How to drive the Telecoms network we need - 5G and beyond
- Mark Skilton
- Dec 21, 2016
- 3 min read
Not Surprised the NIC report just out heavily criticizes the UK Telecoms sector performance, as a consumer just trying using your UK Mobile phone in situations that are not in "well covered" areas of densely populated areas is at best an average experience. The ideas of a connected digital economy of rapid downloads of media as you move about is not actually a reality in many scenarios on a typical trip from Birmingham to London for example, let along if I should actually deviate off the major transport routes.
It is interesting that it takes a separate industry body like the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC) to make a report that reflects reality of the UK when other Telecoms industry reports are saying it's all "going well". The recent July Culture, Media and Sport Committee UK Government report on the BT Openreach is significantly under-investing in Openreach, the infrastructure subsidiary, responsible for a large part of the UK network.
The NIC report makes a key point that the Ofcom charging regulation has kept UK prices in check but failed to address the level of actual service quality delivery, the ability to get the service paid for, not just a metric of "coverage" which does not measure performance.
The NIC report also focuses on the 5G next generation that is a step change in coverage and performance that does require very high performance sub-meter distance coverage, high user device densities, and high network download and upload speeds to be a reality. From Connected self-driving cars to smart cities this whole premise is based on this kind of network that underpins all the economy and all the industries. This fact along means that if one company like BT Openreach has the power and responsibility to enable this then its not a great situation at the moment.
I argue that 5G is certainly the future National infrastructure for the 21st century but the use of multiple frequency band technologies from Wifi, Bluetooth, NFC, all the way to space Satellite technology down to new medium scale area networks such as LorWAN, SigFox and others are all part of the mix of the inter-brand multi-coverage and network strategy.
The move to 5G is critical because the new digital economy which is rapidly replacing the old physical economy within the next few decades will be powered by this technology. It has been known for years that the developer Asian economies are pushing ahead with superfast networks and the west has been looking on to catchup to this level of infrastructure. The response by Chi Onwurah, Labour Shadow Minister for Industrial Strategy, Science and Innovation, that "Improving our digital connectivity will be a huge boon for business, and enable the UK to play a leading role in the coming 4th Industrial (Technological) Revolution." While this is a pollical issue of party rhetoric and governance it also has a serious point of enabling the UK to be competitive in a rapidly changing world. Particular as Brexit has been added to the list of national issues to resolve.
UK plc will need to have strong infrastructure that together with energy power, air, rail and road transport will also need the virtual world of digital networks to be on the same level of investment and strategic national importance if we are to succeed.
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