By Claus Hetting, Wi-Fi NOW CEO & Chairman
More than 20 years after its invention Wi-Fi is still at odds with cellular when it comes to delivering a single, consistent, and coordinated wireless connectivity experience to the smartphone user. Fortunately, a solution to this pervasive problem now exists. Kyrio – a wholly owned subsidiary of CableLabs – has developed the Adaptive Route Control (ARC) convergence platform to finally resolve this issue. We’re delighted to welcome Kyrio as our newest Wi-Fi NOW Partner.
Smartphones connect to both Wi-Fi and cellular networks – including 4G and 5G – but thus far there has been no consistent way for operators to manage the totality of the connected experience. Calls may be dropped when moving between coverage areas of one and the other and subscribers – as well as applications – may for lack of coordination be connected to the worst performing network instead of the best. This is a root cause of poor overall customer experience. The lack of connectivity management also in many cases introduces additional operational costs for operators.
Kyrio’s ARC or Adaptive Route Control solution aims to resolve such significant quality of service shortcomings once and for all. At Wi-Fi NOW we are delighted to be supporting this initiative.
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“Managing cellular and Wi-Fi connectivity for smartphones so that the user extracts maximum quality of service from the combined ‘wireless service fabric’ is the Holy Grail of convergence. It is a hard problem to solve – especially to the satisfaction of operators – but we believe Kyrio has done it with ARC. We’re excited to be working with Kyrio to build awareness and accelerate adoption of ARC into the operator community,” says Claus Hetting, Wi-Fi NOW CEO & Chairman.
Kyrio’s ARC manages the combined cellular and Wi-Fi connectivity of devices combining application and network awareness to boost QoS for subscribers but also to allow operators to make full use of both cellular and W-Fi network assets – while for example allowing MVNOs to guide smartphones to use Wi-Fi data more and cellular data less, hence saving on bulk cellular data costs. The business case for ARC is strong with benefits designed to delight customers through a better connectivity experience while providing operators with a competitive edge, Kyrio says.
“We believe we’ve struck the bullseye as far as a high-performance, practical, and scalable convergence solution is concerned. The solution is also unique because it optimises routing at the application level while providing full operator control via policy management. We look forward to working with Wi-Fi NOW to showcase the technology details and not least demonstrate the value of ARC to operators,” says Mario Di Dio, VP of Software & Network Technology at Kyrio.
A number of mobile operators are right now trialling the ARC solution and so far the results have been excellent, Kyrio says. For more information and to meet the Kyrio team in person don’t miss Kyrio President & CEO Ike Elliott speaking at the Wi-Fi World Congress Americas in Cancún this May 17. Kyrio will also be speaking at the Wi-Fi World Congress Europe in Stockholm this September 26-28.
/Claus.
