The IoT Asks: What Are We Going to Do with All This 5G?

5G was ubiquitously displayed and discussed at Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2019. The context of the Internet of Things (IoT) was no exception, with module manufacturers racing to be the first to announce and exhibit 5G products. 5G modules were showcased by Sierra Wireless, Fibocom, Quectel, and GosuncnWelink (formerly ZTE Welink). Notably, it was vendors from China that dominated, all using chipsets supplied by strategic U.S. partners and investors. Fibocom showcased its FG100 module, based on an Intel 5G chip with millimeter wave (mmWave) technology and a purported throughput rate of 6 Gbps per second . Intel invested in Fibocom, and despite having exited the 5G modem business for smartphones after MWC, is still keenly evaluating its 5G opportunity for the IoT. Uniquely among the 5G modules on show, the FG100 was displayed in a mock-up scenario, streaming real-time advertising content for a digital billboard. But, despite its stated shipping date of 2020, competing vendors were openly skeptical about the state of development and market readiness of Intel’s chip and Fibocom’s module product.

Sierra Wireless and Quectel both announced modules that use Qualcomm’s X55 5G chipset. The Sierra Wireless module is a 5G addition to its AirPrime product line and, like Fibocom’s FG100, uses the M.2 form factor. Standardized for a long time and touted as a “next generation” form factor connector, M.2 is rarely used for cellular modules today. Quectel went one-up on Fibocom and Sierra Wireless by exhibiting two 5G modules, the M.2 form factor RM500Q and the more popularly used Land Grid Array (LGA) form factor RG500Q, with commercial samples of both due to be available in 4Q 2019. Qualcomm is a preferred supplier for many IoT module vendors’ high-bandwidth products, with Quectel being openly proud of its close, strategic association with the chipset manufacturer. North American and European module vendors are certain to face strong competition from China in the soon-to-be contested 5G market.

But, ‘first post’ bragging rights aside, a greater concern is what 5G will be useful for in the IoT. This was echoed as an industry-wide concern at MWC 2019. LTE has proved to be a well-performing technology that is flexible and tunable to a wide variety of bandwidth requirements and use cases, and still has a lot of market growth left in it. This raises the question of whether we even need 5G yet. Technology upgrade cycles should occur when they are needed, not just because they are possible. The wireless industry must be careful not to over-commoditize itself the way  the terrestrial and submarine fiber-optic market did, which was by switching to the latest-and-greatest technology just for the sake of appearances and perceived competitive advantage.

The first and most frequently mentioned IoT-specific 5G application at MWC 2019 was Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) connectivity. Low latency is the most often cited 5G-specific innovation, while automotive is the most valuable growth market for all IoT module vendors today, making this observation unsurprising. Another low-latency dependent application is wireless ethernet for industrial manufacturing, utilizing the Ultra-Reliable Low-Latency (URLLC) feature of the new 5G Release 16, due to be frozen in 1Q 2020. This is a 5G use case that exists in theory with a need for necessary testing to validate it. Unlike Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X), wireless ethernet is a replacement technology that must first prove to be better than existing ethernet to justify investment by industrial manufacturing companies. There were no wireless ethernet demonstrations at MWC 2019. Even at Hannover Messe the wireless ethernet implementations showcased there only encapsulated industrial ethernet connections inside a “vanilla” 5G enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB) connection, which is not how 5G should aim to target manufacturing.

Everything else that 5G may be used for in the IoT is almost entirely speculative. The best suggestions and demonstrations from MWC 2019’s exhibitors were: for 5G to be ubiquitously applied to all IoT use cases regardless of implicit throughput or latency needs. This is for the sake of as-close-to-real-time data transfer to the cloud, for cloud-based processing and data processing-based service provider business models. Similarly, was the option to allow real-time video to be layered on top as a discreet additional value-added service, again regardless of any implicit throughput or latency requirements of the base application. Lastly and least imaginatively, was 5G for the sake of speed and capacity in Customer Premises Equipment (CPE), namely industrial routers and gateways, a small but traditional and high unit-value segment of many module provider businesses.

Narrowband IoT (NB-IoT) is set to be rolled into the 5G standards, even though it is already fully standardized as part of 4G, creating an “inherited” market for 5G in the IoT. Potential uses are varied with NB-IoT being best suited to connecting stationary devices that have low throughput and infrequent communication requirements, although it too has yet to become properly established worldwide. Most NB-IoT chipset and module manufacturers have shipped very few units, with the exception of HiSilicon and its local module vendor partners, the bulk of all NB-IoT chips sold so far being directly integrated into smart meters. The status of the NB-IoT connections market is notoriously difficult to track at its early developmental stage, with an almost complete lack of reporting on the part of Mobile Network Operators (MNOs).

5G has been repeatedly positioned around three pillars: massive connectivity, mobile broadband, and low latency, with all three applicable to the IoT. But a newer message was discretely circulated at MWC 2019 suggesting that, at the risk of seemingly shying away from the cutting edge, savvy carrier groups will stage their 5G deployments only as and when it makes good business sense to do so in each region. The reason being that 5G-specific use cases have yet to be proven at large, and not just for the IoT. 5G’s eventual utility may transpire to be purely for the sake of the extra spectrum and capacity it provides, to keep doing what we already do with cellular, just that much better. Massive connectivity and mobile broadband, two of the three 5G pillars, are already well served by LTE, with the 5G-dependent wireless ethernet being likely to be enabled by private or hybrid, and not public, networks.

The sentiment of “the same, but more of it” brings us back to Fibocom’s 5G digital billboard demonstration, as an example of something that we can already do, but that can be accomplished at a greater resolution in the future thanks to the higher throughput of 5G. Similarly, at the time of the launch of Quectel’s two 5G modules, the vendor stated that the ideal initial enterprise uses for both products would be in fixed wireless access, mobile hotspots, and public safety and surveillance. All of which are mobile broadband applications—none of which do not already exist, nor have been in any way stunted in their development by any intrinsic deficiencies of existing 4G.

5G modules for the IoT will sample in late 2019 and begin shipping to customers in early 2020 at the earliest. The first products will be fully featured, multi-mode, global band, single Stock Keeping Unit (SKU) designs. They are likely to incorporate embedded form factor Subscriber Identity Modules (SIMs) and application processors. They will be destined for the broadband CPE uses previously mentioned. Intel’s Chenwei Yan, the Vice President & General Manager of Connected Products and Programs, and strategic partner to module vendor Fibocom, stated that, “5G’s revolutionary aspect is in its ability to connect all types of devices and become more than just a speed bump for faster phones”. 5G can certainly connect more than just phones, but so could each generation of cellular technology since 2G, with increasing diversity and effectiveness. Vitally, what remains to be proven is whether 5G can provide more than just a speed bump.