Austria's largest mobile operator is seriously considering using Wi-Fi as an offload route to preserve its HSPA network from meltdown. Hannes Ametsreiter, CEO of Telekom Austria, said that the company was prepared for the continued growth in mobile data traffic, but suggested that pushing data onto Wi-Fi made sense.
"If you can use it [Wi-Fi], you should," urged Ametsreiter. "WiFi offloading is a huge topic...and it could significantly reduce the load on the mobile network." He noted that Orange had already indicated its intention to investigate the option, and implied that Wi-Fi offload could reduce traffic over the mobile infrastructure by around 30 per cent.
However, for the present Ametsreiter stressed that the company, whose mobile broadband tariff is cheaper than fixed-line access in Austria, would continue to concentrate on rolling out HSDPA, HSUPA and HSPA+ technologies to cope with demand. "We are ready to install and deploy these enhancements... [and] also LTE in the future."
Outlining the issues involved, the CEO pointed to its experience over the fixed-line fibre network where the average user consumes 56Gb of data per month. However, one heavy user has clocked up a massive 3Tb in a month.
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Total Telecom
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