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Why 5G Will Be the Key to the 4th Industrial Revolution

Apr 10, 2021 | Newsletter Posts

The interest in 5G is undeniable in the USA, a region where data consumption is doubling every year due to users’ enthusiasm for services such as streaming. A trend that will only increase as 4K and 8K resolutions become more popular.

For professionals, the ability to connect billions of devices to form an Internet of Things (IoT) network is the most obvious advantage of a 5G connection. This will not only allow the industry to increase its automation potential but will also unleash the possibilities of digital transformation on a whole new level with virtual and augmented reality, robotics, real-time translation, and much more.

But how will 5G lead to such developments? If the switch from 4G to 5G seems like a minimal linguistic change, in technological terms the distinction is nevertheless enormous. 5G has enough capacity to support extreme mobile throughput – Enhanced mobile broadband, up to 20 GB/s – ten times faster than the 4G LTE network. A two-hour film could thus be downloaded in just three seconds.

5G would also offer much better reliability and low latency (a tenth of that of 4G LTE), two essential criteria for critical machine type communication used in remote operation of production sites and other industrial control applications.

It would also allow an impressive increase in the connectivity of mass machine type communications with one million connections per square kilometer, ten times more than 4G LTE.

Finally, 5G networks would gain in flexibility thanks to network slicing. This practice consists of dividing a network into several “slices” to obtain several virtual networks that the operators can use according to the needs. Companies could also use it to create their own private 5G networks.

What Does This Mean For Businesses?

As we mentioned, 5G technology allows a seamless and fast connection to almost any tool that has internet access. This will help bridge the gap between some tools that cannot be implemented because the connection speed is too slow.

For example, virtual reality technology requires a fast internet connection to ensure the user has as immersive an experience as possible. A slow connection can cause a significant delay and lead to delays in the display, affecting the experience. A faster connection will dramatically improve the VR experience, which in turn helps improve branding efforts.

Also, 5G technology comes with additional security measures that will help protect businesses and users from cyber-attacks such as phishing and malware infection. This helps assure users that they don’t have to worry too much about putting themselves in danger while browsing.

If you’re still not sure what a good 5G network will do for your business, here are three benefits that are sure to have a massive impact in the business world to come:

Improved Communications

First, 5G will make it possible to manage business infrastructure in a completely different way. Since everything can be downloaded in real-time, you can keep track of the work and make sure everything is completed correctly and on time. With 5G, it’s easy to set up a task management system that will notify supervisors of what needs to be done and allow teams to be in touch with each other at all times. Better communication can help minimize confusion and delays, which means work can be done much faster and more efficiently.

Accelerated Work Processes

If you can get more stuff done in less time, your productivity levels will increase. This is what you can expect to see when 5G technology is fully operational. Since your employees won’t have to waste precious time during the day waiting for things to be uploaded or returned to the site, they will have more time to devote to other tasks.

Also, since the connection speed is faster, the automation process can be much more efficient. This will allow companies to automate work in certain areas that do not require human intervention to minimize inefficiency.

Improved Connection With IoT

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a new trend that has seen a massive increase in recent years, along with ever-improving connection speed. It is the technology that allows your everyday tools that are not mobile or desktop devices to connect to the Internet. Google Home and Amazon Alexa are great examples of this, as they allow you to control every part of your home remotely through your internet connection.

You can do the same for your business, as a similar system can be set up to let you control everything remotely in the office. This will help increase efficiency and reduce waste, meaning every dollar will go much further than before.

The Five Major Sectors That Will Be Shaken Up By 5G

Mobility: the advent of the autonomous car

Mobility is one of the sectors that is looking with the most attention on the evolution of 5G. And for good reason, once installed, the technology will revolutionize the use of our vehicles even more.

“If we do not have 5G, we will become an underdeveloped country in the next few years”. This is because the super-fast mobile internet could become the primary communication channel for vehicles with other traffic and infrastructure.

As a first step, this should increase safety. The 5G will make it possible to know in real-time the evolution of the situation on the road and will become a formidable co-pilot.

It will inform the driver if a car is in failure, will give information on blind spots and the presence of workers on a site

In short, 5G will be the eyes of the autonomous car. Moreover, it will be supported by the” V2x “(” vehicle-to-everything “), a communication system, also under development, which allows a vehicle to communicate with any entity that could affect it.

Smart Cities: Smarter And Greener Management Of Urban Centers

Intrinsically linked to mobility, the city of tomorrow will also be marked by the arrival of ultra-fast mobile internet. From remote-controllable traffic lights to autonomous delivery drones, to bins that alert in real-time when they are full, every street corner can turn into a little gem of technology.

Health: Remote Emergency Physician

You are on the ground, injured, but no doctor can approach because of the dangerousness of the situation. Thanks to the speed of 5G and its virtual absence of latency, you can, in the future, be operated (or assisted) remotely. In real-time.

It will suffice for the doctor to put on a pair of gloves that will mimic his actions several kilometers away, executed in situ by a robot. A concrete case that is not science fiction. Swedish equipment manufacturer Ericsson was already demonstrating this at the end of 2018 in Brussels.

Moreover, the ecosystem of low-energy sensors for medical monitoring must offer multiple opportunities: connected beds detecting the quality of your sleep, sensors detecting an elderly person fall…the applications are virtually unlimited.

Entertainment and Tourism.

On the entertainment side, an ever-faster network could well bring some (r) evolutions. The most obvious concerns e-sport. The booming sector is largely affected by connectivity and latency issues. The slightest second of delay can have a considerable impact on the course of a streaming event. An even more crucial question in the field of virtual reality where the synchronization of the headset and the movements of the wearer is essential.

Besides, tourism could also find interesting innovations in the emergence of 5G. The ski resort of Laax in Switzerland has already set up a network (unusable for the moment in the absence of suitable technologies) which will eventually make it possible to pay for your ski pass automatically as soon as you are on the slopes, find a lost ski or pole, or find out in real-time the availability of the ski lifts.

Costs and challenges of 5G

The industrial deployment of 5G will not be easy, especially at the beginning. The majority of companies say they are very concerned about security because devices connected in 5G will significantly expand the potential attack surface of their network.

Some companies have also raised concerns about costs. For internal deployments, companies will need to do a substantial upgrade to their back-end systems.

A lot of manufacturing sites don’t even have Wi-Fi, this will slow early adoption. The adoption will initially be limited to certain spaces of the manufacturing workshops and will expand as the equipment and back-end systems are upgraded.

The total cost can vary significantly depending on the amount of 5G-enabled infrastructure already in place in the business.

Conclusion

The 5th generation of mobile networks (5G) is gradually being rolled out across the world to respond to the strong growth in digital tools. If 3G and 4G have helped speed up the Internet network, 5G is acting as a real technological revolution. Reduction in energy consumption, increase in flow rates, improvement of connectivity… in fact, it suggests an enormous potential for productivity gains.

If you’re a business owner, it is time to start thinking about how you can take advantage of the power of this new network to optimize your productivity and your competitiveness.

For the general public, the increase in the speed of the network will make it possible to download all types of files more quickly or to be able to view live or streaming videos of very high quality.

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