The Pythagoreans thought of five as “hieros gamos” – the marriage between heaven and earth… 5G is thought to be just as magical!
The fifth generation of connectivity will be rolled out this year, with gigabit speeds that will see you downloading full length movies in a matter of seconds.
Not just about faster smartphones, the new networking standard with higher speeds and lower latency will make new experiences a reality, we’re talking virtual reality, connected cars and smart homes. Basically, any arena in which machines need to constant communication without the the delay.
While phones are the first place that 5G will be launched (due to the fact that they are such a pivotal aspect of our lives from a connectivity perspective), 5G is considered to be the post – smartphone generation.
The Non-Standalone Specification of 5G New Radio standard covers 600 and 700 MHz band, the 50 GHz millimeter – wave and paves the way for handsets with 5G modems inside them to be developed. This applies to 5G developed with LTE as an anchor. Millimeter wave signals are best for high bandwidth, short range applications. In order for the technology to be implemented on a larger scale, a new type of an antenna would be required.
5G devices will need to be compatible with existing LTE infrastructure as the coverage may be intermittent during initial stages of implementation.
Qualcomm and Intel are collaborating to create modems that will fit into mobile devices, cars and smart home devices.
These radios needs to be interoperable with networking operators and infrastructure companies.
What does this mean for South Africa ?
- MTN has partnered with Ericsson to host a live trial of the 5G network. Next comes the roll out of this technology to live mobile networks. This will require the adoption of 5G compatible base stations, devices and handsets. 5G will eventually be deployed over multiple bands of spectrum.
Compared to 4G, the increased capacity of 5G has the potential to reduce the cost of data, and enable IoT industries to roll out large scale projects comprised of thousands of devices with ease. This could assist exponentially in sectors such as health care.
#FutureIs5G
Written by Raj
