The number of 5G connections is expected to increase in the coming years as hundreds of operators intend to bring services to market more quickly than previously stated. Tech analyst firm CCS Insight has estimated the number to reach 340 million in 2021, before surpassing 1 billion in the first half of 2023. And by 2025, the total is expected to hit 2.7 billion – this is equivalent to more than one connection in every five in the world.
The analyst firm had to upgrade its previous forecasts after what it described as a ‘flurry of activity’ from operators.
Kester Mann, principal analyst at CCS Insight, said: “The intentions of major US carriers to launch 5G in late 2018 have been clear for a while. But recently we have seen greater urgency to deploy networks from providers in Europe, the Middle East and China. While Europe may still be around a year adrift of the leading markets in 5G, some regional operators are clearly determined to launch commercial services as soon as next year”.
In the US, Verizon, along with its technology partner Nokia, piloted a successful transmission of a 3GPP New Radio (NR) 5G signal to a receiver in a moving vehicle for the first time. The trial, which was conducted at Nokia’s campus in Murray Hill NJ in June 2018, follows the companies’ successful completion of consecutive outdoor data sessions over the 5G NR standard, and the successful multi-carrier aggregation to boost those signals into Gbps range. Moreover, Nokia also signed a memorandum of understanding with China’s Tencent to jointly conduct R&D work to explore the potential of 5G for the benefit of billions of Chinese internet users.
In the Swiss city of Burgdof, Ericsson and Swisscom announced the completion of what is being described as Europe’s first end-to-end, multi-vendor 5G NR call that was made over Swisscom’s 3GPP-compliant network using Ericsson’s radio technology, alongside the Ericsson Cloud Packet Core, a solution aimed to deliver converged communication services. The Federal Communications Commission (ComCom) has tentatively set the date of January 2019 for the country’s 5G auction, with blocs in the 700 MHz, 1,400 MHz, 2,600 MHz and 2.6 GHz being subject to bidding.
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