Why in News?

In June 2018, The 5G committee of the Telecom Ministry recommended that 6,000 MHz of spectrum can be made available without delay for the next generation 5G mobile service

About 5G

• 5G is the fifth generation mobile network.
• It’s a unified platform which is much more capable than previous mobile services with more capacity, lower latency, faster data delivery rate and better utilisation of spectrum.
• The standards for the usage of 5G are defined and driven by 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP).

Timeline: Evolution from 1G to 5G

• 1G: Launched in the 1980s. Analog radio signals and supported only voice calls.
• 2G: Launched in the 1990s. Uses digital radio signals and supported both voice and data transmission with a BandWidth(BW) of 64 Kbps.
• 3G: Launched in the 2000s. With a speed of 1 Mbps to 2 Mbps it has the ability to transmit telephone signal including digitised voice, video calls and conferencing.
• 4G: With a peak speed of 100 Mbps-1 Gbps it also enables 3D virtual reality.
• 5G: with a speed of more than 1Gbps,it is capable of connecting entire world without limits.

Salient features

• Capability: 5G will provide much faster mobile broadband service as compared to the previous versions and will provide support to previous services like mission critical communication and the massive Internet Of things(IoT).
• Speed: With peak delivering rate of up to 20 Gbps and an average of 100Mbps, it will be much faster as compared to its predecessors.
• Capacity: There will be up to 100 x increase in traffic capacity and network efficiency.
• Spectrum usage: Will provide better usage for every bit of spectrum, from low bands below 1 GHz to high bands.
• Latency: It’s expected to have lower latency with better instantaneous, real-time access of the data.
• The 5G, like 4G LTE, also uses Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing(OFDM) but the new 5G NR(New Radio)air interface will enhance OFDM and provide better flexibility in data delivery.

Applications Of 5G technology

• High-Speed mobile network: 5G will revolutionize the mobile experience with supercharged wireless network. Compared to conventional mobile transmission technologies, voice and high-speed data can be simultaneously transferred efficiently in 5G
• Entertainment and multimedia : 5G can provide 120 frames per second, high resolution and higher dynamic range video streaming without interruption. Audiovisual experience will be rewritten after the implementation of the latest technologies powered by 5G wireless. Augmented Reality and virtual Reality services will be better experienced over 5G.
• Internet of Things : IoT applications collects huge amount of data from millions of devices and sensors and thus requires an efficient network for data collection, processing, transmission, control and real-time analytics which 5G network is a better candidate.

• Smart cities : Smart city application like traffic management, Instant weather update, local area broadcasting, energy management, smart power grid, smart lighting of street, water resource management, crowd management, emergency response etc can use a reliable 5G wireless network for its functioning.

• Smart farming : 5G technology will be used for agriculture and smart farming in the future. Using smart RFID sensors and GPS technology, farmers can track the location of livestock and manage them easily. Smart sensors can be used for irrigation control, access control and energy management.

• Mission critical applications : Like telemedicine services, remote control of critical infrastructure and vehicles. It has the potential to transform industries with highly reliable, low latency link.

High-Level 5G India 2020 forum

Government has constituted High-Level 5G India 2020 Forum with three Secretaries of key Ministries/Departments Telecom, Meity and DST, and also comprising renowned experts. The primary aims of the forum are:

• early deployment of 5G in India.
• A globally competitive product development and manufacturing ecosystem targeting 50% of India market and 10% of global market over next 5 to 7 years.

Conclusion

The new 5G technology is expected to launch at the beginning of 2019. With the government push for Digital India, the 5G technology can be a game changer. It can help in better service delivery, faster access to services and deeper penetration of digital services