has a right to?

At the World Economic Forum, the challenge of “Internet for All” comprises one of the key projects under the Future of the Internet initiative launched earlier this year. Through a multi-stakeholder and collaborative process involving dozens of key organizations in the internet development space, including the ITU, one of the key objectives of the initiative is to ensure the internet develops in a way beneficial for all humankind.

A collaborative approach that engages multiple organizations and actors will be critical. At ITU Telecom World 2015, we look forward to further exploring how this can be done in the Wednesday plenary session on “Internet for All”.

This year marks the 150th anniversary of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). The oldest agency of the United Nations, it has pioneered advances in communications since its incarnation, from telegraphy through to the modern world of satellites, mobile phones and the internet.

150 years ago, we never could have imagined the scale, access and global reach that technological innovation would allow us. And today, the degree to which that technological innovation allows us to impact healthcare across the world.

As a global health and care company, Bupa funds and provides quality healthcare to customers in 190 countries around the world. We have no shareholders, so we can reinvest our profits back into the business to deliver our purpose – longer, healthier, happier lives. Our participation in global platform ‘Be He@lthy Be Mobile’, co-led by ITU and the World Health Organisation, enables us to do exactly that through an innovative mHealth toolkit.

mHealth is one of the biggest emerging trends in healthcare, as despite advancements in medical technologies and a general increase in income levels, healthcare continues to pose challenges of affordability, complexity and access across the world.

By contrast, mobile access is becoming ubiquitous worldwide. By 2020, there will be 25 billion devices online[i] and mobile subscriptions will outnumber landline subscriptions.[ii] The feasibility of mobile devices supporting healthcare is greater than ever before and mHealth is set to transform the way healthcare is delivered, from how it is experienced, to how it is paid for.

As a lead partner to ITU in Be He@lthy, Be Mobile, Bupa provides multidisciplinary expertise, health information and mobile health assets to fight NCDs including diabetes, cancer, cardiovascular and chronic respiratory diseases, with national governments around the world – namely Costa Rica, Senegal, Zambia, Norway, the UK and the Philippines.

Be He@lthy, Be Mobile uses mobile phone technology to deliver disease prevention and management information direct to people, and strengthens health systems by providing training to health workers.

It offers governments best practice capabilities for deploying mHealth interventions for their populations, based on existing clinical evidence around the world. The results and experiences of each country’s programme are then fed back into the initiative’s global toolkit and evidence base to support work in other countries.

Bupa joined the partnership at the end of 2013, the first corporate organisation to give its support to the programme, and is the programme’s lead healthcare partner. Other companies have joined the initiative since then, creating one of the most exciting global platforms to help health systems tackle non-communicable diseases at an international scale.

As individual organisations, we know we can make a meaningful impact alone, but global partnerships and collaborations enable a transformational impact to be made. Multi-sectoral collaborations can unlock capabilities, knowledge, skills, tools, networks and funding which couldn’t be accessed otherwise.

This is the exciting landscape within which ITU Telecom World 2015 is set. We’re proud to attend, and to partner with the ITU on Be He@lthy, Be Mobile as ultimately, we believe that collaboration from every sector can contribute to improving the health of the world.

[i] https://www.broadbandcommission.org/Documents/bb-annualreport2012.pdf

[ii] https://www.ericsson.com/ericsson-mobility-report