i3 - July/August 2017 - 23

5G
What
Carriers
Expect
for 5G
Here are 5G perspectives
from the major U.S.
wireless carriers. All four
companies sit on CTA's
Wireless Division Board.

DUE 2020
Enables hundreds of thousands of simultaneous connections,
including massive sensor deployments, enhanced spectrum
efficiency, improved coverage and reduced latency.
Samsung has unveiled
an end-to-end portfolio
of 5G mobile network
products, including this
5G radio base station.

AT&T
President of Internet of Things Solutions Chris Penrose
While speed is important for 5G, the true 5G promise
is much more. 5G will unlock new experiences such as
augmented realities, virtual presence, driverless cars,
telemedicine and connected homes and it will help enable
management of the upcoming "massive" IoT explosion,
which is projected to bring 20 billion connected devices
in coming years. 5G will add a new dimension to our multinetwork strategy that enables us to address a full range
of use cases for our customers via cellular, satellite, Wi-Fi
and low-power wide area networks. Our goal is to create
a seamless fabric of networks. We expect 5G technology
to enable lower latency, increase battery life and handle
more data. We're making great, tangible progress in 5G
through real-world field trials and lab testing to help set 5G
industry standards. We currently have 5G labs operating in
Austin, TX; Middletown, NJ; Atlanta, GA; and San Ramon,
CA; as we march toward full commercial deployment.
We're not waiting until the final standards are set to lay the
foundation for our evolution to 5G. We will support nextgeneration applications with our software-based, Big Data
and Open Source network approach, combined with our
spectrum position and broadband build-out commitment.
As the industry works toward 5G standards, we're promoting open collaboration.
T-Mobile
Vice President of Engineering Karri Kuoppamaki
Nationwide consumer mobility is the biggest 5G opportunity. We expect to see new innovations and applications built for nationwide 5G. Smartphones will be much,
much faster. 5G enables low-cost, continually-connected,
embedded sensors with decade long battery life so
everything you own is trackable. Imagine augmented
reality heads-up displays with real-time information and
real-time augmented reality translation. You can see more
of what T-Mobile envisions 5G will bring in our vision video
and our nationwide 5G video. T-Mobile expects to bring
5G services across the U.S. starting in 2019, with nationwide coverage in 2020. We believe that true mobile 5G
must be nationwide and T-Mobile is committed to deliver
nationwide 5G coverage.

C TA . t e c h / i 3

Sprint
Vice President of Technology Dr. Ron Marquardt
Sprint's priority is mobile 5G. We expect augmented reality
and virtual reality to be important in the consumer space.
This is unique and different from LTE and it will require
different business models from today's handset-based
model. For example, smart factories will likely generate
a great deal of traffic, but most of it is expected to remain
private to the enterprise or factory and will not be transmitted across our entire network. We also see great promise
with IoT. 5G will make IoT much more scalable and cost-effective to deploy widely. Sprint, Qualcomm Technologies,
and SoftBank have jointly agreed to develop technologies
for 5G, including the 3GPP New Radio (NR) standard in
Band 41 (2.5GHz) for accelerated wide-scale 5G deployments. The companies plan to provide commercial services and devices in late 2019. Sub-6 GHz spectrum such
as 2.5 GHz will be foundational for providing nationwide 5G
coverage. Millimeter and centimeter wave bands will serve
as capacity hotspots, providing the highest capacity and
throughput where needed. Some early deployments of 5G
in the U.S. will be for fixed services. To the degree that our
competitors label this as 5G it will cause confusion in the
marketplace because consumers are used to each generation as being a service specifically tethered to their phone.
Verizon
Vice President of Network Planning Adam Koeppe
Fixed wireless use cases and applications that require
very low latency are the focus of our pre-commercial 5G
network deployments. VR, robotics and autonomous
vehicles are initial examples of applications that 5G will
power. Longer term, 5G will enable a new class of mobile
applications and provide tremendous growth opportunities in IoT. Pre-commercial trials are underway in 11 markets
and we expect to have trial customers in the second half
of 2017. With continued success of the trials, we expect
to launch our fixed commercial 5G service in 2018, with
mobility expected in the 2019 timeframe. Our positioning
will remain the same for this network technology launch as
every other launch. We'd like to see a standard set as soon
as possible by the 3GPP. We're working hard with our 5G
Technology Forum partners to help influence that. Another
potential challenge could be marketplace confusion created by players who claim 5G, but are not delivering true
5G. As we've done before, we'll educate customers and
industry observers alike by showing them, not telling them,
what true 5G technology is capable of delivering.
JULY/AUGUST 2017

http://www.att.com http://www.sprint.com http://www.verizon.com http://www.t-mobile.com http://www.cta.tech

i3 - July/August 2017

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