A

Technical Seminar Report

On

3G V/S WI-FI
In partial fulfillment for the award of the degree
Of

BACHELOR OF TECHNOLOGY
IN
COMPUTER SCIENCE & ENGINEERING

SUBMITTED BY:
B.PRATHYUSHA (HTNO: 17N01A0522)

Under the Guidance of

Mr. KHAJA ZIAUDDIN
Associate Professor

DEPARTMENT OF COMPUTER SCIENCE & ENGINEERING

SREE CHAITANYA COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING

LMD COLONY, KARIMNAGAR-505527
(Approved by AICTE, Affiliated to JNTUH, Hyderabad)
 SREE CHAITANYA COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING
LMD COLONY, KARIMNAGAR-505527
(Approved by AICTE, Affiliated to JNTUH)

Certificate

Certified that this Technical Seminar Report entitled “3G V/S WI-FI” is

the bonafide work of B.PRATHYUSHA (H.T.No. 17N01A0522) of IV-B.Tech

I-Sem, in partial fulfillment of the requirements to award the Degree of

Bachelor of Technology for the Academic Year 2020-2021 in Computer Science &

Engineering branch of Sree Chaitanya College Of Engineering, Karimnagar.

Mr. KHAJA ZIAUDDIN Mr. KHAJA ZIAUDDIN

Associate Professor Associate Professor
DEPARTMENT OF CSE Head of the Department
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my Technical Seminar

Supervisor, Mr. KHAJA ZIAUDDIN, Associate Professor whose knowledge and
guidance has motivated me to achieve goals I never thought possible. The time I have
spent working under his supervision has truly been a pleasure.

I also thank Mr. KHAJA ZIAUDDIN, HOD & Associate Professor of CSE
Department for providing seamless support and knowledge for the entire seminar
work and also for providing right suggestions at every phase of the development of
the project. He has consistently been a source of motivation, encouragement, and
inspiration.

It is a great pleasure to convey my thanks to our principal

Dr. G.VENKATESHWARLU, Principal, Sree Chaitanya College Of Engineering
and the College Management for permitting me to undertake this work and providing
excellent facilities to carry out my work.
 DECLARATION

I hereby declare that the work which is being presented in this report entitled,
“3G V/S WI-FI”, submitted towards the partial fulfillment of the requirements for
the award of the degree of Bachelor of Technology in Computer Science &
Engineering, Sree Chaitanya College Of Engineering, Karimnagar is an authentic
record of my own work carried out under the supervision of Mr. KHAJA
ZIAUDDIN, Associate Professor, Department of CSE, Sree Chaitanya College Of
Engineering, Karimnagar.

To the best of my knowledge and belief, this report bears no resemblance with
any report submitted to Sree Chaitanya College Of Engineering or any other
University for the award of any degree or diploma.

B.PRATHYUSHA
(HTNO: 17N01A0522)
 ABSTRACT

This article compares and contrasts two technologies for delivering broadband
wireless Internet access services: ‘‘3G’’ vs. ‘‘WiFi’’. The former, 3G, refers to the
collection of third-generation mobile technologies that are designed to allow mobile
operators to offer integrated data and voice services over mobilenetworks. The latter,
WiFi, refers to the 802.11b wireless Ethernet standard that was designed to
supportwireless LANs. Although the two technologies reflect fundamentally different
service, industry, andarchitectural design goals, origins, and philosophies, each has
recently attracted a lot of attention ascandidates for the dominant platform for
providing broadband wireless access to the Internet. It remains anopen question as to
the extent to which these two technologies are in competition or, perhaps, may
becomplementary. If they are viewed as in competition, then the triumph of one at the
expense of the otherwould be likely to have profound implications for the evolution of
the wireless Internet and structure of the service-provider industry.
 CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE NO.
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION 1
CHAPTER 2
SOME BACKGROUND ON WIFI AND 3G 3
2.1. 3G 3
2.2. Wifi 4
CHAPTER 3
HOW ARE WIFI AND 3G SAME 5
3.1. Both Are Wireless 5
3.2. Both Are Access Technologies 5
3.3. Both Offer Broadband Data Service 6
CHAPTER 4
HOW ARE THEY DIFFERENT 7
4.1. Current Business Models/Deployment Are Different 7
4.2. Spectrum Policy And Management 8
4.3. Status Of Technology Development Different 9
CHAPTER 5
SOME IMPLICATIONS FOR INDUSTRY STRUCTURE 12
AND PUBLIC POLICY
5.1. Wifi Is Good For Competition 12
5.2. Wifi And 3g Can Complement Each Other For 13
A mobile provider
5.3. Spectrum Policy Is Key 14
5.5. Technical Progress Favours Heterogeneous future 14
CHAPTER 6
CONCLUSIONS 16
REFERENCES 17
 CHAPTER-1
INTRODUCTION

The two most important phenomena impacting telecommunications over the

past decade have been the explosive parallel growth of the Internet and mobile
telephone services. The Internet $ An earlier version of this paper was presented at the
symposium ‘‘Competition in Wireless: Spectrum, Service, and Technology Wars’’
that was held at the University of Florida on February 19–20, 2002 cosponsored by
the Global Communications Consortium at the London Business School and the
University of Florida’s Public Utility Research Center, Center for International
Business Education and Research, and Public Policy Research Center.brought the
benefits of data communications to the masses with email, the Web, and
Commerce;while mobile service has enabled ‘‘follow-me-anywhere/always on’’
telephony. The Internet helped accelerate the trend from voice- to data-centric
networking. Now, these two worlds areconverging. This convergence offers the
benefits of new interactive multimedia services coupled to the flexibility and mobility
of wireless. To realize the full potential of this convergence, however, we need
broadband access connections. What precisely constitutes ‘‘broadband’’ is, of course,
amoving target, but at a minimum, it should support data rates in the hundreds of
kilobitsper second (kbps) as opposed to the 50 kbps enjoyed by 80% of the Internet
users in the US whostill rely on dial-up modems over wire line circuits, or the even
more anemic 10–20 kbps typically supported by the first generation of mobile data.
While the need for broadband wireless Internet access is widely accepted, there
remains great uncertainty and disagreement as to how the wireless Internet future will
evolve.2The goal of this article is to compare and contrast two technologies that are
likely to playimportant roles: third-generation mobile (3G) and wireless local area
networks (WLAN).
Specifically, we will focus on 3G as embodied by the IMT-2000 family of
standards3 versus the WLAN technology embodied by the WiFi or 802.1 lb standard,
which is the most popular and widely deployed of the WLAN technologies. We use
these technologies as reference points to span what we believe are two fundamentally
different philosophies for how wireless Internet access might evolve. The former
represents a natural evolution and extension of the business models of existing mobile

1
providers. These providers have already invested billions of dollars purchasing
thespectrum licenses to support advanced data services and equipment makers have
been gearing up to produce the base stations and handsets for wide-scale deployments
of 3G services. In contrast,the WiFi approach would leverage the large installed base
of WLAN infrastructure already in place.

In focusing on 3G and WiFi, we are ignoring many other technologies that are
likely to be important in the wireless Internet such as satellite services, LMDS,
MMDS, or other fixed wireless alternatives. We also ignore technologies such as
BlueTooth or Home RF, which have at times been touted as potential rivals to WiFi,
at least in home networking environments.5 Moreover, wewill not discuss the
relationship between various transitional, or ‘‘2.5G’’ mobile technologies such as
GPRS or EDGE, nor will we discuss the myriad possibilities for ‘‘4G’’ mobile
technologies.

Fig:1.1 3G V/S WI-FI

2
 CHAPTER-2
SOME BACKGROUND ON WIFI AND 3G

In this section, we provide a brief overview of the two technologies to help

orient the reader. Wewill discuss each of the technologies in turn.
2.1. 3G
3G is a technology for mobile service providers. Mobile services are provided
by service providers that own and operate their own wireless networks and sell mobile
services to end-users usually on a monthly subscription basis. Mobile service
providers10 use licensed spectrum to provide wireless telephone coverage over some
relatively large contiguous geographic serving area. Historically, this might have
included a metropolitan area. Today it may include the entire country. From a user
perspective, the key feature of mobile service is that it offers (near) ubiquitous and
continuous coverage. That is, a consumer can carry on a telephone conversation while
driving along a highway at 100 km/h. advanced telephone services are more readily
supported over the digital 2G systems. The 2G systems also support larger numbers of
subscribers and so helped alleviate the capacity problems faced by older AMPS
systems. Nevertheless, the data rates supportable over 2G systems are still quite
limited, offering only between 10 and 20 kbps. To expand the range and capability of
data services that can be supported by digital mobile systems, service providers will
have to upgrade their networks to one of the 3G technologies. These can support data
rates from 384 kbps up to 2 Mbps, although most commercial deployments are
expected to offer data rates closer to 100 kbps in practice.14 While this is
substantially below the rates supported by the current generation of wireline
broadband access services such as DSL or cable modems, it is expected that future
upgrades to the 3G or the transition to 4G mobile services will offer much higher
bandwidths
Although wireline systems are likely to always exceed the capacity of wireless
ones, it remains unclear precisely how much bandwidth will be demanded by the
typical consumer and whether 3G services will offer enough to meet the needs of
most consumers.Auctions for 3G spectrum licenses occurred in a number of countries
in 2000 and the first commercial offerings of 3G services began in Japan in October

3
2001. More recently, VerizonWireless has starting offering ‘‘3G’’ service in portions
of its serving territory (although this is nottrue-3G service).1
2.2. WIFI:
WiFi is the popular name for the wireless Ethernet 802.11b standard for
WLANs. Wireline local area networks (LANs) emerged in the early 1980s as a way to
allow collections of PCs, terminals, and other distributed computing devices to share
resources and peripherals such as printers, access servers, or shared storage devices.
One of the most popular LAN technologies was Ethernet. Over the years, the IEEE
has approved a succession of Ethernet standards to support higher capacity LANs
over a diverse array of media. The 802.11x family of Ethernet standards are for
wireless LANs.16 WiFi LANs operate using unlicensed spectrum in the 2.4GHz
band.17 The current generation of WLANs support up to 11 Mbps data rates within
100m of the base station.18 Most typically,
Moreover, wireless facilities can provide scalable infrastructure when
penetration will increaseonly slowly over time (e.g., when a new service is offered or
in an overbuild scenario). New basestations are added as more users in the local area
join the wireless network and cells are resized.Wireless infrastructure may be
deployed more rapidly than wireline alternatives to respond to new market
opportunities or changing demand. These aspects of wireless may make it attractive as
an overbuild competitor to wireline local access, which has large sunk/fixed costs that
vary more with the homes passed than the actual level of subscribership. The high
upfront cost of installing newwireline last-kilometer facilities is one of the reasons
why these may be a natural monopoly, atleast in many locations.Wireless
technologies also facilitate mobility. This includes both (1) the ability to move
devicesaround without having to move cables and furniture and (2) the ability to stay
continuously connected over wider serving areas. We refer to the first as local
mobility and this is one of the keyadvantages of WLANs over traditional wireline
LANs. The second type of mobility is one of the key advantages of mobile systems
such as 3G. WLANs trade the range of coverage for higher bandwidth, making them
more suitable for ‘‘local hot spot’’ service.

4
 CHAPTER-3
HOW ARE WIFI AND 3G SAME

From the preceding discussion, it might appear that 3G and WiFi address
completely different user needs in quite distinct, non-overlapping markets. While this
was certainly more true about earlier generations of mobile services when compared
with wired LANs or earlier versions of WLANs, it is increasingly not the case. The
end-user does not care what technology is used to support his service. What matters is
that both of these technologies are providing platforms for wireless access to the
Internet and other communication services. In this section we focus on the ways in
which the two technologies may be thought of as similar,while in the next section we
will focus on the many differences between the two.

3.1. BOTH ARE WIRELESS

Both technologies are wireless, which (1) avoids the need to install cable
drops to each device when compared to wireline alternatives and (2) facilitates
mobility. Avoiding the need to install or reconfigure wired local distribution plant can
represent a significant cost saving, whether it is within a building, home, or in the last
-kilometer distribution plant of a wireline service provider.

3.2. BOTH ARE ACCESS TECHNOLOGIES

Both 3G and WiFi are access or edge-network technologies. This means they
offer alternatives to the last-kilometer wireline network. Beyond the last kilometer,
both rely on similar networkconnections and transmission support infrastructure. For
3G, the wireless link is from the enduser device to the cell base station which may be
at a distance of up to a few kilometers, and then dedicated wireline facilities to
interconnect base stations to the carrier’s backbone network and ultimately to the
Internet cloud. The local backhaul infrastructure of the cell provider may be offered
over facilities owned by the wireless provider (e.g., microwave links) or leased from
the local wireline telephone service provider (i.e., usually the incumbent local
exchange carrier or ILEC). Although 3G is conceived of as an end-to-end service, it is
possible to view it as an access service.

5
 For WiFi, the wireless link is a hundred meters from the end-user device to the
base station.21The base station is then connected either into the wireline LAN or
enterprise networkinfrastructure or to a wireline access line to a carrier’s backbone
network and then eventually tothe Internet.
For example, WiFi is increasingly finding application as a home LAN
technology toenable sharing of DSL or cable modem residential broadband access
services among multiple PCs in a home or to enable within-home mobility (see,
Brown, 2002; Drucker & Angwin, 2002). WiFi is generally viewed as an access
technology, not as an end-to-end service. Because both technologies are access
technologies, we must always consider the role of backbone wireline providers that
provide connectivity to the rest of the Internet and supporttransport within the core of
the network. These wireline providers may also offer competing wireline access
solutions..

3.3. BOTH OFFER BROADBAND DATA SERVICE

Both 3G and WiFi support broadband data service, although as noted earlier,
the data rate offered by WiFi (11 Mbps) is substantially higher than the couple of 100
kbps expected from 3G services. Although future generations of wireless mobile
technology will support higher speeds, this will also be the case for WLANs, and
neither will be likely to compete with wireline speeds (except over quite short
distances).22 The key is that both will offer sufficient bandwidth to support a
comparable array of services, including real-time voice, data, and streaming media,
that are not currently easily supported over narrowband wireline services. (Of course,
the quality of these services will be quite different as will be discussed further below.)
In this sense, both will support ‘‘broadband’’ where we define this as ‘‘faster than
what we had before’’. Both services will also support ‘‘always on’’ connectivity
which is another very important aspect of broadband service. Indeed, some analysts
believe this is even more important than the raw throughput supported.

6
 CHAPTER-4
HOW ARE THEY DIFFERENT

In this section, we consider several of the important ways in which the WiFi
and 3G approaches to offering broadband wireless access services are substantively
different.
4.1. CURRENT BUSINESS MODELS/DEPLOYMENT ARE DIFFERENT
As noted above 3G represents an extension of the mobile service-provider
model. This is the technology of choice for upgrading existing mobile telephone
services to expand capacity and add enhanced services. The basic business model is
the telecommunications services model in whichservice providers own and manage
the infrastructure (including the spectrum) and sell service onthat infrastructure.23
End-customers typically have a monthly service contract with the 3G provider and
view their payments as a recurring operating expense—analogous to regulartelephone
service.
Not surprisingly, the 3G business model is close to the wireline telephone
business. The mindset is on long-lived capital assets, ubiquitous coverage, and service
integration.Moreover, telecommunications regulatory oversight, including common
carriage and interconnectionrules are part of the landscape.24 The service is
conceptualized usually as a mass-marketoffering to both residential and business
customers on a subscription basis. The 3G deploymentand service provisioning model
is top–down, vertically integrated, and is based on centralized planning and
operation.25 It is expected that 3G services will be provided as part of a bundled
service offering, to take advantage of opportunities to implement price discrimination
strategies and to exploit consumers’ preferences for ‘‘one-stop’’ shopping/single bill
service. In contrast, WiFi comes out of the data communications industry (LANs)
which is a byproduct of the computer industry. The basic business model is one of
equipment makers who sell boxes to consumers. The services provided by the
equipment are free to the equipment owners. For the customers, the equipment
represents a capital asset that is depreciated. While WiFi can be used as an access
link, it has not heretofore been thought of as an end-to-end service. Only relatively
recently have WLANs been targeted as a mass-market offering to home users.

7
 Previously, these were installed most typically in corporate or university
settings. End-user customers buy the equipment and then self-install it and
interconnect it to their access or enterprise network facilities. Typically, the users of
WiFi networks are not charged directly for access. Service is provided free for the
closed user-community (i.e., employees of the firm, students at the university), with
the costs of providing wireless access subsidized by the firm or university.
If backhaul costs are traffic variable (e.g., suppose the rate for Internet
connection from base station to the cloud varies with traffic), then offering flat rate
service may be perceived as too risky for the base station owner. Once again,
Boingo’s approach suggests how an intermediary willing to aggregate customers and
take advantage of the scale economies associated with serving a larger customer base
(e.g., with respect to retail costs and backhaul traffic management costs) can play an
important role in facilitating the emergence of decentralized networking
infrastructure.

4.2. SPECTRUM POLICY AND MANAGEMENT

One of the key distinctions between 3G and WiFi that we have only touched
upon lightly thus far is that 3G and other mobile technologies use licensed spectrum,
while WiFi uses unlicensed shared spectrum. This has important implications for (1)
cost of service; (2) quality of service (QoS) and congestion management; and (3)
industry structure. First, the upfront cost of acquiring a spectrum license represents a
substantial share of the capital costs of deploying 3G services. This cost is not faced
by WiFi which uses the shared 2.4GHz unlicensed, shared spectrum.28 The cost of a
spectrum license represents a substantial entry barrier that makes it less likely that 3G
services (or other services requiring licensed spectrum) could emerge in a
decentralized fashion. Of course, with increased flexibility in spectrum licensing rules
and with the emergence of secondary markets that are being facilitated by these rules,
it is possible that the upfront costs of obtaining a spectrum license could be shared to
allow decentralized infrastructure deployment to proceed. Under the traditional
licensing approach, the licensing of the spectrum, the construction of the network
infrastructure, and the management/operation of the service were all undertaken by a
single firm.
Moreover, rigid licensing rules (motivated in part by interference concerns,
but also in part, by interest group politics)29 limited the ability of spectrum license
8
holders to flexibly innovate with respect to the technologies used, the services offered,
or their mode of operation. In the face of rapid technical progress, changing supply
and demand dynamics, this lack of flexibility increased the costs and reduced the
efficiency of spectrum utilization. High-value spectrum trapped in low-value uses
could not be readily redeployed. With the emergence of secondary markets, it would
be possible for spectrum brokers to emerge or service integrators that could help
distribute the spectrum cost to enable decentralized infrastructure investment for
licensed spectrum.

4.3. STATUS OF TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT DIFFERENT

The two technologies differ with respect to their stage of development in a
number of ways.
These are discussed in the following subsections.
4.3.1. Deployment status
In most OECD countries, cell phone penetration of 2G services is quite high,
and consumers have a choice among multiple facilities-based providers in most
markets.
Additionally, most of the 2G mobile service providers have announced plans
to offer 3G broadband data services Nevertheless, 3G services are emerging only
slowly. There are a number of reasons for this, including the high costs of obtaining
3G licenses, the lack of 3G handsets, increased deployment cost expectations, and
diminished prospects for short-term revenue.
In contrast, we have a large installed base of WiFi networking equipment that
is growing rapidly as WiFi vendors have geared up to push wireless home networks
using the technology. The large installed base of WiFi provides substantial learning,
scale, and scope economies to both the vendor community and end-users. The
commoditization of WiFi equipment has substantially lowered prices and simplified
the installation and management of WiFi networks, making it feasible for non-
technical home users to self-install these networks.
However, although there a large installed base of WiFi equipment, there has
been only limited progress in developing the business models and necessary technical
and business infrastructure to support distributed service provisioning. In addition,
many of the pioneers in offering wireless access services such as Mobilstar34 and

9
Metricom35 went bankrupt in 2001 as a consequence of the general downturn in the
telecom sector and the drying up of capital forinfrastructure investment.

4.3.2. Embedded support for services

Another important difference between 3G and WiFi is their embedded support
for voice
1. Services. 3G was expressly designed as an upgrade technology for wireless
voice telephony networks, so voice services are an intrinsic part of 3G. In
contrast, WiFi provides a lower layer data communications service that can be
used as the substrate on which to layer services such as voice telephony. For
example, with IP running over WiFi it is possible to support voice-over-IP
telephony. However, there is still great market uncertainty as to how voice
services would be implemented and quality assured over WLAN networks.

First, we have only limited operational experience with how secure 3G

communications are.
Hackers are very ingenious and once 3G systems are operating, we will find
holes that we were not previously aware of. Second, the security lapses of WiFi have
attracted quite a bit of attention and substantial resources are being devoted to closing
this gap. Although wireless communications may pose higher risks to privacy (e.g.,
follow-me anywhere tracking capabilities) and security (i.e., passive monitoring of RF
transmissions is easier) than do wireline networks, we do not believe that this is likely
to be a long-term differentiating factor between 3G and WiFi technologies.

4.3.3. Standardization
It is also possible to compare the two technologies with respect to the extent to
which they arestandardized. Broadly, it appears that the formal standards picture for
3G is perhaps more clear than for WLAN. For 3G, there is a relatively small family of
internationally sanctioned standards, collectively referred to as IMT-2000.36
However, there is still uncertainty as to which of these (or even if multiple ones) will
be selected by service providers. In contrast, WiFi is one of the family of continuously
evolving 802.11x wireless Ethernet standards, which is itself one of many WLAN
technologies that are under development. Although it appears that WiFi is emerging
as the market winner, there is still a substantial base of HomeRF and other open
10
standard and proprietary technologies that are installed and continue to be sold to
support WLANs. Thus, it may appear that the standards picture for WLANs is less
clear than for 3G, but the market pressure to select the 802.11x family of technologies
appears much less ambiguous—at least today.

4.3.4. Service/business model

3G is more developed than WiFi as a business and service model. It represents
an extension of the existing service-provider industry to new services, and as such,
does not represent a radical departure from underlying industry structure. The key
market uncertainties and portions of the valuation that remain undeveloped are the
upstream equipment and application/content supplier markets and ultimate consumer
demand.There are also some form factor issues that may impact the way these
services will be used.Initially, it seems likely that the first 3G end-user devices will be
extensions of the cell phone while the first WiFi end-user devices are PCs. Of course,
there are also 3G PC cards to allow the PC to be used as an interface device for 3G
services, and with the evolution of Internet appliances (post- PC devices), we should
expect to see new types of devices connecting to both types of networks.

11
 CHAPTER-5
SOME IMPLICATIONS FOR INDUSTRY STRUCTURE AND
PUBLIC POLICY

In this section we consider some of the implications that emerge from the
preceding analysis, as well as offer some speculations on the possible implications for
industry structure, competition, and public policy.

5.1. WIFI IS GOOD FOR COMPETITION

One implication that emerges from the above analysis is that the success of
WiFi wireless localaccess alternatives is likely to be good for local competition. First,
if only 3G survives, then it is less likely that we will see non-vertically integrated,
decentralized service provisioning. And, the higher entry costs associated with
acquiring licensed spectrum and the need to construct a geographically larger network
to begin offering service will limit the number of firms that compete in the market. Of
course, this does not mean that wireless access services would not be competitive—
there may be more than enough competition among existing mobile providers to
preclude the exercise of market power. However, there is also the possibility that the
few 3G providers will become fewer still through mergers, and when coupled to the
market power of wireline local exchange carriers, this could provide a powerful nexus
for the continuation of monopoly power in last kilometer facilities. Obviously, the
firms that have a potential opportunity to establish such market power—the mobile
providers and the local exchange carriers (that own a significant share of the mobile
operators)—have a powerful incentive to collude to establish monopoly control over
mixed wireless and wireline services.
Second, if both 3G and WiFi survive, then the diversity of viable networking
infrastructure strategies will be conducive to greater facilities-based
competition.Third, success of the WiFi service model could help unlock the
substantial investment in private networking infrastructure that could be used as the
basis for constructing an alternative infrastructure to the PSTN and cable wireline
networks.

12
 As noted above, this will require adding the necessary business functionality
and technical support to enable base station owners to bill for WiFi service. Once this
is developed, the opportunity to create novel new ways to leverage the existing
infrastructure investment will be increased.
Fourth, if only the WiFi service model survives, then we would expect this to
be inherently more competitive because of the lower entry barriers for setting up local
access services. The use of unlicensed spectrum means that property rights over the
spectrum cannot be used to exclude potential entrants, although congestion—if not
appropriately managed—could be just as effective in limiting competition. However,
at the margin, the threat of competitive entry would limit the ability of any single or
small group of providers from establishing bottleneck control over the last kilometer
wireless access infrastructure. Of course, since the WiFi model does depend on
wireline infrastructure to connect to the Internet backbone, it is possible that wireline
carriers could effectively leverage their control over wireline access facilities to
adversely affect wireless access competition. Since many of the largest mobile service
providers are affiliated with wireline providers, there is likely to be an incentive to
discriminate against WiFi carriers if these are seen as competitors to either 3G or
wireline services.
Fifth, the more flexible nature of the WiFi model means that it can seed a
more complex array of potential business models that could fuel competition both at
the retail level in services and at the wholesale level in alternative infrastructure. For
example, WiFi could emerge as an extension of FreeNets, transmogrified into user-
subsidized community networks, or via third partyaggregators such as Boingo. These
networks could be in direct competition to 3G services.

5.2. WIFI AND 3G CAN COMPLEMENT EACH OTHER FOR A MOBILE

PROVIDER
Each of the technologies has distinct advantages over the other that would
allow each to offer higher quality services under disparate conditions. Putting the two
together would allow a service provider to offer a wider set of more valuable services.
Second, the natural ability of the 3G providers to implement bundled service
offerings will make them more likely to be able to take advantage of a more complex
infrastructure platform that will allow them to offer bundled services.

13
 Integrating 3G and WiFi networks provides the opportunity to offer both
ubiquitous coverage with good voice telephony support (still the killer app for
interactive communication networks) while providing local ‘‘hot spot’’ connectivity
in high demand areas (airports, hotels, coffee shops) or in areas where existing WiFi
facilities may be opportunistically taken advantage of (malls, multi-tenant office
buildings or campuses). The hot spot connectivity would be attractive to offset the
capacity limitations of 3G. The 3G mobile billing and wide-area network management
(e.g., homing, hand-off control, authentication, resource allocation/management, etc.)
capabilities could address some of the shortfalls that are limiting the capability of
WiFi to evolve into a platform for mass wireless access.

5.3. SPECTRUM POLICY IS KEY

Obviously, spectrum policy has already had and will continue to play a critical
role in how our wireless future evolves. One of the key distinguishing features
between 3G and WiFi is the use oflicensed versus unlicensed spectrum. Continued
progress towards creating secondary spectrum markets will benefit both 3G and WiFi
models. For 3G, secondary markets would allow more flexible management of
property rights.
Secondary markets would allow spectrum to be reallocated more flexibly to
higher value uses and could improve dynamic efficiency. For example, to balance
localized supply and demand mismatches. For WiFi, the emergence of spectrum
markets may make it possible to adopt a suitable mechanism for addressing
congestion issues. Of course, if implemented in the unlicensed band where WiFi
currently operates, this would require additional policy changes to implement a
market-based resource allocation process. The appropriate protocols and institutional
framework for supporting such a market is an interesting topic for research. It may be
easier to implement such a mechanism in a WLAN technology that could operate in a
licensed band where there are clear property rights.

5.4.SUCCESS OF WIFI IS POTENTIALLY GOOD FOR MULTIMEDIA

CONTENT
Multimedia content benefits from higher bandwidth services so the ability to
support higher speed wireless access may help encourage the development of
broadband multimedia content.

14
 On the other hand, the lack of a clear business model for deploying broadband
services over aWiFi network may raise concerns for how content would be paid for
and/or digital rights management issues. The digital rights management issues are
perhaps more difficult to control (from a content provider’s perspective) in a more
decentralized, end-user-centric environment than in a centralized service-provider
network (i.e., contrast Napster to AOL). The vertical integration model of 3G may
offer greater control, which might actually encourage more content production. This
is a complex question that merits additional thought. It is premature to posit which of
the two effects are likely to be larger.

5.5. TECHNICAL PROGRESS FAVORS HETEROGENEOUS FUTURE

Technical progress in wireless services favors a heterogeneous wireless future.
There are several reasons for this. First, with each technology, the rapid pace of
innovation means that multiple generations of each technology coexist in the network
at the same time. Coupled to this heterogeneity, there is the on-going competition
among alternative wireless technologies. All of these share common benefits so to a
certain extent, all benefit from advances in basic elements such as modulation
techniques, smart antenna design, power management and battery technology, and
signal processing technology. However, because the different technologies have
asymmetric problems, basic advances affect them differently. This means that in the
on-going horse race different technologies are boosted at different times. Once the
world accepts the need to coordinate heterogeneous technologies, the capabilities to
manage these environments evolve.e For example, the success of the IP suite of
protocols rests in large part on their ability to support interoperable communications
across heterogeneous physical and network infrastructures. Analogously,
developments in wireless technology will favor thecoexistence of heterogeneous
wireless access technologies. One of the more important developments will be
software defined radio (SDR).39 SDR does a number of important things. First, it
makes it easier to support multiple wireless technologies on a common hardware
platform. Second, it makes upgrades easier and more flexible to implement since it
substitutes software for hardware upgrades. Third, it facilitates new and more
complex interference management techniques.

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 CHAPTER-6
CONCLUSIONS

This article offers a qualitative comparison of two wireless technologies that

could be viewed simultaneously as substitute and/or complementary paths for
evolving to broadband wireless access. The two technologies are 3G, which is the
preferred upgrade path for mobile providers,and WiFi, one of the many WLAN
technologies.
The goal of the analysis is to explore two divergent world views for the future
of wireless access and to speculate on the likely success and possible interactions
between the two technologies in the future.
Second, we expect 3G mobile providers to integrate WiFi technology into
their networks. Thus,we expect these technologies to be complementary in their most
successful mass-market deployments.
Third, we also expect WiFi to offer competition to 3G providers because of
the lower entry costs associated with establishing WiFi networks. This may take the
form of new types of service providers (e.g., Boingo), in end-user organized networks
(e.g., FreeNet aggregation or municipal networking), or as a low-cost strategy for a
wireline carrier to add wireless services.
.

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 CHAPTER-7
REFERENCES

1) Alven, D., Arjunanpillai, R., Farhang, R., Kansal, S., Khan, N., & Leufven, U.
(2001). ‘‘Hotspots—connect the dots
2) for a wireless future: Final report for Ericsson Business Innovation and Telia
Research,’’ May 2001, available at
http://www.dsv.su.se/Bmab/Alven.pdf.
3) Brown, K. (2002). As home-networking grows wireless Ethernet takes lead.
Broadband Week, January 21, 2002,available at http://www. broadbandweek.
com/news/020121/020121 wireless wifi.htmor
4) Carros, D. (2001). Mobile carriers: No single standard in sight. Tech Update
ZDNet, November 28, available at http://techupdate.zdnet.com.

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