Advertisement
5G
TechBig Tech

Explainer | What is 5G and how will it change the world?

  • Commercial 5G services were available from 87 mobile network operators in 39 markets around the world as of June 30
  • China Mobile, which already runs the world’s largest 4G network, has the industry’s biggest 5G operation by number of subscribers

Reading Time:7 minutes
Why you can trust SCMP
5G represents the first wireless technology designed primarily to support mobility services for machines. For telecoms network operators, 5G would extend the potential number of connected devices to many times the number of their subscribers. Photo: Shutterstock
Bien Perez
As the latest advance in mobile communications, 5G promises a new and improved era of network performance to support a broad range of applications for individual consumers and industries.
Advertisement
The roll-out of 5G mobile network services across China, with the world’s biggest internet user population and largest smartphone market, is already forecast to spur new growth in the country’s information technology industry by 3.3 trillion yuan (US$491 billion) in the five years to 2024.

That development is expected to rev up digitisation across traditional industries, which is projected to yield more than 10 trillion yuan in growth over the same period.

Initial commercial 5G mobile services were rolled out last year in South Korea, the United States, Australia, Britain, Switzerland, Spain and Monaco. Yet the scale of China’s market is likely to dwarf the combined size of those economies, negating any first-mover advantage.

While most people see 5G as a technical upgrade to 4G, the next-generation wireless system is expected to be a major building block of the fourth industrial revolution, also known as Industry 4.0, that would accelerate the automation of traditional industries.
Advertisement

This 5G explainer includes information from previously published articles in the South China Morning Post about the next-generation mobile system, as well as relevant data from the research arm of telecoms trade group the GSM Association (GSMA), standards development body the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP), the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), and recent reports from AllianceBernstein and other sources.

02:02

Why China is racing to become the global leader in 5G technology

Why China is racing to become the global leader in 5G technology
Advertisement