5G Perspective

WHAT IS

WHAT IS 5G, AND HOW DOES IT WORK? The Fifth Generation (5G) of networks is not an evolution of 3G or 4G – it is an entirely new mobile system. 5G achieves much higher data transmission rates than previous mobile networks – up to 10 Gbit/s. It is much faster than current Internet speeds and upto 100 times faster than 4G LTE. Another advantage to 5G is its extremely low latency (faster response time to commands) of below 1 ms (millisecond) compared with 30-70 ms for 4G. Because of the higher data transmission rates, 5G will serve not just mobile devices, but will also power the general home and office networks and compete with wired Internet providers, such as cable. Here is a top-line overview of the benefits of 5G. 5G networks achieve the higher data transmission rates by using higherfrequency radio waves in or near the millimetre wave band between 30 and 300 GHz, while previous mobile networks used frequencies in the microwave band between 700 MHz and 3 GHz. Mobile provider Three has stated that they have “got more usable 5G spectrum than anyone else. This means our service will be faster and able to handle more data. We’ve got our 5G spectrum in one large 100MHz block in the usable 3.4-3.8 GHz band, which makes it even more efficient to deploy and allows us to achieve full peak and average 5G speeds.” Some 5G providers will use a second lower-frequency range in the microwave band, below 6 GHz, but this will not provide the high speeds of the new frequencies. Because of the more plentiful bandwidth available at millimetre wave frequencies, 5G networks will use wider frequency channels to communicate with wireless devices, up to 400 MHz compared with 20 MHz in 4G LTE, which can transmit more data (bits) per second. 5G technology uses Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) modulation, which transmits multiple carrier waves in the frequency channel, so multiple bits of information are transferred in parallel simultaneously. 10-100X Data Rates 5-10X Latency Reduction 100X Energy Efficiency 100X Area Traffic Capacity 10-100X Connected Devices PAGE 6

WHAT ARE THE PERCEIVED BENEFITS OF 5G? 5G technology provides four main benefits: 1. Faster data transmission speeds, with download speeds up to 10 GB. 2. Greater potential to share data. 3. Low latency, which will benefit online games and services utilising AR since there will only be a short pause between the time a user instructs a mobile device to transmit data of some type and the time it sends it. 4. Energy saving. The main features of the 5G network, including extremely high bandwidth, ultra-low latency and high-density connections, should enable many new uses that are currently impossible on the older network standards. 5G should also increase the activities conducted by e-commerce vendors. PAGE 7