The acceleration of 5G NR standardization will have a significant impact on operator plans

Ovum said that the recent decision by 3GPP to accelerate the development of 5G New Radio (NR) standards is expected to have a significant impact on operators' plans and accelerate the early deployment of 5G technology.

Non-standalone 5G NR was proposed at the MWC 2017 conference and approved by the 3GPP RAN group plenary meeting in March this year. It is based on industry consensus and has been supported by a large number of operators and manufacturers. These supporters have said that they have been working hard to explore it for a year. This change will enable operators to launch large-scale 5G trials and even commercial deployments based on 5G NR as early as 2019 based on the existing LTE core infrastructure.

Julian Bright, senior analyst at Ovum, said the move would help create a level playing field between operators pursuing a standalone approach to building 5G networks (although in some cases not fully standardized) and those choosing to build 5G on their existing 4G infrastructure. Supporters said the rationale for making such a change is the industry's surging demand for new data capacity and the emergence of highly intensive new applications. In addition, they said it would provide opportunities for innovation and exploration of new use cases.

On the surface, this move would appear to be a huge boon to specific business interests. However, such a development is not immune to controversy in terms of commercial impact. In particular, some manufacturers will question whether, in a challenging market, such an adjustment could help to shift the balance towards or away from the strengths and capabilities of specific market players.

However, Ovum said that in any case, in the early stages of 5G network deployment, the acceleration of the non-independent 5G NR standard-setting process will be very important. In the next five years, when 5G network commercialization becomes more and more widespread, this small change in the schedule will be incorporated into the large-scale deployment of 5G networks. At that time, such changes may seem insignificant. But as 5G commercialization advances, this will accelerate the maturity and availability of 5G technology and provide new impetus to the weak equipment supply market.