All three Chinese mobile operators have activated the world's largest 5G network in what has been described as a "tipping point" for mobile technology.
With more than 5 billion active subscriptions, the country is the world's largest mobile phone market, while the development of XNUMXG has received significant support from industry heavyweights such as Huawei and the government.
Operators also need additional capabilities to cope with the growing demand for data.
China 5G launch
This generation of mobile technology is the first time that China will assume a major leadership role. Despite its ambitious 5G plans, China is not expected to launch commercial networks until next year, long after the United States, South Korea and the United Kingdom.
Coverage is already available in major cities such as Shanghai and Beijing and will be expanded to more than 50,000 base stations before the end of the year. The three operators share the infrastructure to accelerate implementation and reduce costs.
Analysts attributed the accelerated time to continued trade tensions with the United States and its hostility towards Huawei. By launching 5G earlier, China will create a tech demand from Huawei, ZTE, and Xiaomi. The long-term goals of the Chinese government are to take leadership in business applications and areas of artificial intelligence and advanced computing.
"China will have 36% of its mobile customer base in 5G by 2025," said Tim Hatt, head of research at GSMA Intelligence. "Due to its large population, this represents 600 million subscribers, about 40% of the global 5G market right now.
"Expect this to act as a growing force of gravity for a national supporting ecosystem of phone makers, chip makers, network equipment providers and content producers, thus reducing use by foreign companies.
"The fact that Chinese mobile operators have been running 5G enterprise trials for 4 years means that as the new network infrastructure is rolled out and standards are finalized, robust commercial deployments can be started faster than other countries.