A recent survey conducted by Accenture revealed that business leaders are uncertain about 5G. While most of the nearly 2000 leaders that participated in the study believe that next-generation mobile technology will not create a profound impact, only a few of them stand with industry predictions about the lightning-fast data speeds offered by 5G networks.
The survey shows that business leaders don’t understand the groundbreaking potential of 5G technology: reduced power consumption, very low latency, and extremely high speed. A unique characteristic that differentiates 5G from other mobile technologies is that it doesn’t require giant towers to be deployed. The antennas are more densely deployed and can be hung over buildings, light poles, and other physical infrastructure. This feature allows 5G networks to provide bandwidth that is about a hundred times faster than 4G technology.
The real question is that when 5G technology has such huge disruption potential, why are investors and business leaders ignorant of it?
The answer is that 5G will bring a massive transformation in our social, financial, and behavioural habits. And this transformation will happen across a range of industries and user communities, which makes it challenging to comprehend and measure the magnitude of those changes.
The same story holds for other revolutionary technologies such as Quantum computing and AI. The problem is that business leaders are looking at them as just little improvements over technologies that are present today. They fail to understand that 5G networks will reshape industries and help solve chronic problems in the environment and healthcare sectors and bring down economic disparity.
When an innovation has the potential to rock the core of multiple industries, traditional thinking and planning fail to measure its impact. It leads everyone — including users, businesses, governments, and societies — to not realize its gains. In business parlance, it’s called trapped value.
For example, take the smart homes of the future where all the devices will be interconnected. IoT technology is in its nascent stage due to various factors, which also includes inefficient mobile technologies. 5G network capacity, low power consumption, and low latency will allow devices such as thermostats, refrigerators, automobiles, vacuum cleaners, and air conditioners to communicate with each other and make our lives simple. Think about baby boomers who are ageing fast and are concerned about doing tasks that require physical prowess. 5G technology will handle everything from mobility to medication, and from 3D printed prosthetics to connected robots. These things will provide a new life to aged people and allow them to live with dignity.
Other areas where 5G will cause massive disruption are smart vehicles and connected roads. They will allow for the creation of smart cities by releasing trapped value in the form of reduced pollution, fewer traffic jams, new employment opportunities, and a tremendous decline in vehicle fatalities.
Agriculture will see a boom due to 5G networks. It will allow for the creation of crop guarding drones, weather sensing robots, and machines that can calculate soil quality. New digital concepts like Cloud Web Apps, AR (Augmented Reality), VR (Virtual Reality), and MR (Mixed Reality) that require super high data speed and extremely low latency will get a new life once 5G technology becomes industry standard.
The examples mentioned above show only a small window of reality. There are hundreds of use-cases of 5G, and there will be many others as we progress further. But as per the current business and political scenario, the implementation of 5G on a large scale looks highly unlikely. History tells us that if conditions don’t settle soon, it may backfire later. The resulting gaps will widen with time and give rise to a slew of startups that will compete with large and established companies. For example, when companies like Netflix, Uber, and iTunes realized that established businesses didn’t show interest in disruptive technologies, they toppled the market and took the reigns in their hands.
This is the time when businesses should start realizing the importance of 5G and make strategies for the upcoming future. The best part is that 5G applications will build upon the traditional business ecosystems and interconnected technologies. Hence, it makes complete sense for business leaders, technocrats, venture capitalists, and governments to come to the same table and work for a shared future. They need to monitor how the 5G markets are emerging so that they remain on their toes and can quickly upscale when the right time and opportunity arises.
Author Bio:
Nishant likes to read and write on technologies that form the bedrock of modern-day and age like machine learning, data science, AI, and robotics. His expertise in content marketing has helped grow countless business opportunities. Nishant works for Sage Software Solutions Pvt. Ltd., a leading provider of ERP Application and CRM Software to small and mid-sized businesses.