Samsung Plans to Launch 5G Networks by 2020
Samsung plans to roll out fifth-generation (5G) wireless networks by the year 2020 for smartphone and tablet users.
The company claims to have discovered a way to transmit large amounts of data in a much faster way then what is currently available with 4G LTE networks. Samsung promises this new technology will allow users to send massive data files "practically without limitation."
Users would be able to download and upload data at speeds up to over 10Gbps by the year 2020 with Samsung's new network. This would equate to the ability to download an entire HD movie in just one second.
Samsung ran a successful trial using the 28 gigahertz (GHz) bandwidth to transfer data at a speed of 1Gpbs. A key aspect of the test was the company's decision to use 64 antenna elements that allowed the device to exchange real-time signals with the 5G network platform. The best of 4G networks only transfer data at speeds of 75 megabits per second.
Samsung hopes to commercialize this 5G technology by the year 2020. The European Union recently announced that it plans to invest 50 million Euros in research to deliver this technology by that year.
"The competition for technology leadership in next-generation mobile communications development is getting increasingly fierce," and Samsung "believes it will trigger the creation of international alliances and the timely commercialization of related mobile broadband services," the company said.
The fastest wireless technology at this point is 4G LTE (long term evolution). It has not been adopted world-wide and many analysts expected the next major shift in wireless technology to be a change to "4.5G" networks. Many smartphone users are still operating on 3G networks all around the world.
