Scoop has an Ethical Paywall
Phone to satellite comms impressive but questions remain
by Tim Hayward
Last week One NZ used the announcement of its partnership with Elon Musk’s SpaceX as the cornerstone of its official launch for the One NZ brand replacing Vodafone. It is the latest in a string of announcements from the mobile and satellite industries over the last eight months for projects where smartphones can directly use satellites for communication in areas where there is no mobile coverage.
There will be many use cases, but the recent impact from Cyclone Gabrielle on mobile services in affected areas shows how these advances will be of enormous assistance for any similar events in future. We are told by the climate scientists that we should expect more of them.
Industry players are adopting two quite different models as they position themselves in this space. Which leads to a number of questions about how services will be delivered, what smartphones will be supported and especially the robustness of emergency satellite-phone communications.
Model 1: Emergency SOS messaging using existing satellites
Several groups of partners
are following this model and either have launched or will do
so in 2023. While based on proven technologies, it is
limited thus far to Emergency Services SOS messages and is
only supported on recent or upcoming smartphones with
specific hardware support.
Apple is the first cab off
the rank with a smartphone-based service that is already
live in eleven countries (expanding over 2023 – although
no word yet for NZ). It has already been used to rescue
several people. Apple’s service is an SOS emergency
messaging service only for use when there is no mobile
network coverage. Users will need to have one of the recent
iPhone 14 models.
A built-in iPhone app guides the
user through the process. They answer a couple of
preformulated questions regarding their situation, align the
phone towards the nearest satellite and then send the
information along with GPS location and battery level of the
phone. It can take from 30 seconds to several minutes to
send the message to the nearest Low Earth Orbit (LEO)
satellite using existing satellite communications
channels.
The message goes to an earth relay centre
and is then forwarded to the relevant Emergency Services.
Apple has made a US$450m investment in the infrastructure of
its LEO satellite partner, Globalstar, to support this and
will have invested much more again in the mobile phone R&D.
Note that even though the Apple service is only live in a
limited number of countries so far, it can be used by any
iPhone 14 user from anywhere in the world who is in one of
those countries.
Garmin is one of the original
satellite SOS providers. It launched an Emergency Response
service in 2011 using the Iridium satellites to provide a
global SOS service on dedicated GPS handheld
devices.
This service has seen over 10,000 people rescued
all over the world including in NZ. Qualcomm, one of the
leading mobile chip vendors, partnered with Garmin and
Iridium to build this capability into chips and create an
Android app to manage the user interaction.
The
technology is available for any Android phone manufacturer
to build into their devices and Qualcomm expects devices to
be on sale in the second half of 2023 from the likes of
Oppo, Xiaomi and Motorola. Even though smartphones are
launching later than Apple’s iPhone 14, the coverage will
be global from day one.
Mediatek, another smartphone chip vendor, is also following this model but has to build it from scratch meaning a staged geographic rollout. The company is partnering with a new SOS messaging provider, Bullitt, and using Inmarsat Geosynchronous satellites. While there are a couple of Motorola and Caterpillar rugged smartphones launched already, the messaging service itself launches in the UK and Europe in April 2023 with the US and Canada to follow soon after but the rest of the world yet to be confirmed.
Model 2: New Generation Satellites acting as “cell sites in the sky”
This is the
preferred approach of the mobile network operators (MNOs)
and promises wider support across existing smartphones and
access to all existing mobile services. This model will use
the MNOs’ reserved mobile spectrum: the phone will treat
the satellite as simply another cell site.
The
standard being used here is called “3GPP 5G
Non-Terrestrial Network (NTN)”. But it requires
constellations of new satellites to be launched, core
network integration and won’t arrive until late 2024 with
SMS messaging that doesn’t specifically support SOS
messages to the Emergency Services. Emergency Services
contact will likely have to wait until voice calling is
supported in 2025.
In August last year T-Mobile (one
of the big three US mobile networks) announced a partnership
with Elon Musk’s SpaceX for a service that would allow a
wide range of new and legacy smartphones to use existing
mobile services via LEO satellites. Locally, in addition to
the One NZ announcement last week, we also saw 2degrees
announce its partnership with another LEO provider, Lynk.
Such announcements are happening around the world as MNO’s
partner with one or other of SpaceX, Lynk and other LEO
satellite providers.
Local timings are a bit vague:
One NZ says that a satellite-based SMS messaging service
could be launched before the end of next year with voice and
data services to follow in early 2025. 2degrees is only
saying that testing will take place over 2023 with “full
LEO satellite mobile services some way
away.”
Earlier this year Samsung said that it will
support MNOs and adopt the 3GPP 5G NTN standard although
they are saying that handsets will need new hardware in
order to work and as yet that is not included in any Samsung
models including the recently released Galaxy
S23.
Google has thus far provided very little detail
save for an announcement in September last year that Android
would gain support for satellite connectivity in Android 14
which is due out later this year. But it is not known what
approach the company will take.
Outstanding questions:
There is no doubt that these exciting
industry initiatives pave the way to a step change in
smartphone connectivity from remote locations that will be
extremely useful, but they also raise a number of
significant questions.
When will these new services be offered?
As stated above, Apple’s service is
already live in an expanding number of countries but there
is no word on when NZ will be included.
Qualcomm’s
Emergency SOS service based on the existing Garmin Emergency
Response service will operate on new Android phones that
should start appearing in the second half of 2023 from
various smaller manufacturers and presumably these could
start working immediately in NZ and globally.
All the
MNO’s and Samsung will have to wait until the supporting
satellites are launched with indications for an SMS text
messaging service to be live by the end of 2024 and voice
and data services to follow in early 2025.
What mobile services will be offered and how will users reach the Emergency Services?
Apple, Qualcomm and Mediatek
are focusing on a proprietary managed SOS messaging service
but there is no word on whether users will also be able to
send their own messages to friends and family, be able to
make voice calls or use mobile data.
The MNOs are
saying that they will start with standard SMS text messaging
in late 2024 but that emergency contact capability will come
with emergency voice calling that will follow later in 2025.
If an SMS only service is going to come first, then perhaps
the industry needs to develop a genuine 111 Emergency SMS
service which exists in some countries but not in
NZ.
Will new mobile phones be required?
Apple, Samsung and the two chip
vendors, Qualcomm and Mediatek, all seem to be aligned on
the requirement for new mobile devices that have specific
hardware support (antennae and chips) for satellite
communications. These four companies are major hardware
players in the mobile industry if they are all in agreement
around this then you’d be brave to take a contrary
position.
However, it would certainly be very useful
if, as claimed by the MNO’s and their LEO partners, a
wider range of existing smartphones will be able to
communicate with satellites. This would mean that users do
not need to upgrade to the latest smartphones to benefit
from these new satellite capabilities.
There is some
clarity that that will be required here and perhaps we will
have to wait until model-by-model testing can be done to
know exactly how many legacy smartphones will be supported
by the MNO model.
What if a phone supports more than one way to reach Emergency Services?
It looks
like compatible iPhones and Qualcomm and Mediatek based
Android phones will have two ways for the user to reach the
Emergency Services – managed SOS messaging and traditional
emergency calls. How will users know which method to use in
what situation or will the phone have one service
prioritized over the other? Perhaps both will co-exist with
Apple and Qualcomm seeing their managed SOS service as the
most robust but that users are also free to make an
emergency call if they prefer.
What will the services cost?
Apple is the only company to announce
pricing to date with the Emergency SOS service being free
for two years, but after that we do not know. This will make
it challenging for other providers to apply charges unless
they are offering significantly more capabilities such as
voice calling and data and perhaps Apple will expand to a
chargeable service across these other capabilities as
well.
There are costs to providing these services that
will need to be recovered but by being first in market with
a live service Apple may be making additional iPhone sales
and it is well known that the company’s margin per device
is far higher than any of the Android competitors. Premium
Android device manufacturers may have to absorb the costs of
providing some of these services for their smartphones to
remain competitive.
Even if Emergency Services contact
remains a free service there would certainly be additional
charges for the user to make their own calls, send SMS
messages or use mobile satellite
data.
Conclusion
111 Emergency Calling has
always been free of charge and very robust with any mobile
phone able to jump onto any of the mobile networks for
coverage if required. One NZ has already said that the same
will apply for its mobile to satellite calling service and I
would expect other providers to follow this approach,
although we will need to see how robust that channel is for
voice calls. But mobile to satellite communications
introduces Emergency SOS messaging as a key emergency
application and we do not yet have industry standards around
this. There is also a big question around exactly which
smartphones will support these new services.
All the companies working on these developments are doing great work and deserve our admiration and encouragement to get mobile to satellite services operational. But given the critical nature of the most important use case being emergency communications where there is no mobile coverage, we need confidence that the best approach will be adopted and coordinated across the industry so that vulnerable users are in the best possible position when the next major natural disaster hits us.
Tim Hayward Bio:
Tim has worked in mobile telecommunications for 25 years at Vodafone and 2degrees. He started as a Core Network Engineer and then moved to Product Development and Management across mobile data and smartphone platforms Blackberry, Android and iPhone. He has worked on Voice over WiFi and Voice over LTE, 4G and 5G development and most recently he developed and launched eSIM and Mobile Broadband 4G and 5G modems and a new modem management platform at 2degrees.
Smartphone to satellite communications
impressive but questions remain was first posted at
billbennett.co.nz.
Bill Bennett
Freelance journalist.
Auckland-based Bill Bennett writes technology and business stories that are directly relevant to New Zealand readers.
His emphasis is on telecommunications, but he also covers other aspects of technology and business. You can find his features in the New Zealand Herald and hear him regularly on RNZ Nine to Noon and the NZ Tech Podcast.
Bennett's The Download Weekly newsletter is published every Friday. You can sign up for it here.
If you want to support his work, you can make a donation to his PressPatron account.
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