CES Drives the Next Wave of Wi-Fi 6E Innovation

The Wi-Fi market saw a large number of announcements during CES 2021, particularly in routers, chipsets, adapters, and smartphones. A number of companies announced Wi-Fi 6 and Wi-Fi 6E solutions, expanding their offerings into the new protocols to provide the highest quality Wi-Fi connectivity currently possible. Wi-Fi 6, which is now becoming mainstream, provides higher speed connectivity than previous iterations, and also offers upgrades in terms of coverage, power consumption, and scalability. Other features include Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access (OFDMA), which segments bandwidth into smaller sub-channels to allow more devices to communicate simultaneously; Target Wake Time (TWT), which communicates the optimal wake time for data transmission between devices and access points to reduce power consumption; Basic Service Set (BSS) coloring, which colorizes data from individual access points to provide device identification and support larger numbers of devices; and 8x8 MU-MIMO, which allows access points to support more devices simultaneously. These new products are helping to accelerate growth, and ABI Research expects that over 838 million Wi-Fi 6 chipsets will ship in 2021.

Wi-Fi 6E extends Wi-Fi 6 into the 6 GHz band, offering access to a larger spectrum, wider channels, and decreased interference. In particular, the 6 GHz band nearly quadruples the amount of bandwidth available, allowing a larger number of devices to be supported in a small area. It also improves the speed, reliability, scalability, and resilience of the network compared to Wi-Fi 6. As the early Wi-Fi 6E products come to the market, the next wave of Wi-Fi innovation is beginning, with more products expected to be released throughout the year. ABI Research expects that over 126 million Wi-Fi 6E chipsets will ship in 2021.

The Wi-Fi 6 announcements at CES 2021 included:

• CommScope – CommScope is expanding its consumer ARRIS SURFboard routers, now including the mesh nodes SURFboard mAX and SURFboard mAX Express. The routers are designed to deliver whole-home Wi-Fi 6 coverage with tri-band connectivity, with the third band consisting of a dedicated 4x4 Wi-Fi 6 radio band for backhauling. Each router provides up to 6.6 Gbps of speed, and together they cover up to 5,500 ft2. The company is also debuting its new SURFboard Central app which provides self-management of Wi-Fi networks within the home.
• D-Link – D-Link has released a Wi-Fi 6 adapter built into a USB stick for laptops and desktop computers, providing speeds of up to 1.2 Gbps. The company has also announced two Wi-Fi 6 mesh routers, the AI M32, which is a dual-band mesh system with speeds of up to 2.3 Gbps; and the DIR-LX1870, which offers a combined speed of 1.8 Gbps.

The Wi-Fi 6E router announcements at CES 2021 included:

• Linksys – Linksys launched a tri-band Wi-Fi 6E AXE8400 mesh router, powered by Qualcomm’s Networking Pro chipset series. It offers speeds of 1.2 Gbps in the 2.4 GHz band, 2.4 Gbps in the 5 GHz band, and 4.8 Gbps in the 6 GHz band (typically reserved for backhaul networking, leaving the other bands for devices), for a total of 8.4 Gbps. It also offers 4x4 MU-MIMO and OFDMA. It has been designed for bandwidth-heavy homes, supporting up to 64 devices simultaneously over 3,000 ft2, useful for work-from-home video conferencing, VR gaming, remote learning, and more. The AXE8400 also supports Linksys Aware, the company’s Wi-Fi motion sensing technology, and features updates to the functionality available on the app.
• Netgear – Netgear has launched the Wi-Fi 6E tri-band Nighthawk RAXE500 router, which is designed to provide faster speeds, smoother streaming, less interference, and improved latency to provide a better overall experience for devices. The device utilizes four streams per band to provide a top speed of 10.8 Gbps.
• TP-Link – TP-Link has launched a new Wi-Fi 6E standalone router, the Archer AX96, and two new mesh systems, the Deco 96 and Deco 76 Plus. The Deco 96 is a tri-band mesh unit that provides a top speed of 6.6 Gbps and can support up to 200 devices, while the Deco 76 Plus provides a top speed of 5.4 Gbps and can support up to 150 devices. The Archer AX96 provides a top speed of 7.8 Gbps over eight streams.
• Asus – Asus has released a Wi-Fi 6E router, the ROG Rapture GT-AXE 11000, in association with Skyworks. It is designed to provide speeds of up to 11 Gbps and is available for pre-order.

The Wi-Fi 6E chipset announcements at CES 2021 included:

• Intel – Intel has launched a Wi-Fi 6E chipset platform for laptops as part of its latest Intel vPro release, which is designed to provide a thin and light laptop experience for businesses, providing a platform for productivity and collaboration. The technology will be up to six times faster in an office environment and up to three times faster in a home compared to Wi-Fi 5 solutions, due to the addition of the 6 GHz band and its 160 MHz channels.
• Qorvo – Qorvo has released two new Wi-Fi 6E compact front-end modules, the QPF4656 and QPF4632, which are designed for consumer and enterprise Wi-Fi access points. The products are designed to be 25% more power efficient and more compact than previous iterations, improving cost, size, and thermal issues.

The Wi-Fi 6E smartphone announcements and other Wi-Fi related announcements at CES 2021 included:

• Samsung – Samsung has released a Wi-Fi 6E smartphone, the Galaxy S21 Ultra, powered by the Broadcom BCM4389 Wi-Fi 6E chipset. It includes seven Wi-Fi and Bluetooth radios, with support for two streams of Wi-Fi 6E, speeds of over 2 Gbps, and support for 160 MHz channels, OFDMA, and MU-MIMO.
• Atlantic Broadband and Plume – Atlantic Broadband and Plume have joined together to launch a whole-home Wi-Fi service, WiFi Your Way. The solution includes HomePass residential services and Wi-Fi mesh SuperPods to provide security, parental control, motion sensing, and other features, and provides a management option for consumers.

It is clear to see that companies within the Wi-Fi market are supporting the push towards offering Wi-Fi 6 and Wi-Fi 6E solutions across a range of devices, including routers, laptops, and chipsets. Wi-Fi is an essential technology for many devices and applications, allowing multiple devices to simultaneously generate and send large quantities of data. It is expected and recommended that other companies will begin to offer Wi-Fi 6 and/or Wi-Fi 6E solutions to remain competitive and provide customers with access to improved connectivity.

COVID-19 has highlighted the need to introduce more services centered on work-from-home, ensuring that Wi-Fi networks are of high quality and can support a large number of different devices and applications. Post-COVID, many people are expected to continue to work from home, highlighting the need for this high-quality connectivity to become a permanent solution. Device vendors, chipset designers, networking product designers, and service providers must all ensure that all solutions can support this increased use of Wi-Fi connectivity, supporting new protocols as they are added.

These companies must be aware of the challenges surrounding these new protocols, including regional regulations, cost, and development time. Along with this, the addition of the 6 GHz band presents extra challenges, particularly surrounding lack of available solutions and infrastructure. It will likely take time for consumers and enterprises to upgrade their systems and devices to Wi-Fi 6E, making it difficult for companies to get an early footprint in the market. However, once these challenges are overcome and the number of devices compatible with the new protocols increases, the market will see significant opportunities and growth, with Wi-Fi 6 seeing device shipments increase from 394 million in 2020 to 3 billion in 2025, and Wi-Fi 6E shipments increasing from 24 million in 2020 to 1.4 billion in 2025.