Our smartphones are becoming appendages at the end of our arms. We feel naked without them.
As this affliction becomes more popular around the world, the burdens on the current cell networks and their shortcomings become more obvious. Furthermore, as our reliance on mobile devices increases, our patience with these shortcomings grows thinner.
Luckily, 5G technology is coming to the rescue. I read an article in Forbes India this morning, “Keeping up to speed with consumers” which explain how 5G technology will solve all of our current, and future, bandwidth problems. The author makes some good points about how 5G will help with our voracious consumption of video on the web and how it will help with AR/VR technology.
Video consumption is increasing day by day and according to a recent Cisco report, video will account for 82% of all internet traffic by 2022. Further, in the future, services such as AR/VR applications will put even higher requirements on network performance. The need for better customer experience means that operators must continuously adapt and expand network capacity.
It is all a vicious cycle, though. As we develop more efficient mobile networks, we develop more broadband gorging technologies. The author points out that these new technologies and the ability to move data faster into our phones is going to tax the battery life of phones like never before.
5G’s advanced connectivity will herald the dawn of a new connected era where devices are always in ubiquitous application scenarios, which brings with it higher energy consumption requirements. This presents new opportunities for charging technologies—a more efficient and safer technology will play a crucial role in the 5G era.
This leads into a broader discussion about 5G technology and what it really means for consumers and businesses. Very simply stated, it is a lot more complicated than many might think. For those interested in some of the complication involved in 5G, I would recommend starting with What is 5G? The business guide to next-generation wireless technology from ZDNet. It provides an excellent overview of 5G and what is needed for it to succeed and how it can help businesses. In explaining the potential impact the author states:
Once complete, the 5G transition plan would constitute an overhaul of communications infrastructure unlike any other in history. Imagine if, at the close of the 19th century, the telegraph industry had come together in a joint decision to implement a staged transition to fax. That’s essentially the scale of the shift from 4G to 5G. The real reason for this shift is not so much to get faster as to make the wireless industry sustainable over the long term, as the 4G transmission scheme is approaching unsustainability faster than the industry experts predicted.
The advent of 5G technology is going to change the way we access and use the internet in countless ways. That said, it is going to be a massive undertaking that will take years to develop in order to even come close to the promises of the pundits. Suffice to say, it’s a lot more than buying a new 5G smartphone.
Overview by Peter Reville, Director, Primary Research Services at Mercator Advisory Group