Chinese networking giant Huawei said it plans to launch a complete set of commercial 5.5G equipment in 2024 during the Mobile World Congress Shanghai 2023 tradeshow.
Huawei said 5G deployment has progressed quickly in the past four years with more than 260 commercial 5G networks globally and 1.2 billion users. However, new services are emerging such as glass-free 3D that will require stronger 5G networks with faster download speeds, lower latency and higher bandwidth.
What is 5.5G?
Huawei has popularized the 5.5G moniker but it is just the next shift in 5G technology with base stations being able to support more than double the current sensing distance and improve overall network performance by as much as 10 times “vanilla” 5G. This means 5.5G would include 10 gigabit peak downlink speeds and gigabit peak uplink speeds.
Due to these speeds, 5.5G is purportedly going to be able to unlock new use cases for such as:
- Smart internet of vehicles (IoV)
- 3D tablets
- 100 billion internet of things connections
- Smart traffic management
"With a clearly defined standardization schedule, the 5.5G Era is already poised for technological and commercial verification,” said Yang Chaobin, director and president of ICT products and solutions at Huawei. “In 2024, Huawei will launch a complete set of commercial 5.5G network equipment to be prepared for the commercial deployment of 5.5G. We look forward to working with all industry players to embark on the new journey towards the 5.5G era."
New technologies
The company said it is also working on applying artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to 5.5G core networks. This would allow end networks to serve numerous industries with 10 gigabit access, ultra broadband transport and microsecond-level latency over AI networks.
The networking sector is also in the early stages of developing a vision for 6G and technologies are only beginning to emerge.
