Cellular connectivity simplifies the shift from legacy systems to a scalable, reliable, and compliant digital infrastructure
by Ryan Lush
The world is increasingly moving away from the telephone service known as “plain old telephone service”, or POTS. It has been the standard telephone service all over the world since the public telephone system was introduced in the late 19th century and enabled voice (and later data) communications by transmitting analog signal over a twisted pair of copper wires.
This process is a part of the bigger trend of digitalization. As consumers and businesses shift to mobile and internet-based communication solutions, there has been a significant decrease in POTS usage, with the number of fixed telephone subscriptions constantly falling since 2009.
Telecommunication companies are transitioning to new digital technologies, as the latter have a number of advantages: they are more efficient in terms of bandwidth usage, they support voice, video and data services over the same infrastructure, offer higher quality voice calls and additional features. Transitioning to digital services also reduces operational and maintenance costs associated with aging copper networks. Besides, in many regions local regulatory changes encourage telecom providers to phase out outdated technologies and promote newer, more efficient communication systems.
For users, digital services like VoIP often come with lower costs, especially for long-distance and international calls. Moreover, they offer advanced features such as video calling and integration with other applications and unified communication. Switching from POTS is also important in the context of ensuring compatibility with future technologies and services.
In some countries, the timelines for this transition can be set by regulatory demands, like in the US, where the FCC issued a federal mandate requiring service providers to replace POTS lines with an alternative service. In other cases, it depends on telecom providers, such as Telefonica which plans to shut down the entire Spanish copper network by March 2026.
However, there are many applications where POTS lines are still used today, and many enterprises rely on them even after switching to digital telephony. For example, they are widely used for emergency, security and fire alarm services. They are commonly found in elevator emergency phones. Industries that still use fax machines need analog landlines, too. Finally, POTS lines may remain the primary means of communications in remote and rural areas with no or limited digital infrastructure.
In more complex scenarios, some enterprises use POTS lines for one-to-many (1-to-M) communications, such as in emergency notification systems or security monitoring services. They integrate POTS with digital voice technologies by using analog telephone adaptors (ATA), and technically, POTS lines in such cases are utilized for data transmission. These enterprises can greatly benefit from switching to other types of connectivity better suited to data service, as it may provide greater efficiency and reliability, as well as improved data transmission speeds.
Among various options that could replace POTS lines, cellular connectivity is one of the most universally applicable. Cellular networks are widely available, even in areas where traditional landline service may be limited, which makes them a practical solution for many users. Furthermore, enterprises have very different requirements depending on their industry, size and use case, and cellular connectivity can be easily customized to adapt to their needs.
Yet, when considering connectivity options for transition from POTS, it is important to keep in mind several requirements that may become quite challenging when implementing a new connectivity solution.
Reliability
One of the reasons why POTS lines are still in use is their reliability in terms of independence from external power sources: since they are powered from the central telephone exchange, phones or connected devices can function during power outages.
When replacing these lines with other connectivity solutions, it is critical to make sure the devices remain connected even if something happens to the provider’s network. Cellular connectivity stands out here due to its ability to switch between mobile networks. Cellular networks are virtually everywhere, and usually there are several mobile operators in any region, which means that connected devices can stay online even when one of the networks is down or the connection to it is unstable. This is also why cellular connectivity is oftentimes used as a backup to enhance the reliability of devices connected to the fixed infrastructure.
Scalability
Unlike outdated telephone systems that rely on costly and inflexible copper lines, modern communication infrastructures must easily scale to meet growing business demands and support an increasing number of users, devices, and applications. Cellular connectivity provides a cost-effective alternative to traditional copper lines for a fraction of the price, eliminating the need for expensive wiring and physical infrastructure. This is particularly advantageous in rural areas lacking fixed-line options and in urban environments where installing physical cables can be time-consuming and subject to regulatory hurdles. However, it is important to remember that certain use cases — such as those demanding low latency or strict regulatory compliance — require careful attention to core network architecture. The design of the core network, its reliability, security, and performance are critical to ensuring that a connectivity solution meets both technical and business objectives.
Compliance with Regulations
Ensuring compliance with telecommunications regulations can be complex when shifting to digital systems. While with uniform POTS infrastructure that was mainly transmitting voice communications there were almost no regulatory concerns related to data privacy and security, the compliance landscape for digital communications can be more intricate. Along with strictly technical aspects, there are general regulations on data transfer, privacy and sovereignty, as well as local regulations that need to be complied with. To make it worse, legislation is always subject to change. That means that enterprises may have problems down the line if their connectivity solution is not adaptive enough to comply with regulations.
Webbing Solution
Webbing offers global connectivity services that ensure access to reliable and high-quality internet, with low latency and the best of class coverage. It provides secure and continuous internet connection, delivering a streamlined, centralized, and scalable means of deploying, controlling and monitoring all kinds of devices at any location any SIM form factor with full Remote SIM Provisioning services capabilities included.
As a global MVNO, Webbing’s network of 600+ mobile operators guarantees world-wide coverage. It allows IoT devices to roam on several carriers’ network in every region, solving the problem of weak spots that any mobile network may have and ensuring full coverage and continuous connectivity for all connected devices, even at remote locations.
Webbing is a global connectivity provider, with a distributed full-core network with local breakouts and data server redundancy that can provide connectivity stability and low latency. As such, Webbing’s network is well suited to support all kinds of use cases, including mission-critical, high-data consumption scenarios. It also allows for all types of localization – from IP traffic that remains in the country to designated profiles for emergency calls, so it’s easy to comply with local and regional connectivity regulation requirements. Webbing can seamlessly localize deployments utilizing Remote SIM Provisioning even in heavily regulated markets.
A flexible approach to data packages allows us to tailor our connectivity offering for every customer based on the type of connected devices and their data consumption needs as well as the locations where the devices are used, aiming at overall optimization of the total cost of operations for the client.
Our solutions help enterprises overcome their connectivity problems and reduce time to market for global deployments, providing the benefits of roaming with multiple carrier options in every country, and seamless transition between carriers, while maintaining low rates and low latency on a global scale with a single SIM.
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