Done and dusted

Less than a decade into the so-called mobile revolution and experts are calling it officially over, but what does that really mean?

It’s not even 10 years since the release of the first iPhone and there have been five major upgrades since — more if you count the incrementally ‘improved’ S models. Samsung joined the smartphone fray in 2009, Apple announced the iPad in 2010 and it’s been full steam ahead ever since. The average user will have spent a few thousand dollars on hardware alone in the intervening years; much more in the case of the truly dedicated.

The impending release of each subsequent phone, tablet or hybrid model elicits rabid speculation and the rumour mill inevitably goes into overdrive. ‘Drastic’ physical changes, such as Apple’s move to the lightning connector on the iPhone 5, are enough to cause virtual worldwide meltdown. In the latest case of conjecture, the company will reportedly remove the headphone socket from the iPhone 7 — cue outrage from the market and threats to jump ship to another manufacturer’s product. With every improvement comes the promise of better battery life, which generally fails to materialise.

We’ve become so attuned to the concept of improvement — smaller, faster, lighter, thinner and better resolution — that many have questioned where it could possibly go next, and all of it makes you wonder how tech analysts managed to fill their days back in the early 2000s. According to experts, there’s nowhere left to move, as we’ve hit the practical and physical limits when it comes to screen size, battery life and network capacity. So that, as they say, is that. We’ve come to the end of the mobile revolution. Meaning what, exactly? Not much, as it happens. 

Don’t sound the death knell 

As with the internet revolution, and the PC revolution that preceded it, the end of the era doesn’t mean that the technology is redundant — far from it. When analysts decree that a technological time period is over, it generally just means that the previously experienced lightning speeds of take-up and development start to slow — it’s so commonly used it’s become part of the fabric of society, rather than old hat. Even in the face of decline, smartphone sales are currently estimated at around US$323 billion per annum, so even with a 1–2% annual decrease, it’s probably not time to panic yet. 

It seems there’s still life in the market yet, if some of the info coming out of the Mobile World Congress (MWC) is to be believed. Billed as the ‘world’s biggest mobile fair’, this year’s event was held in Barcelona in February and attracted over 100,000 visitors. While handheld device development may have plateaued, there were a few standout technologies on show at MWC and trends worth keeping an eye on. 

Shining a light

New to the party, Li-Fi (Light Fidelity) technology is being hailed as a potential successor to Wi-Fi, albeit in limited application. Developed by French start-up Oledcomm, Li-Fi promises speeds up to 100 times faster than Wi-Fi and uses frequencies generated by LED light sources to transmit information as opposed to radio waves. LED lamps flicker on and off imperceptibly thousands of times per second, so some refer to Li-Fi as the ‘digital equivalent of Morse code’, according to recent media reports. Lamps are fitted with a microchip, effectively turning them into hotspots. Demonstrations at MWC showed a smartphone placed under an office lamp that began to play video. 

It’s fast, theoretically showing testing speeds of 2000 Gbps, which means users could “download the equivalent of 23 DVDs in one second”, according to Oldecomm founder Suat Topsu. 

The downside is that devices must be placed directly in light, meaning connection through walls isn’t possible. The technology’s weakness may also be its strength, as this limitation could mitigate the risk of data theft. While Li-Fi may not be a broadscale replacement for Wi-Fi, it has the potential to relieve burden if we hit the predicted 50 billion internet-connected devices expected by 2020. The spectrum for radio waves used by Wi-Fi is finite, so Li-Fi may finds its place in limited environments such as schools, hospitals and aircraft. Apple is reportedly looking at including Li-Fi capability on the iPhone 7. 

5G will save us

The next generation in wireless technology is expected to increase downloads speeds by about 10 Gbps and to dramatically reduce latency, meaning that a full HD movie will take only a couple of seconds to download. We’ll need 5G in operation if the much-heralded ‘IoT’ becomes a reality. 

Many of the companies exhibiting at MWC were focused on 5G, some claiming to be ‘5G ready’. According to comms sector analyst Juniper Research, much of the talk is just that — talk. Until 5G standardisation is resolved, manufacturer claims of readiness and platform trials are more marketing than reality. The frequency bands operators will utilise for 5G have yet to be finalised, and Juniper suggests that many hurdles must be overcome before the next generation becomes commercially available. Juniper points to 2020 as a realistic time frame and suggests that many operators are jumping the gun in promoting themselves as ‘ready’. It expects manufacturers and operators to optimistically market LTE-A or LTE-A Pro services as ‘5G’ once the 1 Gbps barrier has been broken, but sees 2025 as the jumping point for rapid adoption.

Steps to standardisation

IoT was, perhaps unsurprisingly, another focal point at MWC. It feels like we’ve been talking about this for decades, but it has been a concept divided in terms of reaching standardisation. Reports suggest that agreements between consortiums, including the Open Interconnect Consortium (OIC) and the UPnP Forum, will lead to the convergence that successful deployment demands. Certified products are likely to be forthcoming in the next 12 months from players such as Intel, Microsoft, Samsung and Cisco Systems.

Mobility on the move

So, while many claim we’re at the beginning of the end for mobile, it’s perhaps not quite accurate and there are still plenty of advances on the horizon, particularly when it comes to simplification and standardisation. It’s easy to forget that entire industries have risen out of the upsurge in mobility — ridesharing, for example — which are now commonplace yet unimagined a few short years ago. A lot can happen in a decade, so 2025 could be interesting.

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