When it comes to designing wireless devices, there are only two sure bets: Another new technology is always just around the corner, and its arrival will make it tougher than ever to choose the right one(s).
Part of the challenge is FOMO: fear of missing out on a technology that provides a competitive edge, enables new use cases, becomes the market dominator or all of the above. That fear leads to a sense of YOLO: you only live once — or rather your device does. If the new technology turns out to be the next big thing, it’s impractical or impossible to upgrade all of the devices in the field. Sure, you can add the module and antenna in a new SKU, but a redesign can be expensive and time consuming.
Here’s how to overcome FOMO and YOLO and avoid bloating your device with technologies that don’t add value to end users or your bottom line.
Less Can Be More
To understand the benefits of being judicious, take the example of devices with embedded antennas, which rely on the PCB to serve as their ground plane. The choice of RF technology — such as cellular, GNSS, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and so on — determines the bands that the antennas must support and thus the ground plane size requirements. (For a deeper dive, see “Top Tips for Ensuring Your PCB Maximizes Antenna and Application Performance.”
The more RF technologies that a device supports, the more difficult it becomes to create a PCB big enough to provide an adequate ground plane and still fit the form factor — especially if the device is small, such as a wearable or asset tracker. This can result in having to redesign the PCB or the device, or switching from an off-the-shelf antenna to a custom one, if testing reveals that it isn’t meeting RF performance requirements. Those changes increase development costs and can delay the device’s market launch.
One way to avoid these problems is by determining whether a single technology can do the job of multiple ones. For example, an Industrial IoT (IIoT) device might not need Wi-Fi if it’s designed for applications where 4G or 5G is available. Many factories are already migrating away from Wi-Fi and/or Ethernet in favor of private 4G/5G networks for reasons such as greater data security and the ability to support mobile applications such autonomous guided vehicles (AGVs).
For those customers, new Wi-Fi technologies such as HaLow or Wi-Fi 7 may be superfluous. For OEMs, eliminating Wi-Fi can free up PCB space and allow designers to focus their time and budget on other aspects of the device.
Need for Speed?
Another pitfall to avoid is fixating on speed. Like a car, there’s no point in paying a hefty premium for one capable of 100 mph or 200 kmh if you’ll rarely have the opportunity to get above the speed limit.
For example, 5G expanded cellular to the mmWave bands, enabling speeds (up to 20 Gbps) that aren’t possible at lower, traditional frequencies. 6G will pioneer terahertz spectrum to raise the bar to 100 Gbps while enabling new types of use cases, such as integrated sensing. (For more details, see “What is 6G?”)
mmWave 5G or 6G aren’t justifiable if customers’ existing and potential applications don’t require those speeds. Sub-6 GHz 5G can be easier and cheaper to implement and sufficiently fast for the vast majority of wearables, IoT nodes and other devices.
Sometimes sheer geographic coverage is a top priority in terms of customer roaming requirements or the device’s addressable market. In those cases, 4G alone might be the best option. As of May 2025, there are twice as many LTE networks worldwide than 5G. And remember what LTE stands for: Long Term Evolution. It’s still adding capabilities, such as NB-IoT in 3GPP Release 13 and then an upgrade to NB-IoT itself in Release 14. (For more guidance, see “Choosing the Right LTE Standard for IoT Applications.”)
LTE Cat 1 bis is an ideal choice for IoT applications where long battery life and global coverage are top priorities. Mobile operators do not have to have to make any changes to their RAN or core network to support Cat 1 bis devices, unlike alternatives such as LTE-M. As a result, Cat 1 bis devices can connect to any LTE network — provided, of course, that they meet operator and regulator certification requirements and have a subscription. Cat 1 bis also requires only one antenna, thus reducing design complexity and cost. (For a deeper dive, see “LTE Cat 1 bis Explained: The Future of IoT Connectivity.”)
Here Today, Gone Tomorrow?
RF history is littered with technologies that looked like the next big thing but then failed to develop enough market share. A prime example is WiMAX, which initially looked like an ideal fit for mobile broadband and IoT applications such as smart meters before being displaced by LTE, which was the natural 4G evolutionary step for GSM/GPRS/UMTS operators.
WiMAX shows that it’s difficult for an upstart technology to dethrone the heir apparent to the family of technologies with dominant global market share. CDMA operators eventually joined their former GSM rivals in migrating to LTE — including Sprint, which built and then abandoned a WiMAX network.
Like operators, module vendors are continually evaluating their portfolios to determine which products or technologies to keep and which ones to EOL or divest. For example, earlier this year one major module vendor sold off its cellular and cellular-satellite businesses.
Taoglas works with a wide variety of module vendors and technologies. Device OEMs and systems integrators can leverage that engineering and marketplace expertise to choose the right technologies and components and avoid unnecessary complexity and cost. Get in touch with our Engineering team today by clicking the link below.
