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Thread: Flow LTE

  1. #731
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    Quote Originally Posted by Brandysull View Post
    Well this is EXCELLENT, this would mean that Band 12 will likely serve as the VoLTE layer. Good god, FLOW's network looks to be a behemoth... if that happens to be deployed in Kingston & St. Andrew, combined theoretical speed (vis 3CA) would hit 337.5 Mbit/s. Digicel is in serious trouble... save for the rare edge of cell instance, FLOW will likely serve better speed and network consistency after deployment in sparse and dense geographies. They've now practically lost their geographic advantage.
    Yes it is, hoping they will use it for VoLTE in Kingston and St Andrew. Also what about using it to provide additional in building penetration in Kingston and St Andrew as well?. Also whats the timeline for LTE A in Kingston and will it be isolated to specific areas, or will all of Kingston be covered in LTE-A?. I remember asking about a timeline for HD Voice, and Flow responded that I should stay tuned. That sounds promising, so I hope we can get an improved voice quality to go with the unlimited talk and text plans they promoting.

  2. #732
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    Insofar as the prepaid market is concerned - which constitutes the bulk of the market - Digicel has nothing to fear. Flow already offers superior speeds, and yet it has been steadily LOSING customers. Tripling current speeds, while maintaining the same package offerings, will hardly alter the status quo.

    Presently, using Digicel, I can download a 100mb file in 1 minute on average, and about 20secs on a good day. Those speeds, given pricing, are more than sufficient for my needs.

    Seems to me that price sensitivity is the dominant determinant, and here Digicel comes up trumps: Their smorgasbord of offerings is tailored to suit the market. With a little creative imagination it's very easy to build a nice package at a very affordable price.

    Until Flow is able to shake its traditionally elitist tendency - a seeming compunction to demand top dollar for the slightest incremental technological improvement - it will always be second-best. Unless, perhaps, its ultimate aim is to abandon the retail market

  3. #733
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    Quote Originally Posted by Makara View Post
    Insofar as the prepaid market is concerned - which constitutes the bulk of the market - Digicel has nothing to fear. Flow already offers superior speeds, and yet it has been steadily LOSING customers. Tripling current speeds, while maintaining the same package offerings, will hardly alter the status quo.
    FLOW may very well be aiming to sell capacity on their mobile network. I dont see them attracting customers with faster speeds. People will always perceive them as the same old LIME. I suspect they are better off launching a prepaid unlimited MVNO and compete with themselves. Otherwise they wasting money with all these speeds.

  4. #734
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    Quote Originally Posted by Nathan77791 View Post
    Yes it is, hoping they will use it for VoLTE in Kingston and St Andrew. Also what about using it to provide additional in building penetration in Kingston and St Andrew as well?. Also whats the timeline for LTE A in Kingston and will it be isolated to specific areas, or will all of Kingston be covered in LTE-A?. I remember asking about a timeline for HD Voice, and Flow responded that I should stay tuned. That sounds promising, so I hope we can get an improved voice quality to go with the unlimited talk and text plans they promoting.
    They did say end-of-November for faster LTE speeds in a number of places to include KMA. I do expect VoLTE to follow by next year given that Band 12 is already rolling out. Band 12 will certainly be the backbone for any VoLTE offerings as it is solely for keeping customers off of 850 MHz HSPA+ and the now single 1900 MHz HSPA+ carrier. This is even more evident in FLOW's Carrier package on iOS 12 which Cable & Wireless has removed 2G from the selectable options. You can only disable & enable LTE... that's it.

  5. #735
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    Quote Originally Posted by Makara View Post
    Insofar as the prepaid market is concerned - which constitutes the bulk of the market - Digicel has nothing to fear. Flow already offers superior speeds, and yet it has been steadily LOSING customers. Tripling current speeds, while maintaining the same package offerings, will hardly alter the status quo.

    Presently, using Digicel, I can download a 100mb file in 1 minute on average, and about 20secs on a good day. Those speeds, given pricing, are more than sufficient for my needs.

    Seems to me that price sensitivity is the dominant determinant, and here Digicel comes up trumps: Their smorgasbord of offerings is tailored to suit the market. With a little creative imagination it's very easy to build a nice package at a very affordable price.

    Until Flow is able to shake its traditionally elitist tendency - a seeming compunction to demand top dollar for the slightest incremental technological improvement - it will always be second-best. Unless, perhaps, its ultimate aim is to abandon the retail market

    Well, FLOW does pride itself on being a premium provider (don't ask me how they intend to keep that going because...) but on the mobile front, they do actually have a reason to ask for top dollar on it... FLOW's LTE network is now analogous to Verizon & T-Mobile's LTE network, using the same equipment that they do (Ericsson ERS platform among others...pretty expensive stuff). Again, FLOW's network will now peak at 337.5 Mbit/s thanks to smart acquisitions and even smarter pricing strategies.

    Moreover, what should be noted is that FLOW's LTE network is crucial for the company's continuation and success as they're now shuttering their 2G network quietly. They, in addition with banks & other stakeholders, are moving POS terminals in a number of locations to 3G. M2M still accounts for a large portion of the company's revenues on the business side and to mess with that would be erasing revenues.

    Like, AT&T in the US and bmobile in Trinidad & Tobago, FLOW will soon no longer have 2G to divert voice or data traffic to which means more reliance on 3G for basic service and LTE as the acceptable standard come 2019/2020. It would be frankly silly to think that FLOW can nickel & dime and flout net-neutrality like Digicel and still provide excellent LTE coverage. Have we not seen the constant complaints of slow LTE in Kingston & St. Andrew?

    Truthfully, I feel better paying 5k a month on a network that I know I can depend on for providing me top notch data connectivity with zero slowdowns but I am just ONE part of a diverse market mix in Jamaica. I think Jamaica has a lot of maturing to do and perhaps they share the same view. Nevertheless, a number of people use FLOW nowadays... like, A LOT.
    Last edited by Brandysull; Nov 8, 2018 at 11:11 AM.

  6. #736
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    So, here we have 2 tests of the competencies of FLOW & Digicel's LTE networks.



    Here is Digicel's LTE Advanced network in Montego Bay hitting a respectable 86 Mbit/s with carrier aggregation on Band 17 and Band 4 by Doctor's Cave/Starbucks.



    Here is FLOW on Band 4 only earlier in the year with a good 88 Mbit/s at that same location. Here is FLOW with Band 4 and Band 2 aggregated just down the road from there.



    The difference will be getting MUCH bigger between the two and I'm loving the competition on all sides of the island.

  7. #737
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    @Brandy a lot should be minimum 1 million people not less. Flow does not have a million subs. Not even sure if even half their subs use data plans

  8. #738
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    Quote Originally Posted by 876 View Post
    @Brandy a lot should be minimum 1 million people not less. Flow does not have a million subs. Not even sure if even half their subs use data plans
    FLOW has 900+ mobile subs but, factoring in M2M, it is north of 1 million mobile devices on its network.

  9. #739
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    Competition is crucial. I want Flow to do well in the retail market; otherwise Digicel is likely to misbehave. I'm not sure a business model predicated on premium services is suitable in an economic environment as anemic as ours: Remittances represent our largest source of hard-currency inflows. I don't know who these persons are, and what exactly they're doing with their phones, who are supposedly clamoring for ultra-fast speeds. I mean, so long as streamed media plays promptly and smoothly, sans buffering, you're still going to need 10 mins to watch a 10 min clip; and regular downloads are still dependent on the remote server. The point is, as someone else indicated, these hypersonic speeds, for the retail market, are largely unnecessary. And if we're talking about network reliability, my experience is that Digicel is light years ahead: I use Digicel almost exclusively for data and I honestly cannot recall the last service disruption, whilst Flow, when they were the preferred service provider,never failed to falter at least once per month. Not so long ago I could purchase 1gb of nite-time data from Digicel for $20 - this would allow me to update my o/s and apps, and download the latest episodes of my favorite shows, along with a few podcasts - the cost is now $50, still reasonable but a significant jump. This is why, for selfish reasons, I want Flow to provide effective competition. At the moment, I genuinely fear for my pocket

  10. #740
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    Quote Originally Posted by Brandysull View Post
    FLOW has 900+ mobile subs but, factoring in M2M, it is north of 1 million mobile devices on its network.
    I am wondering what is causing digicel to be having so many issues tho. As their lte network is down in Kingston since morning. Called them and they confirmed that alot of their sites offline

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