Most of the major telecom companies in the world, such as AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast, are based in the United States, and they promote innovation by making significant R&D investments consistently. The United States telecommunication sector communications sector, which underpins the operations of all enterprises, public safety groups, and the government, is a crucial part of the country's economy.
Key Highlights
- Even though the adoption of 5G technology is still in its infancy, AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and US Cellular are already creating a roadmap for the deployment of next-generation 6G through strategic alliances. Moreover, the U.S. has the greatest levels of digitization in the world, which is driving up demand for services like OTT (over-the-top) media, messaging, and e-commerce and fostering future sector growth.
- To fulfill the ongoing demand for faster networks in 2021, the United States telecom industry made further strides in expanding its network capacity with further fiber and wireless deployments. The telecommunications infrastructure has relied on the big three traditional U.S. firms for over 20 years: AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile. Tech giants like Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Space X are gradually joining the space of these three. Most of the infrastructure used to transport people's data and content is already owned by the leading IT corporations.
- Utilizing a mix of open networks and the mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) business model, they have begun to provide internet access and mobile services. As per a GSMA report, in 2021, the country had a smartphone adoption rate of 83%, which is expected to rise to 85% in 2025. Subscriber penetration for FY 2021 was 85%. As per the study, the United States had a 4G penetration was 82% during 2021, compared with 15% and the rest of 3% for 3G and 2G. Concerning 5G adoption, the United States is one of the global leaders. The country is expected to have a 5G adoption of 68% by the end of 2025.
- For the US economy to revive and for the green and digital transformation to be realized, mobile networks are essential. Operators are becoming more aware of the potential spectral efficiency gains from deploying 4G and 5G in existing legacy technology bands as they seek to optimize their network operations and costs. As per a GSMA study, in February 2022, AT&T discontinued its 3G service, and by the end of the year, Verizon also plans to do the same. In June 2022, T-Mobile stopped supporting its 3G network, although it will continue to support its 2G network to serve IoT devices. Operators used a range of channels to tell customers about the suggested changes while also providing incentives (such as discounts on 4G and 5G devices and service plans) to speed up the migration. This helped to ensure a successful network switch-off.
- The COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on the US telecommunication industry and other facets of daily life across the country. A large portion of the United States population has been forced to spend almost constantly at home due to the pandemic, which has led to an increase in remote jobs, telemedicine, online education, and streaming in-home entertainment. The unexpectedly high demand for mobile and residential broadband access and capacity has so far been met by network providers. Due to shuttered storefronts and limited client mobility, service providers got the opportunity to improve their value proposition. However, the pandemic has also harmed the live effect on the pay-TV business and the cable TV industry. In the first quarter of 2020, the former lost over two million customers, which was mainly caused by the major cancellations of live shows and events.
US Telecom Market Trends
Deployment of 5G Networks in the United States
- Similar to how the commercialization of the internet was 25 years ago, 5G is expected to have an economic impact on future American prosperity. The next stage of the digital revolution will be supported by 5G infrastructure. Since international networks and technology are now a major battlefield for interstate rivalry, 5G presents security concerns. Still, it also concerns how we employ secure infrastructure to spur innovation and progress. Ensuring that the United States can maximize economic gains while lowering national security risk is the aim of a 5G plan.
- Even after an extensive marketing campaign used by United States telecoms to raise awareness, 5G still have lesser compelling use cases for consumers. But in the business sector, many clear use cases range from corporate requirements like industrial production and automated agriculture to demands of small firms like managing remote workforces. These instances can spur growth and profitability for telecom companies that capitalize on these prospects. For the telecoms that can capitalize on these prospects, these instances can stimulate growth and profitability.
- Supporting businesses as they decide how to shape the future of their work environments will be a crucial use case soon. This will assist businesses in identifying the connection and technology stacks needed to enable working from home and in the office products, as well as how transitioning between the two or operating in a hybrid environment can be done with ease. Small enterprises' post-pandemic resurgence presents another chance. Small companies will need more agility and lower overhead from their solutions, and 5Gbased solutions addressing their requirements will attract a wave of anticipated new company clients in late 2021 and early 2022.
- Tech giants AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile, have invested hugely in deploying the latest 5G technology. Verizon's 5G Ultra-Wideband is its best-performing 5G. For the best possible 5G experience, our 5G Ultra-Wideband network combines high-band (mmWave) and mid-band (C-band) spectrums. Speeds up to 10 times faster than the average 4G LTE speed is only one of the game-changing advantages of 5G Ultra-Wideband.
- Midband 5G deployment is a top priority for major mobile operators AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon through 2021 and 2022. During 2022, AT&T and Verizon have strategized to improve their low-band and high-band millimeter wave (5G) services. Dish, a recent competitor, intended to launch its first commercial 5G service early in 2022. The three largest U.S. carriers, AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon, have all introduced 5G services widely enough to make the claim of countrywide service. T-Mobile has achieved another milestone with its mid-band 2.5 GHz deployment, achieving 200 million users ahead of schedule. The company now has 300 million users in mind by the end of 2023.
- The construction of the country's 5G network, which will serve as the basis for introducing the following major mobile broadband standard, is well underway in the United States. With peak data speeds up to 20 times faster than 4G and a ten times higher network connection density than 4G, 5G creates huge prospects for economic growth, innovation, and better customer experience. Out of the three major telecommunications operators in the United States, according to T-Mobile, the company has the highest 5G coverage area as of March 2021, with 1.6 million square miles covered by its 5G network. During the same period, AT&T and Verizon covered 0.7million and 0.4 million square miles, respectively.
Rise of Cloud Computing
- Due to factors including rising home office use (due to COVID) and improvements in mobile networking, cloud utilization is on the rise in the United States. Fortunately, many computing businesses are available to support the expanding need. With 58% of the entire global cloud computing market share in 2016, the United States has established itself as a global leader and is expected to keep it. The relationship between telecom enterprises and cloud service providers is expanded to include 5G and edge computing. For example, Verizon and Amazon Web Services collaborated to create Verizon 5G EDGE, which aims to link customers, devices, and applications as quickly as possible.
- The use of mobile, broadband, and cloud technologies is facilitated by one another. Their ecosystems are interdependent. It makes it logical for ITU to take these three technologies into account in one report. Utilizing mobile, internet, and cloud technologies together makes them more useful. Their ecosystems depend on one another. The inclusion of these three technologies in one report by the ITU is logical. Implementation of the cloud can help a business in various ways, like cost flexibility, business scalability, market adaptability, and ecosystem connectivity.
- The latest trend of cloud technology has enabled telecommunication organizations to migrate to the internet, where there is no longer the need to have costly hardware for businesses to stay connected to the rest of the world.
- Cloud computing has a significant and unrestricted influence on the telecom sector. The operators and suppliers of telecom services can store and process customer data, build cloud data warehouses, move cloud data, deal with other telecom cloud services, independently access any teleservice through the cloud, etc.
- Some leading telecom companies in the United States are now using Exadata Cloud. The ground-breaking performance, scalability, flexibility, and economics of Exadata Cloud enable telecom organizations to restructure their operations at a reduced cost and with better operational agility. Exadata Cloud provides 50X faster speed than AWS RDS for mission-critical OLPS database reads. 25X more expandable, having up to 3200 database server threads and 2.5 PB uncompressed database. Also, the technology is approximately 47% less costly than using AWS RDS. According to an IDC report, this is a faster cloud-based technology with lesser usage costs. Owing to the architectural network across the Exadata deployment model, the users can easily switch from on-premises to cloud or cloud to cloud network.
- To set a company apart and cloudify it, Amazon Web Services (AWS) offers the most cutting-edge and secure cloud infrastructure, the quickest rate of innovation, and the broadest community of telecom partner companies. To boost tomorrow's growth, we are developing and creating secure, scalable software-driven networks, streamlining business processes, and redefining the customer experience. Due to the remote communication brought on by the pandemic, telecom corporations based in the United States, like AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile, have gained even more chances to raise customer demand starting in 2020. Telecommunications were compelled to be used for work, personal communication, healthcare, food delivery, entertainment, and other fundamental human necessities.
US Telecom Industry Overview
The industrial internet of things market is highly fragmented in nature. Some major players in the market studied include AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, US Cellular, and Comcast. The market also hosts other Internet service providers (ISPs), MVNOs, and fixed-line service providers. Some US telecommunication companies are competitive internationally and hold strong ground in the global telecom space.- July 2022: AT&T announced that it would offer AT&T Fiber customers new and advanced security features. Customers of AT&T Fiber already have free access to AT&T ActiveArmorSM internet security features, including weak password detection, connected device monitoring, and malicious site blocking, which automatically protects from sites that are at risk of infecting you with malware2. For a nominal monthly fee, qualifying AT&T Fiber customers may also benefit from the new advanced privacy & protection features through the Smart Home Manager app.
- In August 2022, Comcast Business declared its strategic alliance with Fortinet, the world-class integrated and automated cybersecurity solution provider. This collaboration promises to provide businesses with a fresh set of secure access service edge (SASE) and security service edge (SSE) solutions. These solutions will aid businesses in safeguarding their distributed workforces by utilizing a cloud-delivered method of enforcing security policies.
Additional Benefits:
- The market estimate (ME) sheet in Excel format
- 3 months of analyst support
This product will be delivered within 2 business days.
Table of Contents
Companies Mentioned (Partial List)
A selection of companies mentioned in this report includes, but is not limited to:
- AT&T Inc.
- Verizon Communications Inc.
- Comcast Corporation
- T-Mobile US Inc.
- United States Cellular Corporation
- Charter Communications Inc.
- Lumen Technologies Inc.
- Cox Communications Inc.
- Altice USA Inc.
- Frontier Communications Parent Inc.
- Windstream Holdings Inc.
- DISH Network Corporation
Methodology
LOADING...