Technology to Pay Attention To (And Why)

Cyber-security will be a big money maker. Ransomware and hacks are increasing; they are also getting easier thanks to the CIA/NSA tool kits that have been released on the dark web. Also, there are now Ransonware-as-a-service sites.

To go along with Ransomware and cyber-security, data backup and disaster recovery services are seeing greater demand. DRaaS is now a thing; ask Datto. Even C Spire is offering DRaaS via Zerto. Frequent and reliable data backup is one safety net for a Ransomware attack.

Everyone realizes how much mass FTTH costs. That's why U-Verse was FTTN with VDSL2 as the last step. Now along comes g.fast, which has gotten uptake in Europe as well as a couple of US ILECs. VZ however had no luck with VDSL2; so they are skipping g.fast for fiber to everything.

SD-WAN is getting as much hype as UCaaS. Many companies are re-marketing with that term now, including Riverbed. Here's where you need to think about SD-WAN: indie operators cannot make margin on cable services and DSL is getting stale. The next evolution is either go to fiber or start thinking about Layer 7.  (Layer 1 or 7 People!)

Layer 7 is managed services like a managed CPE that does fail-over, bonds 2 broadband circuits and has reporting & analytics. The hype about SD-WAN is that the network is software now, making it easier to upgrade the pipe (from 20mb to 100mb on a FastE port); to push updates to a firewall or router; to remotely manage the wi-fi access point. All this from the white-box CPE and through the SDN software that is now running carrier networks. SD-WAN is how you can leverage other networks (cable, DSL, 4G/LTE, satellite and fixed wireless) to deliver a managed solution to your customers.

Millimeter wave wireless will be part of 5G. I don't know how all this works out, but 5G will be using wavelengths from every part of the spectrum - 600 MHz to 60 GHz. It will be used for small cell (because to deliver 100MB+ you have to have a lot of towers! now called small cells) and for backhaul from towers. It may be used for Point to Point. There is even talk of 3650 MHz, which was slated for semi-public use, being used by carriers for 5G fixed wireless deployments to replace wireline broadband. So it is something to think about.