Routers Using New 6 GHz Wi-Fi Band Already in Deployment, Summit Told
The 1,200 MHz of spectrum the FCC opened for Wi-Fi at 6 GHz is spurring action by regulators worldwide, experts told the Fierce Wireless Wi-Fi Summit Tuesday. Raghuram Rangarajan, Amazon engineering leader, told us adoption of the band will happen quickly. Wi-Fi 7, with 320 MHz channels, is a few years away, speakers said.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Export Compliance Daily combines U.S. export control news, foreign border import regulation and policy developments into a single daily information service that reliably informs its trade professional readers about important current issues affecting their operations.
Rangarajan cited statistics from the Wi-Fi Alliance that 4.2 billion Wi-Fi units likely shipped in 2020, with 2.2 billion offering Wi-Fi 6 and 338 million Wi-Fi 6E, which includes 6 GHz connectivity. “Onboarding” with Wi-Fi6E will immediately double available bandwidth, he said: The “bottleneck might be your ISP speed itself.” The 2.4 GHz band offered “very limited channels,” and 5 GHz “had a little bit more, but it started to become crowded,” Rangarajan said. “With the introduction of 6 GHz, we are getting 160 MHz channels, clean usage.” Wi-Fi has to get better since it's projected the average home Wi-Fi network will soon have 30-40 devices, he said.
Chris DePuy, technology analyst at 650 Group, said 25% of business access points and 15% of consumer routers and other broadband equipment now use Wi-Fi 6. The firm projects that by 2025, Wi-Fi 6E will be in 28% of enterprise access points and 27% of consumer infrastructure, with the first Wi-Fi 7 equipment shipping in two years. Chipmaker MediaTek is “on the test bed” for Wi-Fi 6E development and already has “started Wi-Fi 7 investments,” said CEO Rick Tsai last month (see 2101280013).
Some problems must be worked out, said Derek Peterson, Boingo Wireless chief technology officer. At busy airports, it’s hard to make the broad channels offered by Wi-Fi 6 work better than other Wi-Fi because of congestion, he said. That will change as the 6 GHz band comes online, he said: “We’re going to be able to take advantage of those 120 MHz channels.” Industry has to keep pushing for more unlicensed spectrum globally, “because we’re going to need it,” he said.
“If there was ever any doubt as to the central role that Wi-Fi plays in our daily lives, 2020 probably erased it,” said Kevin Robinson, Wi-Fi Alliance senior vice president-marketing. At CES in January, seven of the 12 routers announced use Wi-Fi 6E, he said. Regulators in the U.K., South Korea, Chile and the United Arab Emirates are opening more spectrum for Wi-Fi, following the U.S., Robinson said. “That momentum is going to continue to grow.” The European Commission is expected to address the 6 GHz band in Q1, he said.
“We see a lot of activities” in Central and South America and Asia, said Carlos Cordeiro, Intel wireless CTO: “It’s really rolling thunder now.” Intel is shipping Wi-Fi 6E routers and is “working with regulators” globally to make sure spectrum is available, he said. Wi-Fi 7 will make more efficient use of 6 GHz and let a router use different bands at once, he said. Wi-Fi 7 allows 320 MHz channels, double the size of Wi-Fi 6.
COVID-19 had a big effect on the smart home, with users and devices increasing, said Mike Talbert, Verizon associate fellow-device technology: “There’s no question” of the need for the 6 GHz band.