5 telecom industry trends in 2022

If you caught our blog earlier this year, you’ll know the telecom industry is going through a rapid evolution. Mass digital transformation in all sectors is driving increased volume and complexity of data for telecom operators to manage, forcing many to adopt new technologies, digitize employee experiences, and enhance service offerings.

As with any significant industry shift, battles will be fought, and those with the ability to embrace the right tools and skills will not only avoid getting left behind, but also become significantly more competitive.

Beyond the pressing issue of cyber security (which is outside our area of expertise), here are 5 telecom industry trends we expect to continue to have a huge impact throughout 2022.

Widespread 5G

For a long time, the concept of 5G seemed almost like a distant dream, but the beginning of its standardization is not as far off as you might think. Countries all over the world are ramping up deployment of the infrastructure needed to achieve widespread coverage.

Telecoms is obviously at the heart of this, with 86% of network execs expecting advanced wireless to transform their organization in as little as 3 years. The wider bandwidth and speed of 5G will support immersive opportunities like VR and the Metaverse. Safe to say the potential of 5G and WiFi 6 is truly being recognized and embraced by the global industry.

Heavy reliance on A.I.

The capabilities of A.I. expand every single day. This is obviously something we see here at Intelygenz first hand, and the speed of advancement means it can be difficult to keep up. Advances in approaches such as Hyperautomation – where Big Data and A.I. based automation are combined – are quickly becoming routine in performing tasks and making better decisions at speed.

However, it’s worth remembering that every business has this same challenge to keep up, and those in telecoms that do adopt are slowly shifting A.I. from a nice-to-have to an essential.

Half of telecom companies that have already implemented A.I. have used it to automate processes and tasks¹ – achieving significant ROI and enhancing their competitiveness. Take our project for MetTel as a prime example.

¹https://aithority.com/technology/analytics/top-10-ai-powered-telecom-companies-in-world/

Growth in cloud platforms

This trend is one for every single industry, and telecom is no exception. From reduced costs to more seamless collaboration, telecoms firms are using cloud platforms to focus less on IT issues, and more on their essential business services.

This is clearly reflected in mass migration of communication service providers to the cloud, as hinted at by the projected market growth. By 2026, the telecom cloud market is set to hit a value of $74.36b².

²https://www.mordorintelligence.com/industry-reports/telecom-cloud-market

Embrace of Edge computing

This may seem counter to the previous trend, but there will also be an increased embrace of Edge computing. More telecom companies are recognizing that by storing certain data closer to home, they will gain access to what they need much more quickly and efficiently. Cloud-native platforms (CNP’s) are also making it even easier to build and deploy services and applications on the edge.

With this in mind, the approach to edge computing is likely to be a hybrid one, as businesses continue to leverage the cloud where needed. That being said, 2022 is likely to be the year that over half of enterprise generated data will be created and processed outside of data centers³.

³https://inform.tmforum.org/game-changing-technology/2020/02/a-5g-future-for-the-telecom-industry/

Even more IoT

The Internet of Things is far from a new concept, but the sheer number of connected devices will accelerate to never-before-seen levels in the next three years. Back in 2020, there were around 20b active devices globally, yet this is set to more than triple, with around 75b by 2025*.

This presents a huge opportunity for telecom firms, who can combine this growth with the increased adoption of Edge computing to achieve record profits in this year alone.

*https://www.atrebo.com/en/trends-in-telecom-for-2021/

Dive deeper with our free infographic

And that’s it! Need quick access to these trends, or want to share them with a colleague? Download our infographic for a free visual summary, complete with many more industry stats.