More and more people are now discovering mobile broadband, and the product’s market is expanding to also include people who enjoy the convenience but who don’t necessarily need it for their jobs or lifestyles. As with many new technologies, during this period of rapid growth many subscribers have been running into issues that are causing Mobile Broadband QoE to drop because the service isn’t providing the speed or quality that subscribers’ envisioned or were promised. This perceived instability of Mobile Broadband is one of the main factors that reviewers point to when they make recommendations against purchasing the service or for customers to wait until the technology becomes more established. Therefore, at this point in the product’s life, the main focus for providers needs to be on improving the subscriber’s Mobile Broadband QoE so that more casual customers’ will be able to enjoy the technology’s convenience.
The main detriment to the QoE of Mobile Broadband and also the root of the majority of subscriber complaints is the speed of the service. There are many reasons for poor speeds while using mobile broadband but most of the major reasons relate to the subscriber’s location. Mobile Broadband works through cells that were set up originally for mobile phone service, and similarly to mobile phones, if a subscriber is located in a less populated area or a less busy are, service may dwindle. Given that even in the most developed countries, only a small percentage of areas have the latest 3G network technology, it follows that the top speeds can be found almost exclusively in urban areas.
The problem then leads to another problem in the mobile broadband infrastructure, which is that oftentimes subscribers are connecting through a 2G cell and not a 3G cell. Working through a 2G cell will have a significantly harmful effect on speed and Mobile Broadband QoE. This problem is also representative of location-based issues, in which Mobile Broadband solutions need to be present to provide a high-degree of visibility so that cells can be constantly monitored to manage available resources with where the most pressing needs are.
However, even in the situation that a subscriber is located in an area with the proper network technology and coverage, speeds could still be slow due to a variety of reasons. The logical downside of using Mobile Broadband in an urban area is that there will be many other users and everyone needs to share a limited amount of bandwidth. This is the type of problem that promises only to get worse with time as the technology’s popularity continues to increase.
Regardless of reason, in a lot of cases the speed is so poor that it prevents the subscribers from having a reasonable browsing experience. In some cases, subscribers are forced to view all text versions of websites or avoid image-heavy pages. While this might not necessarily be a problem for business-users, if this issue continues to be prevalent it might eliminate Mobile Broadband as even a possibility in the minds of many customers. Considering that most functions of the internet that have been popularized in recent years depend on pictures and videos (social networking, streaming movies, etc.). Mobile Broadband Optimization is necessary to ensure access to these types of content so that Mobile Broadband can realistically compete directly with ADSL and Cable Modems.
The aforementioned issues should be considered as a few general examples among a much larger pool, each of which are experienced somewhat uniquely depending on the particular circumstances of subscriber. What is required to maintain Mobile Broadband QoE for each of these subscribers is a level of visibility that allows operators to deal with problematic trends plaguing the network and also to deal with each subscriber on a personal basis.
