5G development: Don’t be afraid of the clouds blocking your view

Although some voices that are pessimistic about 5G have resurfaced recently, the achievements of 5G development are obvious to all. At the 2020 Beijing International Communications Exhibition, which was just held, many industry experts and industry insiders affirmed the achievements made by China's 5G development in the first year and were optimistic about the future development of 5G. Wu Hequan, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, said that the first year of 5G commercialization has achieved the expected results and handed in the annual inspection report that has attracted global attention. Wu Hequan believes that from the perspective of the country's long-term interests, 5G has an unshirkable responsibility as a new engine of the digital economy. The contribution of 5G commercialization far exceeds the communications industry itself, and the development prospects are broad. Wang Zhiqin, deputy director of the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, believes that 5G will play a major role in the fields of industrial Internet and other fields. my country will usher in an explosive period of 5G applications, and 5G applications will go deeper. Ding Yun, executive director of Huawei and president of the Carrier BG, said that China's 5G development has achieved initial results and is confident of building the most successful 5G.

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Moreover, from a global perspective, 5G is developing rapidly. According to GSA statistics, as of mid-September, 101 operators around the world have launched one or more 3GPP-compliant 5G commercial services in 44 countries or regions. In addition, 397 operators in 129 countries or regions are investing in 5G.

Therefore, the trend of 5G development is unstoppable. Those who intend to take out of context and deliberately distort the views of industry experts and enterprises to smear China's achievements in 5G development are doomed to fail.

China's 5G is accelerating

In the development of 5G, China has always pursued the strategy of "doing more and talking less" and does not pursue the gimmick of leading. However, since the issuance of licenses in June 2019, despite the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, China's 5G construction and development have achieved world-renowned achievements. At present, China has built and opened 600,000 5G base stations, the number of 5G terminal connections has reached 150 million, and 5G applications based on industry needs are constantly emerging. Therefore, whether in terms of network construction or user development, China's 5G ranks first in the world.

The three major operators are going all out to develop 5G. In the 5G construction, the 5G construction of the four major operators in my country is in rapid development, and the speed has exceeded the expectations at the beginning of the year. China Telecom and China Unicom have jointly built and shared, and have opened 300,000 5G base stations in total; as of September this year, China Mobile has completed the annual construction target ahead of schedule, opened more than 300,000 5G base stations, and has realized 5G network commercial use in all cities above the prefecture level and some key county towns across the country; China Radio and Television has entered the 5G market, which has accelerated the work related to the 700MHz frequency band and realized the integrated development of the national one network and 5G.

At present, the cumulative shipment of 5G mobile phones in China has reached 120 million. The industry generally believes that the value inflection point of 5G will soon come, and innovative personal services will soon enter a period of rapid development. The industry application of 5G is also gradually gaining momentum. In ports, mines and some manufacturing scenarios, industry solutions with the coordinated development of 5G, AI, cloud computing and the Internet of Things have completed the commercial closed loop. The next step is to usher in the climax year of 5G application development.

The reason why the industry is full of confidence in China's 5G development mainly comes from three aspects of confidence: first, confidence in China's 5G network construction capabilities; second, confidence in 5G industrial policies; and third, confidence in the maturity of the 5G ecosystem.

In terms of network construction, China's 5G license issuance has been in progress for one year, and domestic 5G construction has reached a new level in 2020. 600,000 5G base stations will cover all cities above the prefecture level across the country by the end of the year, and the number of base station construction and coverage has ranked first in the world. At the same time, in terms of 5G applications, China has created and achieved many firsts. In May this year, local operators in Zhejiang also used 4.9G+2.6G 200M bandwidth in the "5A+5G" scenic spot-Yandang Mountain in Wenzhou, and achieved a downlink peak test rate of 3.2Gbps through carrier aggregation technology, setting a new record for the downlink rate of 5G users. At the same time, the leading technologies used in China's 5G construction, such as large-scale multiple-input and multiple-output, carrier aggregation, dynamic spectrum sharing, and uplink enhancement, will also effectively guarantee the ultimate experience of 5G users in the uplink and downlink networks.

In terms of promoting innovation and development of the 5G industry, the state and local governments have formulated and implemented clear policies. These policies include reducing the cost of building sites, reducing electricity costs, giving priority to the allocation of industrial funds, driving industry joint innovation, incubating and cultivating 5G innovative applications and expansion, and opening up laws, regulations, and regulatory links. The state has given great support to the development of 5G.

The maturity of the 5G industry ecosystem has developed rapidly, exceeding expectations. Generally speaking, my country's 5G industry ecosystem has achieved phased results. At present, in terms of 2C, there are more than 150 million 5G package users, and the cumulative shipment of terminals exceeds 120 million. With the improvement of the 5G network coverage of the three major operators, the number of 5G online terminal connections has exceeded 100 million; in terms of 2B, more than 100 CPEs and modules have been launched. The three major operators have a total of more than 5,000 toB projects, with a total related revenue of more than 1.5 billion.

At the same time, 5G mobile phones have entered the era of thousand-yuan phones. Although the current price of 5G industrial modules is still relatively high compared to 4G modules, the development trend is obvious. The first 5G module released in 2019 was about 3,000 yuan, and in 2020, the market demand for industrial modules in China alone was 2-3 million. It is believed that the price of 5G modules is expected to drop below 500 yuan soon. On the one hand, as the value of 5G's first industry application scenarios is revealed and the commercial closed loop is closed, 5G modules will continue to promote the enrichment of 5G industrial modules; on the other hand, under the scale effect, the cost of 5G industrial modules will also be greatly reduced, further promoting industry applications.

All these indicate that China has been accelerating the development of 5G, and the pace will be even faster in the future. China has the best soil for the development of 5G: China has the largest user base, the world's top operators and communications manufacturers, a leading mobile Internet and industry information application foundation, a high-quality innovation ecosystem, and strong policy support from the country. Therefore, the statement that "we are full of confidence in the future of 5G" is not just empty talk, but is based on confidence.

It will take more effort to build a successful 5G

China has currently built the world's largest 5G network, with more than 150 million 5G users.

Academician Wu Hequan said that China is the first country in the world to deploy 5G SA on a large scale, which of course involves the risk of exploration and the test of product maturity and stability. The problems facing China's 5G are also the problems faced by other countries in their development, and solutions are sought in the process of development.

Ding Yun believes that China has the ability to build the most successful 5G. Ding Yun said that the success of 5G is reflected in three aspects: first, in the field of personal business, the goal is to achieve a closed business loop; second, in the field of industry, it is to face the new blue ocean, incubate new capabilities, and create a new growth engine; third, for the industry, it is to accelerate the digital transformation and intelligent upgrading of industries and sectors, lay a solid foundation for the new ICT foundation of the digital economy, and enable new infrastructure.

For operators, to create the most successful 5G, they need to solve three problems:

First, we need to do a good job in 5G user migration. In the early stages of 5G network deployment, there is a gap in user experience. This requires the use of big data platforms and network optimization tools to identify problem areas with grid-level accuracy, and to locate experience problems intelligently based on expert experience libraries, so as to improve the experience of 5G users to the greatest extent possible.

Second, through differentiated ultimate experience, 5G network can be truly used. When there are enough 5G users, the next key is to make the business really happen on the 5G network and fully release the traffic dividend of the 5G network. Applications that can bring differentiated ultimate experience to users include video, HD and interactive, 4K, VR, AR, free view, cloud games, holograms, etc.

Third, maximize the value of 5G networks through network efficiency improvement and operation upgrades. Operators need to use comprehensive solutions to minimize the total cost of ownership of the entire network, improve the efficiency of the entire network, and maximize the value of 5G networks without affecting the performance of the entire network.

Of course, from the overall perspective of 5G, building the most successful 5G also requires attention to computing, industry applications, business models, ecology and other aspects. 5G has just been commercialized, and there will certainly be more problems and challenges, but Ding Yun believes that China's biggest advantage now is that it has built the world's largest 5G network. In the next stage, as long as it focuses on the ultimate experience and commercial success, it will be able to fully build the world's most successful 5G.

5G development: Don’t be afraid of the clouds blocking your view

In fact, any new thing will face doubts in the early stages of development, and 5G is no exception. However, doubts are doubts, and we cannot discredit it. We cannot deny it and continue to criticize it endlessly just because there are problems and challenges in the development process of 5G. Everything grows in development. 5G is constantly advancing from the evolution of technical standards to network construction and then to landing applications, which is in line with the law of development of the mobile communications industry. Industry insiders have said more than once, "To develop 5G, we must look to tomorrow from today." If people today only see the problems in the early stages of 5G development and do not seek solutions, then mobile communications will definitely be a dead end, and human exploration of nature will be out of the question, and human society will have no future for development.

Therefore, the industry can ignore some of the negative remarks that currently question the development of 5G. Even if there are some smears with ulterior motives, they are nothing more than the murmurs of autumn insects and cannot stir up any big waves.

Of course, we see more of the future development prospects of 5G. Academician Wu predicted that many new business forms of 5G will appear in a few years, which should be business forms that the industry cannot imagine now. In short, the application of 5G in vertical industries will stimulate more and larger-scale new business forms. At present, the industry is working hard to solve some challenges facing 5G.

From the perspective of return on investment, the current ARPU value of 5G users in South Korea is 37% higher than that of 4G, indicating that 5G will exceed 4G in terms of revenue from consumer users. In fact, even in South Korea, 5G's ultra-high-definition video, VR/AR, indoor positioning, and Internet of Vehicles services have not yet been applied on a large scale. If these new services are taken into account, 5G consumer business revenue will be more than twice that of 4G. In the long run, 5G's main revenue will come from government and enterprise customers, and their contribution will be more than three times that of consumer business. Therefore, Academician Wu did some calculations and took into account the construction, operation and maintenance of macro stations and dense micro stations. The operating income will be more than 6 times that of 4G. It can be considered that the return on investment of 5G will be better than that of 4G.

From the perspective of industrial development, after more than two years of development, 5G has now attracted attention from all aspects. In China, whether it is network construction or industry applications, first of all, in terms of policy, the development of 5G has been supported by all aspects of the country; secondly, in terms of application innovation, China has huge industry market demand, and the demand for 5G is also very high.

Therefore, in developing 5G, we must have the spirit of "not being afraid of the clouds blocking our view, just because we are at the highest level". Wang Zhiqin said that 5G will release potential at the three levels of industry, economy and society, thereby driving huge development. We should take a long-term view, recognize the general trend of digital economic development with 5G, AI, cloud computing and the Internet of Things as the core, strengthen our confidence in the development of 5G, and believe that the future of 5G will be better.