Huawei eyes 5.5G market in 2024, increasing network capabilities

Huawei Technologies plans to launch a complete set of commercial 5.5G network equipment in 2024, which will set a mainstream 5G standard for over 1 billion people within a few years, the tech giant said in Shanghai.

Huawei explains the concept of a "5.5G Era" and releases the system, which will be commercially ready in 2024. It protects carriers' previous investment in 5G, while also improving network performance up to 10 times, the company said during the ongoing Mobile World Congress (MWC) Shanghai 2023.

China, already the world's biggest 5G market, will be the first market in the world to have 1 billion 5G connections by 2025, and 1.6 billion by 2030, accounting for one-third of the global level, according to GSMA, the telecommunications industry association and organizer of MWC.

The industry has widely agreed that 5.5G will be a key milestone in 5G evolution, and that it is fast approaching, Huawei said.

Highlights of 5.5G

The highlights of the 5.5G network upgrade include speed, computing capabilities and IoT (Internet of Things) coverage.

• Speed: The 5.5G Era would feature 10 gigabit peak downlink speeds and gigabit peak uplink speeds, almost 10 times more than current 5G services.
• Computing capabilities: The 5.5G Era features artificial intelligence, cloud and big data capabilities in networks, which improves AIGC performance like ChatGPT and Stable Diffusion.
• IoT: More smart devices will be connected to the 5.5G network in the future, which will unlock a market of 100 billion IoT connections, 10 times more than the current level.