5G and what speed means
A fast speed does not necessarily translate to good mobile Internet experience, writes Balqis Lim
THERE has been an expectation in the past that speed, in many ways, tells everything about a mobile network. Having the fastest network is equated to having the best network. But in reality, things aren’t that simple.
Speed is just an abstract measurement, not an indication of how consumers actually experience the Internet or applications on their mobile phones. Opensignal, an independent analytics company specialising in consumer mobile experience, released a report in September to show how different factors go into ensuring a good mobile network experience.
SPEED IS NOT KING
Its Chief Executive Officer Brendan Gill, in presenting the results, starts with video experience and the speeds of five major networks in Malaysia.
“It’s actually quite fascinating because firstly, we see the speed leader being Maxis, beating out Celcom. But when we look at video experience, we see the reverse and we actually see Celcom providing the best video experience in the country.
“Now why is this? Speed is an important factor, but it doesn’t mean everything. When it comes down to a fast start up time for video, having low latency is important. Video is actually not that intensive, it needs a consistent speed as opposed to a really high speed,” he says.
Gill says video makes up a majority of the traffic on networks.
“Watching a video file requires a lot more information than listening to a song, or sending an email, or browsing the Internet. So for that reason, video forms the vast majority of mobile traffic.
“And in the future, as we get higher definition video, there will be an increase in the amount of video data. So when it comes to the massive volume of data on mobile networks and the capacity crunch that we face, video is the key culprit for that.”
VOICE APP EXPERIENCE
For the first time, Opensignal measured the quality of consumer experience for overthe-top (OTT) voice services using apps like WhatsApp, Skype and Facebook Messenger over mobile networks in Malaysia.
“We’ve got a fascinating result for this. We found that there was a new network, which hasn’t previously won any of our speed or video tests, actually winning. And it is one of the smaller mobile networks, Unifi.
“You don’t normally see a massive difference in this metric because voice isn’t super intensive on a network, but we saw a big difference here. Why is that? Unifi is connected to Telekom Malaysia (TM) which operates most of the backbone of the Internet, fixed line and fibre, and cable Internet.
“Speed is irrelevant to be measured here. You need low latency, the network’s got to be responsive and you need low packet loss. Basically, having a good backbone like TM is really important to ensure a good voice app experience,” explains Gill.
Unifi was well ahead of its rivals with a winning score of 78 points, backed by low packet loss and core network capabilities. There was close competition for second place, which was jointly shared by Maxis and Celcom with a score of 75 points.
“I often get asked a lot on which is the best mobile operator. In reality, there is no simple answer to that.
“It depends on what’s important to you as a user. Are you focused on video experience? If so, Celcom provides the best video experience. Are you focused on pure speed? Why is that important? If you’re downloading
large files regularly, Maxis may provide the best experience.
“What if you make a lot of calls on WhatsApp, then Unifi may be the best one for you. So it depends on what kind of user you are. And Malaysia is fascinating because for each of those different use cases, a different operator has come to the top of the pack,” he adds.
MALAYSIA LANDSCAPE
Gill reveals that in terms of price, Malaysia is among the lowest worldwide. Speedwise, Malaysia measures well against its Asean peers, at 12Mbps download speeds on average across mobile networks.
Gill says the amount of competition is also driving things forward. At the same time, they all share the spectrum or the airwaves of mobile activity. He adds that spectrum is a fixed asset. So the more operators there are, the more we have to share. And that does lead to some challenges as well.
“There is a potential for consolidation going forward and when it comes to 5G, Malaysia is stepping up to be a leader, particularly among the Asian countries.
“It’s still early days but overall, this means Malaysia is extremely exciting from a connectivity perspective.”
With Malaysian operators approaching 80 to 90 per cent 4G availability, and the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission opening a consultation on the allocation of new spectrum bands, these events signify that Malaysia’s 4G network experience is rapidly reaching maturity.
PROMISING 5G
Gill says as 5G is rolled out, this can make a very big difference to our network experience. “One thing that’s been talked about a lot regarding 5G is that it brings superfast speeds. But another part of 5G that often
gets missed is managing capacity.
“A pattern that we observed globally is that in the middle of the night, when no one else is using the network, you can get very fast speeds. When it comes to peak hours, which is different depending on each place in the country and cultural and business activity, the speeds are much lower.
“Now, one of the things that 5G brings is additional capacity to the network. 5G will open up new frequencies of spectrum and we can start using things that we previously couldn’t use.
“The biggest impacts it can have is actually relieving some of this congestion and at the busiest time of the day, having a better experience than you would have. And this is something that doesn’t get a lot of attention in the media, but it potentially is going to be one of the most impactful parts of 5G, effectively allowing the continuation of the use cases we have today.”
Moving forward, Gill says they are going to look at how to measure gaming experience by setting up labs and hiring people to play games.
“We’re setting the connection to different factors limiting the speed, latency and others to see what impact it has on the gaming experience and measuring on average what network parameters are required to have a good gaming experience.
“What’s interesting is that 5G, again, is going to have a big impact on that and is actually one of the reasons why we want to look at gaming experience.
“It promises to lower latency on the network significantly. And we, therefore, think that having this measurement will reflect the impact that 5G can have on network experience.
“There’s exciting potential here. We got to know where we are in the journey, which is still quite early, but Malaysia is really stacking up to be a leader.”
When it comes to 5G, Malaysia is stepping up to be a leader, particularly among the Asian countries. Brendan Gill