Growing Deployment of 5G Seen Among Biggest Stories at CES
LAS VEGAS -- Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg told CES 5G is just starting to deploy and will change how everyone communicates: “It will change everything.” Vestberg channeled one of the big themes here so far -- 2019 will be the year of 5G. How that will look is taking shape. “Last year, Verizon launched the first 5G network in the world,” Vestberg said Tuesday. “There’s so much more to come from 5G this year and in years to come.” The new technology is “just radically different” and “a quantum leap compared to 4G,” he said.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Communications Daily is required reading for senior executives at top telecom corporations, law firms, lobbying organizations, associations and government agencies (including the FCC). Join them today!
Vestberg delineated "eight currencies" of 5G. They include peak data rates of 10 Gbps, mobile data volumes of 10 Tbps, and mobility, with devices traveling at up to 500 kilometers per hour potentially able to stay connected. New network equipment and devices will consume 10 percent of the energy used by 4G equipment and devices, Vestberg said.
Verizon has been building toward 5G for years, Vestberg said. “You need a lot of fiber, you need a lot of dense networks,” he said. “You need real estate to do mobile edge computing. Not only that, you need spectrum.” Vestberg brought guest speakers on stage. New York Times Co. CEO Mark Thompson said his namesake publication will start a 5G journalism lab in its offices in New York City. Disney Studios Chief Technology Officer Jamie Voris said the company will work with Verizon to give Marvel, Pixar, Disney and LucasArts filmmakers early access to 5G innovations. CTA President Gary Shapiro called Vestberg’s speech “one of the highlights” of the show.
Melissa Tye, Verizon vice president-public policy, said on a panel that 5G is “putting the U.S. on the cusp of the 4th industrial revolution, where everything that can be connected will be.” Tye said autonomous vehicles are being tested, and 5G will prove critical as the vehicles are launched at scale, using huge amounts of data. Deploying 5G across the U.S. “is a big undertaking,” Tye said. “It won’t happen overnight.” Some communities have been much more difficult to work with than others, she said. Verizon is working with many unidentified cities to make them the next 5G cities, she said.
John Godfrey, Samsung senior vice president-public policy, noted as many as 500 people had packed a CES discussion of 5G and self-driving cars. Both topics are at the “white-hot epicenter” of CES this year, he said. Autonomous vehicles are a key early “use case” for 5G and artificial intelligence, though the most important use probably “hasn’t even been thought of yet,” he said. All major carriers expect to have 5G phones this year, Godfrey said.
Clearing regulatory hurdles is key to making 5G widely available, Godfrey said. Small cells aren’t big, “probably the size of a kindergartener’s backpack,” he said. Rumors that small cells also require a “refrigerator-sized component” at the foot of a light pole are “not true,” he said.
Godfrey urged the FCC to allocate more spectrum for 5G. Tye said the biggest need is mid-band spectrum.
Consumers will be interested in self-driving cars only if they address their needs, said Tekedra Mawakana, chief external office of Google affiliate Waymo. “It’s really not magic.” Waymo is available as a commercial service in one city, Phoenix, and it will be years before self-driving cars are widely available, Mawakana warned. Waymo doesn’t “have all the answers” and is “partnering” with policymakers and communities across the U.S., Mawakana said. Waymo has tested in 25 U.S. cities and surpassed 25 million road miles and 7 billion simulated miles, she said.
CES Notebook
Planning is critical to use of technology in disasters and other emergencies, speakers said Wednesday. “We’re not waiting for an event to happen,” said Erik Newman, fire chief in Stockton, California. “We’re working with our partners. … We’re doing tabletop [exercises]; we’re doing training.” Stockton was an early adopter of FirstNet, he said. Newman recalled a recent wildfire where the nearest cell tower burned down. “FirstNet came in and they set up trucks and they got the system back up,” he said. “They gave the command team devices.” Newman said his FirstNet phone works throughout California. Previously, his department couldn’t even talk to other local agencies, he said. On the day a disaster strikes, “that’s not when you’re starting to think about what you’re going to do,” said Henry de Chaille, industry head at Loon, which helped provide emergency wireless service in Puerto Rico after the 2017 hurricane. “Everybody has to be open to try new things,” de Chaille said. “Sometimes it’s required to see a long way ahead and try to have a long-term vision.”