A massive 90% of respondents in a cross-industry survey conducted by the Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) are already planning to deploy WiFi 6.
The respondents include personnel from a global cross-section of over 200 telecommunications service providers, technology vendors and enterprises.
Highlighting the speed of planned upgrades, 66% said they plan to deploy the next iteration of WiFi before the end of 2020.
These findings were released by the WBA, as part of the WBA Annual Industry Report 2020, an in-depth analysis of the state of the WiFi market
“Although the WBA has been driving the adoption of WiFi 6, with deployment guidelines and field trials, we were ourselves surprised at the scale of support that Wi-Fi 6 already has,” says Tiago Rodrigues, CEO of the WBA.
“When such a large proportion of service providers and technology vendors have the technology in their short-term roadmap, it means that Wi-Fi 6 will very quickly become part of the landscape for service providers, enterprises and consumers.”
Other key findings from the survey and report include:
* 78% of those surveyed find the 6 GHz extension to be very important or important to their current or future network strategy.
* The role of WiFi or unlicensed spectrum was the most important factor to consider in terms of strategy for network evolution and 5G, for about half of respondents.
* Next Generation Hotspot (NGH)/Passpoint continues to gain in popularity, with 40% of those surveyed saying they would incorporate the WiFi roaming technology before the end of 2020.
* A further 37% plan to implement the technology, but have not set a firm date.
* Within three years, IoT and vertical industry applications are expected to become the leading revenue driver for WiFi, with 45% placing it in their top three expected revenue sources.
“2020 is set to become the breakout year for Wi-Fi 6, which is clearly energizing our membership,” adds Rodrigues. “This is easily the most dynamic time we have seen for anyone involved with WiFi – from service providers to technology vendors – as we address massive opportunities from WiFi 6 and unlicensed spectrum to 5G convergence, WiFi roaming and IoT.”
Lead author of the WBA Industry Report 2020, Adlane Fellah of Maravedis Research, comments: “As WiFi celebrates 20 years of success, it is clear that WiFi platforms drive a whole new generation of use cases and revenues. The impact from innovation, investment and hard work by companies involved with the WiFi industry and the supporting standards bodies and industry alliances, including the Wireless Broadband Alliance, will be powerfully felt in 2020.”