Enhanced Voice Service (EVS) technology is continuing to be steadily introduced by operators and vendors, with a small ecosystem of device suppliers now also supporting the technology. The number of telecoms operators known by GSA to be investing in the technology has increased to 25 since our last report in September 2018, with EVS deployments in Africa, Asia, Europe, and the USA. The growing interest in EVS in the operator world has been reciprocated by device launches by the vendors. We have managed to identify 169 EVS-enabled devices in the market, all of them phones. This is a rise compared to the 153 devices included in our September 2018 report. Enhanced voice services are often being marketed around the world using the terms ‘HD Voice Plus’ or ‘Ultra HD Voice’.
As of May 2019:
- 25 operators are known to have been investing in EVS demonstrations, planned launches or launches.
- At least 21 and possibly 23 of those operators have introduced EVS services in their mobile networks.
- 169 EVS enabled mobile handsets are currently available in the market, from a set of 16 vendors.
EVS (Enhanced Voice Services) codec overview
The EVS codec was developed within 3GPP as part of Release 12 and offers HiFi call quality for speech and audio alike. EVS is the first 3GPP conversational codec offering up to 20 kHz audio bandwidth, delivering speech quality that matches other audio input such as stored music. In addition, EVS increases call reliability and network efficiency due to its high robustness against packet loss.
Operators investing in EVS around the world
At present, GSA is aware of 25 telecom operators in the world that are or have been investing in EVS. At least 21 and possibly 23 of them already offer commercial services to their customers. Since the last report in September 2018 GSA has identified six launches including A1 (Austria), Orange (Romania), Play (Poland), Sprint (USA), Vodacom (South Africa) and Vodafone (India). Two of those launches are subject to confirmation (Vodafone India and Sprint USA).
©2019 GSA
