Goodbye to 2024! It was a rough year for the mobile industry…revenue was down 17% from 2023 and 30% from 2022. We’ve finished the fun part of the 5G cycle, and we started the routine part, extending the initial 5G coverage to wider areas and additional bands.
We’ve seen some exciting new growth areas pop up, such as Fixed Wireless Access and Private Cellular, but so far these have been too small to save our industry colleagues from massive layoffs.
We’ve heard about large RFPs for Open RAN. But these have been delayed and watered down, with the definition of “what is Open RAN” changing in a way that locks new software vendors out of some big opportunities.
And we’ve seen the rise of projects in several countries (Vietnam, Brazil, India, U.S.) that are aimed at localizing the design and manufacturing of telecom infrastructure.
Big questions
Without a view of upcoming growth, industry players are fighting each other for scraps. Where do we go from here?
As always, my company is focused on the future. In 2025, I think that we can expect some rationalization of open questions.
Will ‘single software’ Open RAN become a trend?
Will AI applications on smartphones drive data traffic and ARPU?
Will NTN/D2D be profitable for anybody that’s not named Elon?
How will Neutral Hosted Networks change the game in Private Cellular?
Mobile Experts has identified a few key areas that we believe will lead the industry out of its gloom.
Growth areas
Private cellular is growing quickly, and we’ve identified two vertical markets that have already “crossed the chasm” to make private cellular a mainstream solution. Fixed wireless and satellite broadband are rapidly gaining subscribers and will start to eat the lunch of cable providers that treated their monopoly fixed-broadband customers poorly. And NTN will allow operators to actually shut down some rural sites, making their operations more efficient. Network slices will be a commercial reality and will demonstrate premium revenue.
We’re still optimistic about the future of the market. Personally, I see 2023 as “the end of the growth phase” for mobile telecom. 2024 was a lost year — an in-between year with various players moving in conflicting directions.
2025 will be the beginning of the new era where the growth trends that we’re predicting will get traction. Some of these new trends (private cellular, network slices) carry the potential to grow for the next 20 years. I'm looking forward to many happy years to come.
Joe Madden is principal analyst at Mobile Experts, a network of market and technology experts that analyze wireless markets.
Op-eds from industry experts, analysts or our editorial staff are opinion pieces that do not represent the opinions of Fierce Network.