5G : Next Evolutionary Wireless Standard

With Superfast 4G mobile data service both coverage and speed capabilities, we all wonder, what more 5G would do?? 5G is one of the most discussed technologies in this decade ,but do we really need it?? Yes, is my answer as I believe it’s the foundation for the next technological revolution. .. Let’s have a close look of what actually 5G is...

5G Revolution Coming Soon

When we check the history of mobile communication: 1G was analog cellular which brought mobility to analog voice services, 2G technologies, such as CDMA, GSM, and TDMA, were the first generation of digital cellular technologies. 3G technologies such as EVDO, HSPA, and UMTS, brought speeds from 200kbps to a few megabits per second. 4G technologies, such as WiMAX and LTE, were the next incompatible leap forward, which brought all-IP services (Voice and Data), a fast broadband internet experience, with unified networks architectures and protocols and they are now scaling up to hundreds of megabits and even gigabit-level speeds.

The next evolutionary step in mobile communication technology will hit the market by 2020 and is fondly called 5G. 5G simply stands for fifth generation and refers to the next and newest mobile wireless standard based on the IEEE 802.11ac standard of broadband technology, although a formal standard for 5G is yet to be set. The main differnce compared with today’s 4G and 4.5G (LTE advanced) is beyond data speed improvements, it will be focused on IoT and critical communications applications.

5G promises heightened speeds, superior responsiveness and better coverage. 5G is seen as the foundational technology for other areas like self driving cars and streaming virtual reality. It’s a unifying, more capable communications system that will take on a much bigger role than previous generations of mobile technology. It’s a layer of connectivity that will become fundamental to our cities, jobs, homes, and ourselves.

Ofcourse 5G is more complex than any connectivity technology that came before it. 5G will also support redundant connections through multi-connectivity, allowing devices to connect across multiple 5G network nodes, or even 4G or Wi-Fi, simultaneously to enhance reliability. 5G will expand mobile networks and technologies into a much wider range of industries. It will enable smart cities that can sustain tomorrow’s urban population growth, autonomous cars that communicate with each other and traffic lights to save lives, VR headsets that allow us to experience the world in new ways, body sensors that monitor our health and make dietary recommendations, and so much more. It will change the way we interact with our world and each other.

With speeds of up to 100 gigabits per second, 5G will be as much as 1,000 times faster than 4G, 4G networks have higher base speeds, they experience less of this peak-hour strain. There is more than enough capacity to share for core services, such as e-mail and web browsing. 4G provides an additional speed boost for increasingly important business services, such as mobile video conferencing and cloud computing. 4G also allows for cost-effective, stable international calls on data calling services, such as Skype, even at peak times. 5G will run on a new "high-spectrum band", which uses higher frequency signals than 4G. The new band will be much less congested than at present, which will be vital for use with the Internet of Things. However signals won't be able to travel as far, so there will be need to be more access points positioned closer together, more on that later.

Making this 5G connected world a reality is incredibly complex. You need a new kind of mobile network to meet an expanding and radically diverse set of connectivity requirements like both high throughput and low latency, high security and low power, high reliability and deep coverage. The 5G platform needs to be flexible and nimble at applying the right techniques, spectrum and bandwidth to match the needs of each application, and to support efficient multiplexing for future services and device types. According to the Groupe Speciale Mobile Association(GSMA) to qualify for a 5G a connection should meet most of these eight criteria:

1. One to 10Gbps connections to end points in the field
2. One millisecond end-to-end round trip delay
3. 1000x bandwidth per unit area
4. 10 to 100x number of connected devices
5. (Perception of) 99.999 percent availability
6. (Perception of) 100 percent coverage
7. 90 percent reduction in network energy usage
8. Up to ten-year battery life for low power, machine-type devices.

The new technology will affect nearly all aspects of our life, countries need to stay upto date with technological developments to improve the lives of their citizens and continue evolving in the global economy. 5G network will contribute to the transformation of transportation, improving safety and, in some cases, freeing drivers from the act of controlling their vehicles. This will open up significant time for increased productivity, entertainment, and social interaction, so passengers can take advantage of the speed enhancements that 5G also brings. At the same time, reliable connectivity for vehicles will reduce auto fatalities and the resulting negative societal and economic impacts.

Notable advancements in 5G technologies have come from Nokia, Qualcomm, Samsung, Ericsson and BT, with growing numbers of companies forming 5G partnerships and pledging money to continue to research into 5G and its application. Qualcomm and Samsung have focused their 5G efforts on hardware, with Qualcomm creating a 5G modem and Samsung producing a 5G enabled home router. At Mobile World Congress this year, Samsung showcased its 5G Home Routers, which achieved speeds of up to 4 gigabits-per-second (Gbps), that's 500 megabytes-per-second, which could let you download a 50GB game in under two minutes, or a 100GB 4K movie in under four minutes. Both Nokia and Ericcson have created 5G platforms aimed at mobile carriers rather than consumers. Ericsson created the first 5G platform earlier this year that claims to provide the first 5G radio system. Ericsson began 5G testing in 2015. Similarly, in early 2017, Nokia launched "5G First", a platform aiming to provide end-to-end 5G support for mobile carriers.

Inshort, 5G brings three new aspects to the table: greater speed (to move more data), lower latency (to be more responsive), and the ability to connect a lot more devices at once (for sensors and smart devices). 5G will increase download speeds up to 10 gigabits per second. That means a full HD movie can be downloaded in a matter of seconds. It will also reduce latency significantly (giving people faster load times). In short, it will give wireless broadband the capacity it needs to power thousands of connected devices that will reach our homes and workplaces.

Advantages of 5G

Like all the previous generations, 5G will be significantly faster than its predecessor 4G and 4.5G. This should allow for higher productivity across all capable devices with a theoretical download speed of 10,000 Mbps. Plus, with greater bandwidth comes faster download speeds and the ability to run more complex mobile internet apps.

Disadvantages of 5G

However, 5G will cost more to implement and while the newest mobile phones will probably have it integrated, other handsets could be deemed out of date. A reliable, wireless internet connection can depend on the number of devices connected to one channel. With the addition of 5G to the wireless spectrum, this could put us at risk of overcrowding the frequency range. The problems with 4G and even 3G aren't exactly filling us with the hope of an immediate super fast connection.

While 5G isn't expected until 2020, an increasing number of companies are investing in 5G development, I really hope 2018 will be the year that 5G stops being a distantly-whispered myth. With 5G it’s not just your phone and your computer anymore, Home appliances, door locks, security cameras, cars, wearables, dog collars, and so many other inert devices are beginning to connect to the web. Thus 5G is inevitable and its impact will unarguably be transformational, for businesses and consumers across the globe.