Discussions on 5G remained a focal point at 2023 Shanghai World Mobile Communications Conference held recently. Significant achievements have been made in the commercialization of 5G, and the technology is about to enter the second half of its development phase, characterized by industrial upgrading and convergence. However, several bottleneck issues need to be addressed to continue advancing further, including the insufficient network speed, incomplete coverage in complex scenarios, and the absence of phenomenal applications.

    Since the commercialization of 5G in China four years ago, China has achieved global leadership in network construction, technological innovation, and application promotion. Following the principle of moderate advancement coupled with construction-driven usage, as of the end of May this year, the total number of 5G base stations in China reached 2.844 million, accounting for 25.3% of the total number of mobile base stations. The coverage rate of administrative regions at and above the county level has reached 100%, achieving 5G coverage in all counties. This has effectively supported the scale application of 5G, with 5G applications integrated into 60 out of 97 categories of the national economy, resulting in over 50,000 application cases. The construction of 5G industry-specific virtual private networks has accelerated, covering multiple sectors such as industry, ports, energy, and healthcare. Emerging applications like live streaming e-commerce have rapidly developed. After going through three stages of strategic planning, systematic advancement, and application implementation, the development of 5G is about to enter the second half considering the 10-year generational shift in communication technologies.

    To transition from building well to utilizing well, there are still significant challenges in terms of costs, investment, coverage, and integration for 5G applications. The most pressing issue is the return on investment for 5G. In recent years, telecom operators have openly admitted to reducing their investment in 5G. One important reason is that the massive investment in 5G network construction has not yielded satisfactory revenue returns. Currently, many individual users complain that the network speed and coverage of 5G are not as expected, while some industry users believe that investing in private 5G networks is costly and unnecessary. As a result, if the scale of 5G applications cannot increase, costs cannot decrease, which subsequently constrains further investment, affecting user experience, and hinders application promotion, thus failing to form a virtuous cycle.

    The lack of phenomenal applications means that the depth of 5G applications is still insufficient. The number of 5G connections has yet to surpass that of 4G. If the entire development of 5G is likened to a marathon, it is still in the early stages. In terms of individual users, the number of subscribers to 5G plans announced by the three major telecom operators has exceeded 1.2 billion. However, in reality, a significant proportion of these subscribers have not actually used 5G networks or devices. In terms of industry applications, although 80% of the value of 5G lies in the industry domain, there have been no phenomenal applications yet, and the market demand for 5G has not been fully stimulated. This is due to issues such as insufficient application depth, inadequate integration and connectivity, and unclear profit models.

    5G is a new engine for the development of the digital economy and will lay the foundation for the development of 6G. The Global System for Mobile Communications Association predicts that China will become the first market with over one billion 5G connections by 2025. Industry insiders predict that the large-scale deployment of 5G will have a significant impact on global economic growth. By 2035, Chinese 5G technology is expected to create a total economic output of 10 trillion Chinese yuan. Currently, the integration of 5G with artificial intelligence is bringing about opportunities for innovation. Enhanced 5G technologies are accelerating their transition into the industrial implementation stage, which will effectively support the growth of 5G application scale and digital innovation.

    Releasing the new value of 5G and creating a more mature global industrial ecosystem is an important task. We must open up the capabilities of the 5G network to ecosystem partners, emphasize collaboration along the industry chain, and promote industrial ecological integration. This will accelerate maturation of vertical industry applications, thereby increasing monetization channels and prospering the 5G industry. Telecom operators have realized the need to expand the provision of scenario-based network services in the consumer market, building upon their existing data traffic management. In the industry market, they need to transform from network operators into platform enablers and solution providers. Partners along the industry chain need to accelerate the promotion of collaborative innovation in the industrial chain supply chain, engage in joint research and development, establish standardized systems for integrating 5G applications across industries, and create replicable and cost-effective scalable applications, thus unleashing the full potential of 5G.