While carrier marketing departments have heralded fifth-generation (5G) wireless as something akin to the second coming, others argue it's more of a normal evolutionary step than a massive leap into the future. For example Eric Xu, current Huawei Chairman, recently argued that consumers will ultimately "find no 'material difference between 5G & LTE.'"
And while some might argue this skepticism is due to Huawei recently being
blacklisted by Ajit Pai's FCC from the US market due to unproven spying allegations, concerns that 5G is being overhyped is a sentiment that's quietly growing among many in the telecom sector.
"Pessimism about 5G has been growing behind the scenes in the mobile industry but Huawei is the first large infrastructure company to state it explicitly,: Canalys analyst Ben Stanton told the Financial Times this week. "The reality is that 5G will be incredibly expensive for operators to deploy, requiring tens of thousands of new base stations per country. And the industry is yet to uncover a killer-use case for the 5G network."
Stanton argued that it's "becoming clear that oft-cited use cases, like IoT and self-driving cars, are actually more dependent on computing power built into the device itself, rather than the network."
A lot of this hype is coming from companies like Verizon, who have been striking major, taxpayer-subsidized 5G deployment deals with cities like Boston. As part of those deals, Verizon has convinced several cities that "smart city" tech will only be made possible by helping to subsidize Verizon's network upgrades.
Long-time industry watcher Dave Burstein argues that most of the 5G-enabled miracles carriers are promising with 5G are little more than BS, and were already well underway (smart cities, IOT connectivity, VR, medical advancement) before the 5G hype train came to town.
That's not to say 5G won't be an improvement; it's a combination of numerous technologies that should make networks faster, more resilient, and easier to manage with lower latency. But again it's going to be a modest evolution of existing ideas, not some kind of mind-blowing technological revolution. And with AT&T and Verizon still
enjoying a monopoly over the business data services (BDS) market (which feeds everything from ATMs to cellular towers), the million dollar question remains just how much consumers will have to pay to enjoy 5G.