What will 5G rely on to disrupt data centers?

In a January 2017 survey, research firm IHS Markit positioned 5G technology as "a catalyst that pushes mobile communications technology into the exclusive realm of general purpose technologies (GPTs). General purpose technologies now include printing presses, steam engines, automobiles, the Internet, and other fields. These revolutionary technologies cover a wide range of applications that will redefine workflows and set the rules for competitive economic advantage.

Some signs and trends at the 2019 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) indicate that many major telecom operators are optimistic about the potential of 5G technology as a competitive advantage. During the four-day conference event, Samsung outlined its end-to-end 5G connectivity solution plan, AT&T also demonstrated its 5G mobile network launched in 12 pilot cities last December, and Sprint revealed that it had completed the world's first 5G data call on a live commercial network via the 2.5GHz band.

IHS Markit predicts that the global 5G value chain will be created as early as 2035, but there are still many strong barriers between the current state of mobile networks and global 5G connectivity. Perhaps most importantly, the development of network infrastructure in the United States lags behind mobile communication technology, resulting in its system being unable to meet the needs of 5G communications.

5G network speed requires good "pipeline"

5G is expected to achieve mobile Internet speeds of more than 10 Gigabits per second, about 100 times faster than 4G LTE, with end-to-end latency of less than 1 millisecond. The key to 5G's potential lies in its super speed. Along with the increase in bandwidth, 5G promises to provide another noteworthy improvement, and its transmission speed will greatly accelerate the maturity of technologies such as self-driving cars, drones, telemedicine, smart grids, and any other remotely operated, fault-tolerant systems.

Since 5G systems are inherently failure-intolerant, the entire network infrastructure must be able to support 10-Gigabit speeds and sub-millisecond latency. Unfortunately, few stakeholders are proactively preparing for the fixed backend of 5G network infrastructure.

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Most of the developments on display at the CES forum involved the "last mile connection" between network routers (such as cell towers) and mobile devices (such as smartphones and IoT sensors). While the technology for the connection between the fixed edge of the network and its core (i.e., the last mile connection) has been revolutionized, from beamforming to massive multiple-input, multiple-output arrays to millimeter waves, the server infrastructure that connects them has not evolved in a more meaningful way since the introduction of 4G technology nearly a decade ago.

Against the backdrop of skyrocketing data production, this inadequate fixed infrastructure will lead enterprises to lean towards a single surefire solution to harnessing the potential of 5G technology (at least for now): moving their data processing operations closer to the edge of the network.

Colocation and resolving latency issues

By simple physics dictates, the shorter the distance a data packet has to travel, the less latency the end user will experience. Currently, user requests often travel hundreds or even thousands of miles between the nearest cellular tower and a centralized data center, but the relatively slow internet speeds provided by 4G mean that end users don’t notice the latency caused by this transmission distance.

However, as 5G becomes more mainstream, continued reliance on large-scale centralized data centers will largely offset the benefits of 5G by subjecting end users at greater distances to latency. Until communications infrastructure is significantly upgraded, arguably the only way for enterprises to take advantage of what 5G has to offer is to diffuse their data processing.

To realize the potential of 5G, enterprises must find ways to quickly process new data and move caches of existing data closer to end users. Achieving the former is the driving force behind the recent rise of micro data centers, or "containerized data centers," which are located at the edge of the network (i.e., at the base of cellular towers). These small and medium-capacity servers are able to meet routine requests from end users without having to run the workload through a traditional data center, all while eliminating latency.

But while micro data centers will play a key role in the growth of the IoT, they cannot satisfy requests involving complex data processing or access to large amounts of cached information. To incorporate these types of workloads into the 5G era, organizations will have no choice but to geographically disperse their data center portfolios.

For example, while building multiple new data centers in strategic locations across the U.S. is within the realm of possibility for U.S. enterprises, it is far beyond economic feasibility for most small and medium-sized businesses. Therefore, for these small and medium-sized companies, data center colocation is often the easiest way to expand their high-performance data processing footprint.

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Colocation allows businesses to rent appropriately sized server infrastructure in multiple data center facilities simultaneously, enabling them to process and store data close to end users, even if the users are not concentrated in a single geographic market. For example, if the majority of a company's user base is in Southern California, with some minority user bases in the tri-state area and the Midwest, the company could operate its primary data center in Los Angeles while renting one or two server racks in New York City and Chicago.

The road ahead

Ultimately, data center diversification, whether through micro data centers, increased investment in proprietary data centers, colocation data centers, or most likely a combination of all three, will be a key component in the implementation of 5G technology. Stakeholders should see this as a necessary step in incorporating mobile technology into general-purpose technology.

In fact, the emergence of almost every general technology began with the construction of a large infrastructure. The full effect of the printing press was realized as literacy rates increased. The full effect of the automobile was realized only after governments invested in building a large road network. And the full effect of the Internet was realized only after consumers widely adopted personal computers. Therefore, 5G technology can only play a greater role after the mobile and fixed communications infrastructure matures.