There’s currently a battle being waged between over-the-top (OTT) services such as WhatsApp and Line, and cellular operators. OTT services are eating the lunch of operators, turning cellular into a commodity and grabbing the profits.
Voice-over-LTE (News - Alert) (VoLTE) is the biggest opportunity for operators to fight back, as it lets operators move from the current system of data over LTE and voice over 3G to a system where all communications goes over LTE. This enables operators to compete more directly with OTT services, and also drive efficiencies and new services at the same time.
Roughly 80 percent of operators recently polled by research firm Ovum (News - Alert) indicated that they think improved user experience delivered by VoLTE will be key in beefing up their ability to take on the challenge posed by OTT providers. Further, 57 percent said that VoLTE will allow them to deliver voice services more efficiently as a result of LTE’s inherent spectral efficiency.
This is why Voice over Mobile Broadband (VoMBB), which includes VoLTE, Voice over HSPA (VoHSPA) and Voice over Wi-Fi (VoWiFi) are growing fast and should continue to grow in the next few years.
Roughly 360 mobile operators commercially launched LTE services last year, covering 124 countries, according to the Global Mobile Suppliers Association (GSA (News - Alert)). Roughly 49 operators commercially launched their LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) carrier aggregation last year, too.
Market research firm Visiongain predicts that the number of active VoLTE subscriptions worldwide will climb to 101.7 million by end of 2015, and TechNavio is forecasting that the VoMBB market overall will grow by a compound annual growth rate of 101.23 percent from 2013 to 2018.
VoLTE will help operators build out the next generation of communications services, a future that looks a lot like what OTT is offering today but with better service guarantees and integration because it comes from cellular operators directly.
This future includes more than just the voice and data services currently on offer. It also should include video calling, video messaging, conferencing and sharing of rich content thanks to RCS.
OTT services are doing well now, but their fortunes might change soon as operators make many OTT services redundant.
Edited by Rory J. Thompson