MWC Speakers Say Data, AI Are Big Challenge, Opportunity for Carriers

MWC is a mobile-phone show, but “I’m in the right place,” said Lockheed Martin CEO James Taiclet. Lockheed is an airspace and defense company, “but our business is the business of deterrence and exploration -- deterrence from conflict and exploration of science,” he said. “We have a huge opportunity … to really accelerate the adoption of digital, 21st century technologies into the things we do,” he said.

Taiclet cited a project Lockheed is developing with the Army, which uses a “5G-class” satellite network to communicate with autonomous drones operated under firefighter control. “The commander says this is the way to most safely and effectively fight the fire right now,” he said.

Nokia offers the gear and technology to build networks that “sense, think and act,” said CEO Pekka Lundmark: “We believe these networks can bring exponential potential to industries and services of all types. As such, every business, every organization and every community deserves to benefit from them.” 5G networks go beyond connecting people and their devices, he said: “They are adaptable. They are autonomous, and they can bring digitalization to every industry.”

Verizon showcased how big 5G can be at the Super Bowl last month in Arizona, said Debika Bhattacharya, Verizon Business chief product officer. “We were able to just demonstrate tremendous scale” after investing more than $100 million in the Phoenix market, she said. There were 70,000 fans and more than 100,000 devices, and they used 50 TB of data, she said.

All Verizon Business customers are digitizing, “but that’s not enough,” Bhattacharya said. The company is “embedding” intelligence into the network, she said. Historically, carriers collected lots of data, but it was “locked in silos,” she said: Verizon’s “unlocking the data, so we can now help our customers with insights and analytics and be able to really have the network work for them.”

“We see the network as really the foundational level for everything we’re doing with our clients today -- everything from cloud to data and AI, to security,” said Gretchen Tinnerman, senior vice president-U.S. network and edge at Kyndryl, the spinoff of IBM's infrastructure services business.

The next decade will be “one of really profound opportunity for us as mobile operators,” said Vicki Brady, CEO of Australia’s Telstra. “It is going to take a different approach” and carriers need to learn how to better collaborate with other companies, she said. Carriers in the past have been more focused on protecting their turf than “thinking about the larger opportunity,” she said.

Telstra has been a leader in 5G, which can be deployed with artificial intelligence and automation, edge computing and “an explosion of applications creating this very special, unique opportunity,” Brady said. “Our role is all about how we become an ecosystem builder, building on top of that connectivity we provide, to bring together those new technologies, to bring insights into the data that is traveling over our networks,” she said: “This requires a very big mindset shift.”

Data and AI

Data and AI can be used to make farming more effective and environmentally friendly, said NEC CEO Takayuki Morita. Morita discussed a project that uses AI to analyze data from moisture sensors in the ground and satellite images to recommend the best use of water and fertilizers. “Using this solution, farmers are seeing a 20% increase in harvest” using 15% less water and 20% less fertilizer, he said.

Climate change is causing more natural disasters, Morita said. “Using satellites and AI can help provide an early warning for disasters, so we can save lives and minimize damage,” he said. Similar technology can also be used to survey infrastructure, he said. An NEC solution “reduces maintenance and repair costs by 50% over the long term and future CO2 emissions can be reduced accordingly,” he said.

Andrew Feinberg, CEO of NEC subsidiary NetCracker, cited the promise of data analytics to fight cancer. Today, patients diagnosed with the same cancer are usually all treated with the same regime, he said. The problem is “that at a molecular level every one of us is completely unique and a therapy that can work really well for one patient can be ineffective, toxic or even lethal for another,” he said.

Feinberg told the story of one cancer patient, Curtis, who was sent to BostonGene for genomic testing when doctors didn’t know what else to do. BostonGene “ran a 22,000-gene comprehensive genomic panel on his tissue biopsy and discovered multiple rare mutations,” Feinberg said. AI processed massive amounts of data, looking at other treatments, clinical trials, “publications, outcomes and therapies” and BostonGene was able to recommend a tailored treatment regime, he said. Two years later “Curtis is still cancer free,” he said.

Notebooks

5G deployment is spreading globally, with big countries like India and Brazil adding networks, GSMA said in a Tuesday report. “India will be especially significant, with the expansion of services from Airtel and Jio in 2023 expected to be pivotal to the region’s ongoing adoption,” GSMA said. Networks are being added in regions across Africa, including in Ethiopia and Ghana, and in Asia. 5G connections are expected to double over the next two years, “expedited by technological innovations and new 5G network deployments in more than 30 countries in 2023 alone,” GSMA said. The group predicted 15 5G stand-alone networks will be deployed this year. “Until now, 5G adoption has been driven by relatively mature markets and consumer use cases like enhanced mobile broadband, but that’s changing,” said Peter Jarich, head of GSMA Intelligence: “We’re now entering a second wave for 5G that will see the technology engage a diverse set of new markets and audiences.”

Nearly a quarter of the electricity used by the wireless industry worldwide now comes from renewable sources, GSMA said Tuesday, up from 14% in 2020 and 18% in 2021. “Operators are working to improve energy efficiency across their footprint, investing in 5G -- which enables higher bandwidths with lower power usage per bit delivered -- retiring power-hungry legacy networks and investing in electric vehicle fleets,” GSMA said. Major handset and equipment suppliers, including Apple and Samsung, are working “to make supply chains more sustainable by using recycled content, more renewable electricity in manufacture, extending the lifetime of devices and supporting repair and recycling,” the group said.

Huawei’s massive presence at MWC is likely designed to send a message to the U.S., John Strand of Strand Consult blogged Tuesday. “Huawei is a major sponsor of MWC and its presence is omnipresent: they have the largest exhibition stand, placards, audio-visual communications, and so on,” Strand blogged. “This is likely designed as big middle finger to [President] Joe Biden and to demonstrate (however real or perceived) that US policy has zero impact on Huawei’s global business,” he said.