Mobile communications going massive

Mobile communications have undergone an amazing development over the last few decades, with new generations coming out roughly every ten years. Each transition from one generation to the next has brought new capabilities and improved technology. The first generation was based on analogue technology and supported only traditional phone calls, while subsequent generations have become increasingly digital, making them more efficient, flexible and capable. Today a mobile phone is much less “a phone” than it is a centre for our social networks, a diary, a personal assistant, a camera, and the way we keep updated on the latest news. No matter how we measure the development of mobile communications, curves tend to show exponential growth without signs of slowdown. In this sense it is obvious that mobile communications are “going massive”, but it is a different aspect of going massive on which this text focuses. Current estimates show that worldwide mobile data traffic will grow from a current 3 ExaBytes per month (3 000 000 000 000 000 000 Bytes) to around 20 ExaBytes per month (20 000 000 000 000 000 000 Bytes) by the year 20201. There are no existing systems that can efficiently supply this increase in