5G might just be around the corner

China Mobile Hong Kong and Huawei Hong Kong are partnering in pioneering commercial deployment of LTE-A Pro 4.5G as part of Huawei’s roadmap to 5G which is set for a timeline of 2020.

LTE-A Pro or 4.5G was officially named as the new LTE standard by the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) and with it comes a number of enhancements to 4G.

1. Ultra-Broadband Gbps networks
2. Enhanced voice and video experience
3. Lower latency with introduction of  Network Functions Virtualizations (NFV)
4. Better spectrum efficiency over 4G

This all sounds like good news considering we are entering  the age of Big Data as entertainment, business and industry are generating more volumes of data as well as demanding high quality content from the web. 4.5G will address scalability as well as enhanced quality of service.

So what then is all this fuss about 4.5G and LTE? Well all these enhancements are paving the way for the impending increase in internet volume from data hungry media.

The IoT (Internet of Things): self driving cars, smart home systems, artificial intelligence, remote farming, automated machinery, cloud computing, telepresence and virtual reality, real-time monitoring systems are the main data crunchers that will demand the Gigabit capacity of 4.5G.

Allow me to expand on the characteristics of a few of these technologies.

Virtual Reality (VR)

From a business standpoint, a company without a showroom can host a virtual catalogue in which, via an application on a smartphone and a pair of VR headsets, one is able to view and interact with a whole catalogue of the store’s inventory without the need of being in the actual store.

Virtual interior design. Gone are the days when you had to look at a 3D computer model to have a 3rd person view of an interior design demo. With VR one can view the interior design as if they are in the actual room/building giving an immersive designing experience.

VR can also be used in virtual tours of anything you can imagine, from astronomy with a virtual tour of the constellations to a front row seat in the stone age to a deep sea dive into the lowest depths of the oceans the possibilities are endless.

Artificial Intelligence (AI)

With the breakthrough in deep learning AI it is now possible for a computer to analyse historical and present data simultaneously and be able to provide a prediction of the outcome with pretty high accuracy. With this, AI can use data obtained from business to predict the success of that business.

To farmers it can do the number crunching of data from soil samples of that region and real time weather predictions to produce the best advice on how to farm and what crops to farm as well as recommended fertilizers in that particular region to get the highest possible yield.

Cloud Computing

Well with cloud computing it is not just limited to storing backup files online and pulling them down at will. There is more to it.

With cloud computing you can carry out media processing such as video editing as well as rendering HD content online using processing power of external servers.

For passionate gamers who cannot afford powerful machines, the processing can be executed by the gaming server, for online gamers, and your device only has to stream the feed to you.

So watch the space. LTE-A Pro paving the way for 5G. Its going to be a game changer.