On June 6, 2022, my country will celebrate the third anniversary of the commercial licensing of 5G in China. The number "three" has been endowed with important meanings and rich connotations since ancient times. Taishi Company Ma Qian's "Historical Records: The Book of Laws" said, "Numbers begin with one, end with ten, and become three"; Laozi's "Tao Te Ching" even interprets it as "Tao gives birth to one, one life to two, two to three, and three to all things". In the formation of the universe, "three" is regarded as the foundation and beginning of the evolution of all things.

In the past three years, my country's 5G industry development has made remarkable achievements. It continues to lead the world in terms of network scale, number of users, industrial ecology, application innovation and other dimensions. promise. More importantly, the role of 5G in improving people's lives, promoting industry transformation, helping poverty alleviation, and supporting epidemic prevention and control has begun to emerge, and has been widely perceived and recognized by all sectors of society.

However, the value released by 5G so far is only the "tip of the iceberg", especially in thousands of industries, 5G is in the critical stage of accelerating from "rooting" to "blooming and fruiting". With the advancement of large-scale applications, in the future development of 5G, more new scenarios will emerge and more new services will be enabled.

"The tide is flat and the banks are wide, and the wind is hanging." The 5G industry and the intelligent world it points to are more prosperous, and we need to write together.

5G: A strong engine for the development of the digital economy

In recent years, the digital economy has flourished and has become the main economic form after the agricultural economy and the industrial economy, and is driving profound changes in production methods, lifestyles and governance methods. The report released by the World Bank in 2020 pointed out that the development of the digital economy will have a fundamental impact on the structure and process of the economic system. Research by Oxford Economics shows that the long-term returns of digital technologies are 6.7 times higher than those of non-digital technologies.

The "new infrastructure" represented by 5G is an important path for my country to promote the development of the overall digital industry. In order to realize the structural adjustment of the current economy, improve the quality, enhance the stamina, and ultimately drive the growth of the digital economy of the whole society.

The national "14th Five-Year Plan" has set the tone for the development of China's digital economy. The digital economy will set off a new wave of development. During the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, the digital economy is expected to maintain an average annual growth rate of about 9%, and the scale will reach 2025. will exceed 60 trillion yuan.

In the deep integration of digital technology and the real economy​, the importance of 5G is beyond doubt. Data is a key factor of production in the digital economy era. By building a credible, reliable, and promiseable mobile network, 5G realizes the efficient collaboration of cloud/edge/terminal data and provides a highway for the flow of massive data. At the same time, as a digital enabling base, it can organically integrate digital technologies such as big data, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence, thereby empowering thousands of industries and inspiring more new industries, new formats, and new models.

In fact, 5G has become a strong engine driving the development of the digital economy. The "Research on China's 5G Development and Economic and Social Impact (2021)" released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology shows that in 2021, my country's 5G will directly drive the total economic output of 1.3 trillion yuan, and indirectly drive the total output of about 3.38 trillion yuan, both higher than in 2020. increased by more than 30%. According to its earlier estimates, the market size of my country's 5G industry chain will reach 3.3 trillion yuan in 2025, and the scale of the 5G ecosystem and 5G-enabled industries will reach 6.3 trillion yuan, and more than 3 million jobs will be created. .

Value presentation: behind the beautiful numbers

Thanks to the guidance of national policies and the joint efforts of the industry, my country has built and opened a total of 1.56 million 5G base stations​, covering all prefecture-level cities, all counties and urban areas, and 87% of townships and towns. The deployment of 5G industry virtual private networks has exceeded more than 5,325; a total of 761 5G terminals have obtained network access licenses, including 548 mobile terminals, and the number of 5G mobile phone users exceeds 400 million; the 5G distribution ratio of the three major operators has reached more than 20%, and the number of 5G mobile phone users in Guangdong, Zhejiang, Shenzhen and Shanghai has reached more than 20%. The 5G diversion ratio in key areas such as China, Beijing, etc. has reached more than 30%; the number of 5G standard-essential patents declared by Chinese enterprises remains the world's leading... The rapid development of the 5G industry has become a beautiful landscape under the century-old changing situation and the epidemic of the century.

Even more gratifying is that behind these numbers are real scenarios and use cases that we can perceive. ‍‍For example, during the epidemic, various 5G+ applications have greatly contributed to the prevention and control of the epidemic and the resumption of work and production after the epidemic, and strongly supported the stable operation of the social economy.

In the field of toC, typical applications of new media based on 5G technology can be seen everywhere. The 5G+UHD live broadcast and 5G+AR/VR applications at the Beijing Winter Olympics brought an immersive and immersive view to the audience outside the venue. Competition experience; many impoverished villages have been transformed into "live broadcast villages" and "Taobao villages" due to 5G signal coverage, making great strides on the road to get rid of poverty and become rich; 5G is extended to remote areas through online classes, telemedicine, etc. To achieve high-quality education and medical resources, and to achieve inclusive development of society.

In the toB field, the enabling effect of 5G has effectively accelerated the digital transformation of thousands of industries. The latest data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology shows that 5G has formed a number of typical application scenarios with commercial value, covering 40 of the 97 categories of the national economy. As a representative reference, the number of entries in the 2021 "Blooming Cup" 5G Application Innovation Competition has increased from 330 in 2018 to 12,000, covering industrial Internet, medical and health services, intelligent transportation, smart finance, sports and entertainment, etc. 10 In many fields, 33% of them have been commercialized, and 15% can be replicated on a large scale; in the leading application industries such as mining, steel, power and ports, large-scale promotion has also been achieved.

For example, in the mining industry, 5G goes deep into the ground, realizing automatic underground inspection and remote control of shearers, roadheaders, and transportation rail cars, effectively reducing the number of workers going down the well; in the steel industry, 5G has high bandwidth and low time. The extension feature realizes the unmanned and remote automatic control of the crane, improves the working environment and greatly improves the production efficiency; in the port industry, the remote control of the gantry crane in the 5G smart port reduces the number of people working at heights, improves the working environment, and at the same time Through one person and multiple machines, the overall efficiency has been improved; in the manufacturing industry, the collaboration of 5G+AI has changed the quality inspection mode of the product line, improving the efficiency of quality inspection and at the same time the interception rate of bad parts has reached 100%. It can be seen that the integration of 5G and the real economy not only brings significant commercial value, but also reflects the social significance of "people-oriented".

A hundred feet of success: a new round of industrial upgrading is about to emerge

5G is increasingly connected with society, economy, and people's livelihood. With the accelerated release of market demand, increasing application scenarios, and rising expectations of Chinese people, its future development still has a long way to go, especially in matching industry needs. Breakpoints and pain points, a new round of industrial upgrading is about to emerge.

In this regard, a series of industrial policies such as the "5G Application "Sailing" Action Plan (2021-2023)" and the "14th Five-Year Plan for the Development of the Information and Communication Industry" have pointed out the direction for us. Efforts will be made to expand coverage, deepen integrated applications, and increase industrial collaboration to realize the scale replication and promotion of 5G from leading industries to thousands of industries.

The layout of the three major operators in the 5G-enabled industry is also further deepening. In addition to focusing on key industries to build benchmark applications and achieve scale expansion, they are also building application ecosystems, creating open platforms, incubating innovative products, and even providing investment and financing. Take positive action.

At the same time, from the perspective of the development law of the mobile communication industry in the tenth generation, 5G technology itself will continue to evolve. In April 2021, 3GPP identified the name of 5G evolution as 5G-Advanced, and decided to start standardization from Rel-18; Standardization has entered a practical stage, opening a new chapter in the exploration and development of 5G.

Commercial deployment of 5G-Advanced is expected to occur in 2024-2025. It not only enhances the original capabilities such as uplink and downlink experience rate, delay and connection density by 10 times, but also brings new capabilities such as broadband real-time interaction, synaesthesia integration, and high-precision positioning to the 5G-enabled industry. Recently, the three major operators have also held press conferences one after another, releasing the latest achievements of their joint innovation with their industrial partners.

"Three" represents the key node in the process of "Tao" producing all things, from conception to explosion, and the same is true for 5G that has been commercialized for three years. With the transition of 5G to a higher, wider and deeper level, this fertile soil will eventually bloom and bloom with the power to change the world.