Tantra's Mantra with Prakash Sangam

Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) has been a growing trend recently and became a norm during the pandemic. The biggest driver for this trend has been the upfront cost savings for the enterprises. A recent Oxford Economics report commissioned by Samsung analyzes the phenomenon with Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) approach and casts doubt on the perceived cost savings. In this episode, I discuss the study'...

In this episode, I interview Chris Pearson, President of 5G Americas, the US cellular operator and vendor organization. The discussion includes the opportunites and challenges of 5G Americas. as well as how the next phase of 5G and 6G will take shape in the USA. 

Discussion with Qualcomm RAN product marketing head Gerardo Giaretta on why in-line accelerators are needed for 5G virtualized and Open RAN deployments and their collaboration announcements done at MWC 2022. For reference, check out our previous podcast and articles on the subject below: Forbes: What It Takes To Build Modern 5G Open Radio Networks (Open RAN)  HPE and Qualcomm announcement signifie...

Samsung Networks had lots of news before, during and after Mobile World Congress 2002. I go behind the headlines with its head of Marketing and Business Development, Derek Johnston to discuss what that means for the company and the industry at large.  Check out this article on Samsung Networks' growth tragectery - https://bit.ly/3GSI2YY    

The discussion about 5G Private Networks often revolves around Ultra-Reliable Low Latency Communication (URLLC) and how such networks are a perfect match. In this episode, I chat with Dr. Mehmet Yavuz, CTO, and co-founder of Celona, a leading Private Network solution provider, to answer the question, "Wait for URLLC or deploy them today?" Additionally, address the perennial question, "What does a...

In this episode, I discuss the mmWave RoI report and its specifics with its lead author Stephen Rose of Bell Labs Consulting. The discussion revolves around the methodology, findings, and the value of the report cellular operators and industry at large. As a reference, here is my article summarizing the findings of the report published on RCR Wireless News Can 5G mmWave deployments be profitable?...

Once famous for its simplicity, Wi-Fi has gotten increasingly complex, with many spectrum bands, (2.4 GHz, two bands of 5 GHz, 6 GHz & more to come) new topologies (e.g. Mesh), a diverse mix of devices, applications, and use cases, each requiring varied needs of speed, bandwidth, latency, etc. This has made managing even simple home Wi-Fi very difficult for the average consumer. In this podcas...

Learn more about what, why, and how of 5G Advanced, especially regarding the new and exciting areas it is exploring—Artificial Intelligence, Full Duplex Operation, and Network Power Saving. Each of these has its challenges when it comes to standardization. I discuss with Dr. Tingfang Ji of Qualcomm what 3GPP is looking to study and standardize, including specific features and possible performance...

While automobiles are being transformed from mechanical machines to electromechanical gadgets driven by SoCs and software, the trend is to move from 10s of single-function, limited-capability microcontroller-based ECUs to fewer high-performance SoC-based domain controllers. Stefan Buerkle , SVP Sales at Bosch USA, and Shyam Krishnamurthy   VP & Head of Auto business at Qualcomm discuss the dri...

A detailed discussion with the incoming chairman of 3GPP's largest group RAN - Technical Standards Group (RAN-TSG) regarding 5G Advanced and beyond, his vision for 5G evolution, his priorities, challenges, and opportunities, and how 3GPP is well poised to go beyond smartphone market into many industry verticals. Also, please check out my two ongoing article series related to 3GPP and standards: ht...

An in-depth discussion with Jeni Panhorst VP & GM of Intel, on the latest trends in the Networking and EdgeCould market, what are the challenges the ecosystem is facing, and how Intel's latest 3rd Gen Xeon Scalable processors can address them. The Xeon Scalable 3rd Gen processors were announced at a recent event titled " How Wonderful Gets Done ."  

Defying expectations, rural 5G is attracting a lot of attention. FCC has set up a sizable "5G Fund" to help rural cellular carriers to expand the reach of 5G in the rural parts of the country. In this episode, I discuss with Michael Irizarry - CTO of US Cellular, opportunities, challenges, and the driving forces behind rural 5G. ---------------------------------------------------------------------...

Small coverage footprint is one of the major challenges of mmWave bands. They require hyper-dense deployments to be effective. But bringing fiber backhaul to these is very expensive as well as time-consuming. Integrated Access Backhauls (IABs) introduced in 3GPP Rel. 16 solve that issue. It's not just IABs, you will also need Self Interference Cancellation (SLIC) implemented in them to maximize th...

Intel is a leading provider of the solutions to virtualized networks--both core and RAN. In this wide ranging discussion, I talk to Caroline Chan, VP and GM of Intel's 5G Infrastructure Division (Network Platform Group) about Intel's vRAN and Open RAN journey so far, quiz her about what makes her think the market forces are aligning to make these new architectures mainstream, and how Intel is acce...

Qualcomm was a major cellular infrastructure player in the CDMA days, but only had a limited Small Cell offerings in 4G. It all changed with their recent announcement of 5G RAN solutions for virtualized and open radio networks. In this episode, I talk to Gerardo Giaretta of Qualcomm to understand the reasons behind this new development as well as the overall vRAN and Open RAN market landscape.

Patent evaluation is a complex process. Many industry observers usually take an easy route and use simple patent counting to decide technology or market leadership, completely disregarding the quality of the patents they hold. But when it comes to patents, we know that quality matters much more than simple quantity. In this episode I talk to the head of a leading patent evaluation firm Patent Sigh...

After many years of discussions and token deployments, Open and virtualized RAN (Open RAN and vRAN) architectures are seeing lot of market interest and traction. In this interview podcast, we discuss their suitability for 5G, drivers, current status, and future trends, as well details about Samsung's recently announced Open and vRAN offerings.

The cosmic combination of 5G and AI will play a key role in the future of robotics. In this interview with Dev Singh, the head of robotics business at Qualcomm, I go behind the market speak and hyperbole to discuss the current trends, exciting applications and services they are currently working on, and how their recently announced cutting edge robotics platform, RB5, will deliver on the promise o...

A recent report ranked the global telecom companies based on how many 5G Standard Essential Patents (SEPs) each of those companies owned. Many industry observers and media wrongly equate patent holding to technology leadership. This podcast takes a deep dive into the perils of simple "patent counting" and explains how SEP designation works. It also explores why patent quality is more important tha...

Exploring the motivations behind the formation of this new group Open RAN Policy Coalition  and the prognosis for 5G infrastructure business in the USA, in view of security concerns and Huawei ban.  The coalition includes who's who of US Tech industry -- Cloud giants, Compute majors, Chipset leaders, and Global Operators.