Last month, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the National Development and Reform Commission jointly issued the "Three-Year Action Plan to Expand and Upgrade Information Consumption (2018-2020)", proposing that "the scale of information consumption will reach 6 trillion yuan by 2020, and the annual average growth of more than 11%," among which 5G commercialization will become an important contributor. It is required to promote 5G large-scale network construction and application demonstration projects, accelerate 5G standard research and technical testing, and ensure that 5G commercialization will be launched in 2020. This is considered the latest "small goal" of 5G.
As the fifth generation of mobile communication technology, the first feeling that 5G network brings to people is - "fast"! Compared with 4G, the peak rate of 5G has increased tenfold, from 4G100Mb/s to dozens of Gb/s. In other words, more than 10 high-definition movies can be downloaded in one second, and the number of supported user connections has increased to 1 million users/square kilometer, which can better meet the needs of massive access in scenarios such as the Internet of Things.
However, this is only the most basic capability of 5G. The greater "power" of 5G lies in its "low latency" feature. Under a 4G network, the delay from the terminal to the base station is generally 5 milliseconds, and the delay from the terminal to the server is 50 to 100 milliseconds. Under the 5G network, the delay from the terminal to the base station can be reduced to 1 millisecond, and from the terminal to the server, it can reach 10 milliseconds. Among them, in the medical field, telemedicine not only requires renting large-capacity network lines, but also may cause deviations in the operation due to network delays during the operation. 5G technology completely makes up for the shortcomings of the existing telemedicine network. The network transmission delay is almost 0, which greatly improves the success rate of surgery.
It is precisely because of these unique advantages that 5G will be further applied to industrial, medical, security and other fields, which can greatly promote production efficiency in these fields and innovate new production methods. At the same time, 5G will also penetrate into related industries such as the Internet of Vehicles and the Internet of Things to realize the true "Internet of Everything."
Although there is still a year and a half before 5G is officially commercialized, the three major operators are now able to capture the presence of 5G. Among them, China Telecom stated earlier that it would take the construction of 5G innovative demonstration network as an opportunity to achieve trial commercialization of 5G in 2019 and large-scale commercialization in key cities in 2020.
In the field of Internet of Vehicles, 5G’s ultra-reliable and low-latency characteristics are exactly what V2X and autonomous driving require. In recent years, the technological development of V2X has emerged. However, the existing 4G communication technology cannot fully meet the needs of V2X, and it is difficult to achieve the technical "standard configuration" of autonomous driving. The transformation from connected cars to remote driving, vehicle platooning and truly unmanned autonomous driving requires the support of advances in network technology, and 5G can provide exactly these capabilities. Although autonomous driving and Internet of Vehicles have made a lot of noise in the past decade, there has been little rain. This is because there are still bottlenecks in the basic technology, and the commercial use of 5G networks is bound to provide more suitable opportunities for the integration of autonomous driving and Internet of Vehicles.
Today, the development of 5G technology has entered a critical period, and global communication operators are accelerating the verification and commercialization of 5G technology. According to GSA statistics, as of July 2018, 42 countries and regions around the world are planning or have launched 5G frequency band auctions, and 67 operators plan to launch commercial 5G from 2018 to 2020.
“In the 3G and 4G era, we were many years behind developed countries in terms of license issuance. Moreover, when it comes to 3G and 4G standards, we should be said to be latecomers. If we talk about 3G, we have achieved If there is a breakthrough, then 4G will catch up with developed countries, and the issuance of 5G licenses will not be later than that of developed countries,” said Wu Hequan, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering.
For the public and all walks of life, 5G is not just the next generation of mobile communications technology, it is a brand-new network that connects cars and cities, hospitals and homes in a more meaningful way , people and everything around them. Are you looking forward to it?