How VoWiFi can solve the quality and network coverage issue

We have witnessed a huge reforms in telecom industry in span of just few years. Wireless technologies have experienced an abrupt growth in telco industry and has also gained trust of many people. Even the telecom operators have embraced this technology with full zeal as a tribute to mobile data and voice services.

No doubt, VoWifi became mobile operator’s best friend as it solved quality and network coverage issues. But before we go into details let’s see what is VoWiFi. VoWiFi uses WiFi for access but the PS network for guaranteeing the quality of service (QoS). VoWiFi also called Voice over Wi-Fi is a term that is used to describe delivery of telephony services based on Voice over IP technologies from mobile phones connected across Wi-Fi. Voice over Wi-Fi is counter to Voice over LTE in which licensed spectrum mobile network operators is used to carry packetized voice.

Sometimes due to weak cellular reception in homes, office etc. many users get frustrated. Poor indoor coverage is the worst nightmare but with the inception of VoWiFi, the problem is solved. VoWiFi facilitated users to make and receive calls reliably even when indoors without having to install new equipment or upgrade their smartphone. VoWiFi increases the quality of services overcoming the poor or no network coverage from Operators which leads to customer satisfaction. As most of the calls on mobiles are made indoor, due to weak signal issues many customers were dissatisfied and end up leaving that particular network.

The most recent survey from uSwitch revealed that in U.K, 62% of total mobile users experienced poor call quality and 50% said that the call drops when they are trying to make calls at homes. Mobile operators cannot do anything for it, as there are some building in which the signals do not penetrate and sometimes signals are very poor to reach indoors. SO in order to facilitate users and get them out of the stress of making call, VoWiFi was integrated. Now people can make calls to their loved ones by using some social apps such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Skype and other by using the WiFi facility. uSwitch also analyzed that out of total users who had coverage issues at their homes, 39% used landlines, 30% had to go out, 11% had lean out of the window and 27% users OTT services for making calls successfully.

The best thing about VoWiFi is that it neither require the upgradation of smartphones nor an installation of any new equipment. According to GSMA, there are 50 VoWiFi services available in 31 countries. Moreover VoWiFi not only overcomes indoor voice coverage issues but also guarantees best users experience in different environments be it indoor or outdoor. This service has attracted many customers who had shifted to OTT services due to bad cellular coverage in their respective areas.

Operators adopted VoWiFi to complement their VoLTE services as both the services powers the same IP multimedia subsystems. VoWiFi when delivered as an App is like VoIP call on the data network. This app allows Wi-Fi calls to be delivered over WiFi but it also over mobile data. The app can function as an individual Wi-Fi calling app or can be integrated with native dialer to make regular calls.

To make VoWiFi acceptable to more people, it should deliver excellent quality calls over access networks with variable bandwidth resources. So the VoWiFi app should be designed with a reliable codec such as SILk that can adjust just accordingly to bandwidth conditions. There is also need of proper monitoring in such a way that the app switches itself when it finds stronger signal and at the same time maintain continuous service between Wi-Fi and mobile networks.

Nowadays VoWiFi is successfully improving the customer experience for the users who have in-building coverage issues with 3G and 4G data services. Time is near, when VoWiFi will provide the foundation for an abundance of the latest solutions that may be launched quickly and cost-effectively, particularly with virtualized solutions, designed from scratch for cloud surroundings.