Page 26 - Mobile World Daily - Day 2

INTERNET OF THINGS | GLOBAL CERTIFICATION FORUM
Lars Nielsen, General Manager, Global Certification Forum
Mobile interoperability
is key to M2M and
IOT success
Industry analysts are predicting that
the number of “things” connected to
mobile networks could vastly exceed
in-service mobile phones by the end of
the decade. Machine-to-machine
(M2M) and the Internet of Things (IoT)
open up many exciting opportunities -
for traditional mobile players, new
entrants and for society at large.
It says something about the achievements
of the mobile industry over recent years
that many IoT propositions appear to take
the mobile connectivity component for
granted: there is an assumption that it will
simply work. However, radio can be a
demanding medium and good connectivity
happens through careful design and
implementation, not by accident.
The global potential of IoT is attracting
millions in investment – most of it from
outside the traditional mobile industry.
Appropriate levels of interoperability for
these new types of connected device will be
critical to realising global scale and
generating the anticipated returns on these
investments.
The growing interest in the concept of the
connected car is a good example. The
automotive industry gears its capital-
intensive manufacturing processes,
production lines and supply chains to
produce models that are distributed across
multiple markets. There is, therefore, an
explicit need for vehicle connectivity
solutions that are able to connect to any
network in any country or region the vehicle
is likely to be driven in. From the perspective
of mobile networks, a significant proportion
of connected cars will be in a permanent
roaming state.
By providing an assurance of interoperability, increase further in 2015 as Carrier Aggregation
device certification can make an important
contribution to the success of IoT.
BENCHMARKING INTEROPERABILITY
The Global Certification Forum (GCF) was
established in 1999 as a voluntary certification has driven the smartphone market would not
scheme focused on interoperability between
mobile handsets and networks.
PAGE 26 Tuesday 3rd March
At the time GCF was founded, operators
played a more prominent role in handset
distribution than today. Many operators had
their own device acceptance regimes which
meant manufacturers were required to
undertake multiple tests of the various
device attributes in order to present their
operator customers with data in their
preferred format. A common certification
scheme accepted by a broad cross-section of
the world’s leading operator groups had the
potential to generate efficiencies that would
improve economies of scale while reducing
both costs and time-to-market for the benefit
of the wider industry.
GCF’s maxim of “Test once, use anywhere”
has delivered efficiencies and has made an
important contribution to expanding the
overall market by increasing the choice of
trusted devices. In the first full year of
certification, two manufacturers delivered 12
certified devices. In 2014, 531 different
devices were certified by 53 manufacturers.
Dual-band GSM handsets represented the
cutting edge when GCF was founded. In the
15 years since, the scope of the scheme has
expanded to accommodate new mobile
technologies and functionalities. GCF took
over the certification of CDMA2000 devices
in December 2014.
In 2014, the “typical” GCF-certified device
incorporated 3.5 GSM bands, 2.6 3G bands
and 2.3 LTE bands.
Illustrating how ever more RF functionality is
being packed into higher-spec devices, the
“average” GCF-certified LTE device had 4.4 FD
LTE bands, 3.1 3G bands and 3.5 GSM bands.
With FD LTE being deployed in approaching
20 bands worldwide, the complexity of higher
end smartphones and phablets is likely to
is adopted more widely and more bands are
implemented in e ach device to facilitate
international roaming over LTE.
The abundant variety of sophisticated
multi-mode, multi-band mobile devices that
have been possible without a trusted
certification scheme providing a robust
benchmark of a device’s interoperability while
keeping testing overheads under control.
Comparison of global device sales against device certifications
The common testing framework also helps
many manufacturers expand their
addressable markets by enabling them to
build confidence in their devices among the
major operator groups. The underlying
principles are equally relevant to the success
of IoT where partnerships between multiple
stakeholders are expected to be the basis of
many propositions.
Interoperability will remain a critical
success factor for IoT. Interoperability still
matters. Any IoT device with poor
interoperability will struggle to achieve scale.
In addition, devices that do not fully
conform to the standards can also negatively
impact mobile networks. This risk could be
compounded in large-scale M2M
deployments. If an outage in an M2M system
were to trigger thousands - or even millions -
of devices to attempt to re-register with
mobile networks simultaneously, the
disruption could be serious. With mobile
networks increasingly being seen as part of a
nation’s critical infrastructure, the regulatory certification has made a significant
backlash could be severe.
Enhancements to the core 3GPP standards
are being developed with the aim of giving
operators tools to mitigate such risks. These
on-going developments are already feeding
into GCF’s Certification Criteria.
MOBILE WORLD CONGRESS DAILY 2015 | www.mobileworldcongress.com
Understanding these developments and
ensuring their devices are compatible with
them will help M2M device manufacturers
protect themselves.
Unsuccessful devices aren’t good for the
industry: as well as damaging the reputation
of their manufacturers, they can also damage
the brands of the operators over whose
networks they were intended to connect.
While there is a cost to certification, the
financial and reputational cost of a failed
device will almost certainly be higher.
The ability to benchmark interoperability
will continue to be important even as
operators play a less prominent role in
marketing devices and the proportion of
“open market” sales increases. After-sales
support costs for poorly performing devices
could rapidly erode margins for independent
distribution channels.
As a scheme that has been designed “by
the industry, for the industry”, GCF
contribution to the global expansion and
success of the mobile industry. A GCF Task
Force is currently analysing how
Certification can best contribute to the
success for M2M and IoT. GCF welcomes
input and insight from any organisation with
interests in this growth sector.