Shipments of 5G fixed wireless access (FWA) broadband are expected to reach 7.6 million units this year with shipments expected to grow to 13 million unit shipments by 2023, according to new research from TrendForce.
The growth is due to demand for the services and new solutions being launched by Nokia, Huawei, Casa Systems and TCL using chipsets from Qualcomm, MediaTek and UNISOC. New demand is coming from communication equipment manufacturers and new business opportunities are becoming available to upstream component suppliers.
TrendForce said 5G FWA has an opportunity to become a key application for telecom vendors to attract new broadband users as well as provide an alternative to current broadband offerings.
What is FWA?
5G FWA is seen as an alternative to broadband using 5G cellular to supply wireless technology for home-based networks. 5G signals are converted into Wi-Fi signals through base station construction and paired FWA devices as user internet connections. The technology has also been moving forward with 5G new radio interfaces, network slicing, massive MIMO and quality of service guarantees.
According to TrendForce, FWA has advantages over fiber-to-the-home in terms of infrastructure and maintenance costs including in ground excavation, burying cable and installation in buildings and households. With governments looking to expand broadband, many are seeing wireless as a low-cost means to provide broadband internet services, the market research firm said.
