Last month the US made headlines when President Donald Trump urged American wireless technology companies to step up their efforts to build next-generation data networks, saying he wanted “5G, and even 6G, technology in the United States as soon as possible.”
6G? We haven’t even gotten 5G yet, and is there even such a thing as 6G? It depends on how you look at it. No specifications have been defined for 6G which currently exists only as a theoretical concept.
The International Telecommunications Union, a United Nations body that deals with global telecom issues, has a working group studying what 6G might be. The group’s name, “Network 2030”, is clear indication just how far off 6G is.
“6G is not defined yet,” Richard Li, the head of the group, said last year. “I’m going to act like a wily fox and let other people define it.”
So, it’s probably pretty safe to say that what Trump was referring to when he said 6G was the advanced data network of the future that succeeds 5G.
Although there is no official definition of 6G, most telecoms experts say that it should have speeds of up to 1Tb per second. This is almost unimaginable speed. To give you some perspective, it means you could download about 100 movies in less than a second.
Being that it’s more than a decade away, it makes more sense to look at what 5G, which is expected to roll out this year or next year, has to offer. But before we do that, I think it’s worthwhile to take a trip down memory lane and recall the journey of the “G’s”.
1G was introduced in the late 1980s, allowing us to make simple calls on mobile phones. 2G came next, in the 1990s offering mor secure lines and allowing for the first data service in the form of SMS messaging.
3G arrived in 2003, giving us mobile Internet access and paving the way for the smartphone revolution. 4G was released in 2012, bringing broadband to the mobile phone. Suddenly it was possible to stream content to the phone, opening up new business models for music, movies and other content-related industries.
THE DAWN OF 5G
And now, we are about to get 5G, which is not just the next step in the mobile network’s evolution but a great leap forward. It will permeate almost every aspect of our lives, connecting people, buildings, vehicles and other infrastructure. It will make the Internet of Things possible and revolutionise the way business is done. O2 research last year estimated that 5G could create over £6 billion of efficiency savings for UK cities, with innovation including smart energy grids and traffic management systems.
So, what is 5G exactly? It’s basically mobile connectivity that offers much, much faster data download and upload speeds than what’s currently possible under 4G. Chipmaker Qualcomm expects 5G speeds to be up to 20 times faster in a real-world situation.
Some countries have said they expect the roll-out to happen this year but most likely we will see mass roll-out by next year.
The obvious question consumers would have is: Will I need a new phone? The short answer is yes. Of course your existing phone will continue to work with the 4G network that you are using now but if you want to take advantage of the speeds offered by 5G, you will need a new phone (which will also work with 4G networks).
Perhaps the next obvious question is whether 5G will be the final nail in the coffin of fixed lines? As it is, many consumers forego fixed line telephones for phone calls but many still used fixed line broadband because fibre to the home is still faster and more stable than 4G.
In all likelihood, people will still hold on to their fixed lines for broadband, at least in the first few years of 5G until it becomes a stable and mature technology. But over time, if it can prove to be not only faster than fixed line offerings but at least as stable, people will ditch their fixed lines.
Ironically 5G may not be the best solution for rural areas which are lacking in fixed lines. That’s because 5G operates on high-frequency bands that have a lot of capacity but cover shorter distances. As such it is mainly a technology for densely populated, urban areas.
Lower frequency bands are better over longer distances so it is likely that telecoms operators will continue to bolster their 4G services alongside their new 5G ones so that rural areas will get coverage too. Besides, not every one will want to get a 5G phone straight away so 4G will be around for a while.
As mentioned earlier, the main value proposition of 5G is much faster speed. Besides allows consumers to do whatever they want to do on their smartphones more quickly and efficiently, it should allow a whole range of applications that until now was not really viable due to not-so-fast speeds.
These include high-resolution wireless surveillance cameras and game streaming. It will really make a difference with Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality, where 5G’s low latency and consistent high speed will make VR and AR viable.
Mobile video, which never took off in the way it should have due to constant buffering, should be smooth and glitch-free. Wearables should also become far more functional than they are today.
Crucially, it will make IoT, where everyday objects connect and interact with each other wirelessly, viable. Driverless cars, for example, can work best when it can interact with its surroundings – such as lamp posts, road signs, buildings – and read live GPS maps and traffic data.
There’s bound to be a slew of new services and applications we can’t even imagine are possible today. This is what makes technology so exciting.
Oon Yeoh is a consultant with experiences in print, online and mobile media. Reach him at oonyeoh@gmail.com.