It’s not going to be this year, or even 2016 but eventually 2G and 3G networks are going away, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
According to tech research and advisory firm Ovum (News - Alert), mobile providers will be ready to move on from 2G and 3G networks by around 2020. And it looks like 3G will be the first to go.
“The majority of operators are not in a position today to close their legacy networks, nor will they be in the next one to two years,” Ovum principal analyst Nicole McCormick told Web technology site Cable.Co.UK. But determining the “sweet spot” to close down these legacy networks is challenging, she added.
For those unaware, the terms 2G, 3G and 4G refer to the second, third and fourth generations of mobile technology. Word is that early trials of 5G are already underway by some mobile networks.
In the report from Ovum, McCormick indicated that the revenue which mobile providers generate from both 2G and 3G—including voice calls and roaming—would be taken into consideration when determining the right time to switch off the networks, but “We don’t expect networks to be retired en masse until closer to 2020.”
Before the introduction of VoLTE, mobile calls were exclusively carried on 2G networks, with data being sent and received using either 3G or 4G. But all that is changing.
"LTE (News - Alert) [Long-Term Evolution or 4G] provides a better mobile broadband experience than 3G, and with VoLTE [Voice over Long-Term Evolution], LTE can handle the voice responsibilities of 3G,” McCormick said. “This points to the possibility that operators opt to close their 3G networks before they close 2G.”
Some operators in the U.S. and Asia have already started to announce intended network closures, but Ovum says these are the exception rather than the rule.
Edited by Dominick Sorrentino