F ive years since 5G’s introduction, the projected to soar to ten billion by 2025. 5G availability on public networks in most European nations, South Korea, the US, China and Canada is widespread, though concentration remains in urban areas. While the global average download speeds have increased to 207.42Mbps, 5G upload performance has stagnated at 19.90Mbps, while latency continues to drag on the whole experience according to recent tests by Ookla. The EU warned in January that low 5G deployment in Europe risks other technologies dependent on fast internet, such as AI, facing delays. In 2023, 5G in Europe reached 80% of the population – that’s up from 73% the previous year – whereas the level is 98% in South Korea and the US, and 94% in Japan according to the EU. Around 40 million people in EU countries will still have no access to a fixed gigabit connection by 2030, therefore failing to meet the block’s target of providing 5G to all households. global telecom landscape has witnessed significant evolution. Mobile operators are projected to spend $1.1 trillion on capex from 2020-2025, predominantly on 5G according to trade body GSMA. With 2023 heralding 5G’s launch in 30 new markets, primarily in Africa and Asia, global 5G connections are MOVING INTO MEDIA For media and broadcast, 5G is a classic technical engineering story, a lot of early (over) promise brought to down to earth with longer timelines than expected, exacerbated by outside blockers like the global pandemic. This year finds 5G for broadcast moving into commercial, but still niche use. For mobile video vendors at the front end of live event broadcast, 5G is an incremental evolution which increases the aggregate of bandwidth available for coverage of live events. “To our customers in news and sports, 5G is a natural progression in cellular technology and offers new spectrum and infrastructure,” says Matthew McEwen, VP of product management at TVU Networks. Most TVU customers are ordering KITTING OUT COPENHAGEN Danish public broadcaster TV 2 teamed up with Sony to deliver a proof of concept using 5G in a live studio environment. TV 2 evaluated 5G’s capabilities during production of an evening show from its studio in Copenhagen. A pair of wireless 5G-enabled cameras and wired studio cameras were linked to a private 5G network created by Cumucore. During the broadcast, the production team included pictures acquired over 5G, proving the picture quality matched the standard required for a prime-time live show. For Morten Brandstrup, head of news technology at TV 2 Denmark, the POC opened the possibility of using 5G cameras in more studio productions. “This will add greatly to the flexibility of our production workflows,” he explains.
EXTENDING REALITY WITH 5G
The launch of Apple Vision Pro might kickstart a fresh wave of livestreamed virtual, mixed or extended reality applications long promised by 5G evangelists. The underlying technology of mobile edge computing (MEC) is mature – and may even beat network slicing to the market. MEC is the near real-time processing of large amounts of data produced by edge devices and applications closest to where it’s captured. Scenes can be rendered in the network, allowing XR content to be delivered directly
to headsets with minimal impact on local graphics processing. For example, Amazon Wavelength embeds AWS compute and storage services within a carrier’s 5G network, paving the way for ultra low-latency applications. It’s available in 30 cities including Manchester. “With the addition of 5G and edge computing using Wavelength Zones, network latency in cloud-based remote production can be reduced,” says Peter Henebäck, principal solutions architect for AWS.
cellular units with a 5G option ‘because they want to be future-proofed,’ but are using the box today ‘to aggregate multiple links for high bandwidth and consistent connectivity.’ LiveU, whose bonded cellular modems also support 5G, reports everyday broadcasts using 5G over the public network also to add bandwidth. At a rough estimate, over half of LiveU transmissions in the US use 5G as part of their standard workflow. What’s not widespread – achieved only in a handful of trials and limited commercial application – are the benefits of superfast, ultra-low-latency, multi-megabit upload and downloads. Depending on the country and exact choice of rollout, reports suggest 5G has not offered amazingly improved performance than top-of-the-range LTE, the standard 5G was to supersede. “The dream of simply turning up to an event with 5G kit, switching on and streaming high-quality, low- latency video direct to the studio is proving elusive,” introduces Stuart Brown, special projects director at Domo Broadcast Systems. “5G coverage is patchy and likely to be limited to highly populated urban areas for the foreseeable future. Using public networks to cover large events can also run into problems with network congestion, as most attract large numbers of spectators who also compete for access to the cellular network.”
Powered by FlippingBook