Foreword

Advancing 5.5G and Embracing the AI Era

This year has been a year of firsts. 2024 marked the first year of both commercial 5.5G deployment and on-device AI applications, and the rapid evolution of AI is continuing
to reshape services, data, and decision-making. Productivity has begun a profound transformation and enterprises are becoming more efficient, more innovative, and more
competitive. This has accelerated upgrade in all industries and brought us even closer to a truly digital and intelligent world.

The demand for intelligent ICT products and solutions, from individuals, families, and enterprises, are giving rise to more application scenarios for ubiquitous intelligent services.
This means huge opportunities for the ICT industry.

Content interaction for individuals will transform, driving a spike in network traffic. This will be underpinned by generative AI and full-modal technologies which enable more
efficient and higher-quality interactions, as well as the emergence of human-model interactions.

The boundaries of the Internet of Everything will also expand, from humans to digital humans, vehicles to smart vehicles, and enterprise production assistance to core parts of
production. These expanded connectivity boundaries will change the way we live and work.

For individual users, AI is creating more and more advanced multi-dimensional experiences. As ways of interaction change, network traffic models and business logic are also
changing. The features and capabilities of 5.5G make it ideal to drive experience monetization. AI is built into more devices, like mobile phones, wearables, and vehicle cockpits.
AI mobile phones can autonomously orchestrate apps and generate user interfaces in real time to facilitate one-stop services. AI assistants will be able to quickly and accurately
respond to instructions and serve users anytime, anywhere. However, this means networks must deliver more on all fronts. Diversified performance requirements in bandwidth,
latency, and deterministic experience will drive network evolution and reshape business models. The telecom industry can already provide differentiated, scenario-based services
and experiences for different user groups. More monetization factors beyond just network traffic have also emerged, like rates, computing power, and VIP assurance. These
are pushing traffic-based carrier monetization to become more experience-based. Carriers can also leverage their huge user bases and continued AI innovation to create more
services and value for users, and achieve a new round of business growth.

For families, communication service scenarios are evolving from home security to smart homes, as demand for more and more diverse experiences arises. Home assistants and
agents powered by home computing devices that serve as small home AI brains, alongside cloud-based big AI brains, will offer real-time intelligent decision-making for smart
home devices and services. They will also support personalized settings based on the habits and needs of individual family members, making homes more comfortable and
convenient. To meet these more diversified needs, carriers can provide integrated packages leveraging home networks that are evolving from gigabit speeds to 10-gigabit speeds.
On top of basic data and bandwidth packages, carriers can provide privileges and premium services that comprehensively enhance user experience. Accelerated commercial
adoption of 10-gigabit packages is expected to occur in 2025 to offer consumers more intelligent, convenient, and personalized smart home services, lifting home broadband
to a new level.

Finally, for enterprises, service operations are moving past digitalization and on to intelligent transformation, driving the adoption of converged cloud, AI, and security services
on top of basic private-line and private-network services. Carriers can invest in multiple areas here, including cloud, edge, and devices, to achieve growth through industry
intelligent transformation and inference. They can provide combinations of standardized offerings and AI to small- and medium-sized enterprises to help them implement
simplified, service-oriented, and standardized edge AI inference services. These, alongside inclusive AI capabilities from smart devices, can meet the needs of numerous industries.
In addition, AI will continue evolving and empowering more industries. In manufacturing, education, healthcare, and more, the integration of connectivity, networking, and AI
technologies is fostering new products, services, and business models. Examples of these include the low-altitude economy and passive IoT. The application of AI in diversified
scenarios is set to enhance both production capacity and production quality.

We will need intelligent computing target networks to support all of these experience and industry upgrades. We will move away from centralized computing power deployment
and towards distributed deployment models, and cloud-edge-device computing power collaboration will become a trend. This means we need differentiated networks for
accessing computing power and connecting resources within and between intelligent computing centers. We will need to build a unified, collaborative, and efficient intelligent
computing target network to create "a nationwide computer" that delivers efficiently integrated and flexibly scaled computing, transport, and storage resources. This will facilitate
new service models such as computing power leasing and industry-specific model incubation. It will also improve end-to-end AI application experience, and create new industry
opportunities. Telecom foundation models and smaller models are pushing network automation towards level-4 autonomy, which will significantly improve network O&M
efficiency and energy efficiency.

Over the next decade, we will continue to embrace AI and move even faster towards an intelligent world. 5.5G will have an essential role to play. Huawei looks forward to working
with all industry partners to explore better ways to build networks and achieve business success, provide more abundant digital experiences, and help industries go intelligent.

By Yang Chaobin,
Board Member
Chairman of the Investment Review Board
President of ICT Products & Solutions
Huawei
Published by

01
ICT Sales & Service Dept.
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.

Sponsor
Li Peng, Liu Kang

Editor-in-Chief
COVER STORY
Song Xiaodi
UAE: du’s 5G-A Strategy P6
Contributing Editor-in-Chief is Founded on Technology
Shen Shixiong, Yao Xiangxiang, Chen Jipeng Innovation and
a Clear Business Case
Editors
Cai Wei, Chen Quanbao, Gao Pengcheng, Saleem Alblooshi,
Gou Boru, Guo Ping, Kang Yu, Huang Rui, CTO, du UAE
Luo Xini, Ma Jinge, Qian Hao, Shen Yubin,
Tao ling, Tang Xiaoqiang, Wu Kun,
Wu Xiaofeng, Xu dongjian, Zhou Qian,

02
Zhu Wei, Samuel Luke Winfield-D'Arcy

For the electronic version, please visit:

https://carrier.huawei.com/en/winwin/45
VOICES FROM INDUSTRY
E-mail: [email protected]
Address: G1, Huawei Industrial Base,
China Mobile Shanghai: P10
Bantian, Longgang, Shenzhen 518129, China
Publication Registration No.:
Stepping up 5G-A
Yue B No. L015060029 Commercialization to Help
Build a 5G-A² City
Copyright © Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 2024.
All rights reserved. China Mobile Shanghai
No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted
in any form or by any means without prior written consent of
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.

Disclaimer Elevating Innovation: P14

The contents of this document are for information purposes
only, and provided “as is”. Except as required by applicable laws,
China Unicom Beijing
no warranties of any kind, either express or implied, including Paves the Way
but not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability
and fitness for a particular purpose, are made in relation to for Commercial 5G-A
contents of this document. To the maximum extent permitted
by applicable law, in no case shall Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd Yang Lifan,
be liable for any special, incidental, indirect, or consequential
damages, or lost profits, business, revenue, data, goodwill or
Deputy General Manager,
anticipated savings arising out of or in connection with any use China Union Beijing
of this document.

China Telecom Shanghai: P19

Fostering an F5G-A All-optical
10-Gigabit Ecosystem
Ji Hongfeng,
General Manager, Marketing Department,
Read on your phone China Telecom Shanghai
 03 05
PERSPECTIVES WINNERS
5G-Advanced Poised for P23 e& UAE: Leading in P43
Take-off in 2024 5G-Advanced and Building
Mobile World Live the Intelligent Green Network
Marwan Bin Shakar,
Senior Vice President of Wireless and
5G-Advanced as a Booster P26 Access, e& UAE
for the Transformation to
an AI World
Yang Guang,
AIS Leads Thailand's P47
Senior Principal Analyst, Service Provider Digital Revolution with 5G
Strategy and Mobile Infrastructure, Omdia Mark Chong Chin Kok,
Deputy Chief Executive, AIS

04 Telefónica: Paving the way

from 5G SA to 5G-Advanced
Cayetano Carbajo,
P50

TAO OF BUSINESS Director for Core,

Transport and Service Platforms, CTIO Office,
Telefónica Group
From 5G to 5G-A: P30
Charting a New Course
for Business Success with CTM: 5G-A Takes P53
Further Innovation Digital Macau to a New Era
James Chen,
Hudson Lou,
President, Carrier Sales Department, Huawei
Director of
Network & Services Development, CTM

The New 5G-A Journey: P34

Embracing New Opportunities Entel Propels Chile into P56
in Mobile AI F5G-Advanced Era
Cao Ming, Luis Uribe,
President, Wireless Network Product Line, Huawei Chief Technology Officer, Entel

5G-A Core with Native

Intelligence: Gateways, P38
Business Models, and the
Value of Connectivity
George Gao,
President, Cloud Core Network Product Line, Huawei
01
Cover story

UAE: du’s 5G-A Strategy

is Founded on
Technology Innovation
and a Clear Business Case
As a leading provider of telecoms and digital services in UAE, du has historically put
5G at the heart of its commercial offering, focusing on 5G investment, monetization
and an enhanced customer experience. In keeping with its pioneering approach to
the technology, du is today making 5G-Advanced a key priority.

By Saleem Alblooshi,
CTO, du UAE

A history of 5G innovation full of superlatives: the highest building, the biggest

shopping mall, the biggest indoor snow-park, the most
luxurious hotel, and the widest highways. As the top tele-
Those who know du’s 5G history will be aware that we
com service provider in the UAE, we are always trying
launched our “5G Leading” strategy in 2019. Having
to provide the best experience to our consumers and
partnered with Huawei to unveil the world's first 5G-Ad-
visitors.
vanced (5G-A or 5.5G) demonstration villa in 2022, we
announced the commercialization of 5G-A in February
2024, and published details of our 5G-A strategy togeth-
er with our vendor partner. A clear business case for 5G-A
Today we provide 5G service to 98.5% of the population 5G-A is one of the technologies which will help us to
in the UAE, a historically high 5G benchmark which has achieve that target. It will provide 10 Gbps to each user,
been verified by several independent parties. 10 times that which can be achieved with 5G. And in
phase 1, we are going to develop three component car-
Anyone who has visited Dubai will know that it is a city rier (3CC) TDD coverage nationwide, which can provide

6 Volume 2023
ISSUE 45 ISSUE 3
09/2024
The business case for 5G-A is clear. A 12.6%
growth in home broadband use in 2023 result-
ed in a historical high of 600,000 users for our
FWA offering.

ISSUE 45
Volume 09/2024
2023 ISSUE 3 7
up to 5 Gbps to each user. In the coming years, we will we can also explore new use cases, such as guaranteed
embrace 5G-A to massively enhance the experience for quality of experience, RedCap features, Passive IoT, and
our customers. other capabilities.

The business case for 5G-A is clear. A 12.6% growth

in home broadband use in 2023 resulted in a histori- Partnership is a driver of
cal high of 600,000 users for our fixed-wireless access innovation
(FWA) offering. Even with fiber penetration in the UAE
at 97% (mainly accounted for by our competitor), du Cooperation between Huawei and du goes deeper in
itself still accounts for around 20% of the home broad- 5G-A, with milestones being realized one after another.
band market. Since du launched its FWA business in Together, the two companies have witnessed how con-
2021 the number of users has doubled in two years, tinuous evolution of wireless networks can bring mobile
while utilization of the network has reached more than users the convenience, superior network performance,
25% overall, with hundreds of sites achieving more and enormous possibilities of an innovative service ex-
than 80%. perience.

By launching our 5G-A network we can provide an unim- As well as support for cutting-edge technologies such as
paired and even better experience to customers as traffic passive IoT and native intelligence, 5G-A is opening up
levels continue to grow. As a result of our FWA business new business opportunities. Operators around the world

8 Volume 2023
ISSUE 45 ISSUE 3
09/2024
 Release 18 will be frozen in the first half of this year.
And five connections in people, home, things, industries,
and vehicles are constantly expanding the boundaries of
connectivity.

For terminals, 3CC devices such as smartphones and

CPE are mature, and RedCap terminal modules are be-
ing continuously enriched. Also, rich business models are
there to support monetization of uplink and latency ca-
pabilities. Finally, many countries have issued policies to
fully support the development of 5G-A.

Global 5G-A commercialization is accelerating. More

than 10 operators have announced 5G-A commercial
plans, and more than 30 operators have carried out re-
lated technical verification. In the Middle East, leading
operators such as du, have taken the lead in achieving
large-scale commercial use of 5G-A. Operators in Eu-
rope, Asia Pacific, and Latin America have actively veri-
fied the 10 Gbps capability to prepare for the commercial
use of 5G-A in 2024.

Planning for the next phase

After working with 5G for 5 years of development, the
technology’s capabilities in mobile and FWA are much
clearer. However, we need to think about how we can
enable industries’ digitalization. In du, we call it Beyond
have varied spectrum conditions and service require- Core Revenue. We started with a strategy named “EN-
ments, but carrier aggregation can be performed on the ABLE” which we have now updated as “RENABLE”. We
existing sub-6 GHz large-bandwidth spectrum to quickly would like to create more streams which can help oper-
deliver a downlink peak rate of 5 Gbps. ators to monetize the network.

du has taken the lead in setting up a large-bandwidth For example, can we open the network APIs to different
3CC TDD commercial network. To further improve the industries? How can we bundle the network and cloud
5 Gbps download rate, spectrum such as millimeter together and provide differentiated services? How will
wave (mmWave) can be utilized to provide an ultimate 5G-A change the manufacturing industry? How will FWA
10 Gbps experience in the downlink and accommodate and fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) cooperate with each oth-
more service scenarios, thereby creating huge market er? We need to work together with leading vendors like
opportunities. Huawei so that we can find the answers.

From 5G-A vision to reality

After three years of work, 5G-A has progressed from vi-
sion to reality, and all of the standards, services, products,
terminals, business, and policies are ready. Firstly, 3GPP

Volume 2024
2023
ISSUE 45 ISSUE 1
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02
Voices from Industry

China Mobile Shanghai:

Stepping up 5G-A
Commercialization to
Help Build a 5G-A² City
China Mobile Shanghai

On June 25, China Mobile Shanghai held a commercial 5G-A exploration and commercialization. It has commer-
5G-A launch themed "Magic Speed Program for Extraor- cialized 5G-A at scale and delivered superior user experi-
dinary Experience". At the event, the operator launched ence through contiguous network coverage.
three commercial service packages for consumers as part
of its exploration of business models that meet the diversi- China Mobile Shanghai has been tireless in its efforts to
fied needs of different user groups in the 5G-A era. maintain its lead in 5G-A. On July 6, at the closing cere-
mony of the 7th World AI Conference held in Shanghai,
This is an important step for China Mobile Shanghai as the Shanghai Municipal Government and China Mobile
it spearheads the commercial adoption of 5G-A. 2024 announced their strategic cooperation to make Shanghai
marks the launch of commercial 5G-A. China Mobile a "5G A² Demonstration City". The two parties are ex-
started commercial 5G-A deployment this March and pected to work together to promote deeper integration
plans to bring 5G-A coverage to more cities by the end of 5G-A with AI.
of the year. China Mobile Shanghai has been pioneering

10 ISSUE 45 09/2024
Network construction: Leveraging 5G-A's network capabilities, China Mobile
Shanghai achieved record-high test speeds on devices
Creating value with available in the market: 5 Gbps peak downlink rate, over-
differentiated advantages 500 Mbps peak uplink rate, and 2.5 Gbps average expe-
rienced rate.
Over the course of a year, China Mobile Shanghai de-
ployed a large-scale commercial 5G-A network with China Mobile Shanghai also built the first 5G-A demon-
contiguous coverage. The network achieved 100% 5G-A stration network based on three-component carrier
coverage at famous landmarks like Lujiazui and the (3CC) aggregation for a metro line in Shanghai. This
Bund, as well as in 10 key settings, urban expressways, innovation has set an industry benchmark by providing
and trunk roads. faster and more stable connectivity for metro riders.

In the Watertown Lobby area, we built 10-gigabit op- We believe that user willingness to embrace the 5G-A
tical network infrastructure to deliver high-speed and era will depend on our ability to provide differentiated
large-capacity connectivity. The use of 10-gigabit con- network advantages. We have been actively exploring
nectivity technology significantly improved communica- ways to improve user experience with such 5G-A-based
tion network speeds and capacity in the area, helping advantages.
turn Watertown Lobby into a demonstration area for
digitalized agricultural machinery production and rural The first advantage is 10 Gbps downlink. By introducing
governance. millimeter wave (mmWave) 3CC aggregation technolo-

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gy, 5G-A can deliver 10-fold higher downlink rates than
Accelerating commercial 5G-A
5G. The second advantage is the ability to boost the con-
nectivity of all things. With passive IoT capabilities, 5G-A
The three commercial service packages we launched this
can be applied in many new domains, such as ware-
June can deliver differentiated experiences to users.
housing and logistics. This will promote IoT adoption and
development. The third is integrated sensing and com- The 5G-A business travel package offers users network
munications. 5G-A can support high-precision sensing at speeds of up to 3 Gbps downlink and up to 200 Mbps
low cost for all domains. The fourth is more determin- uplink. This enables stutter-free videoconferencing, high-
istic network performance, which can play a vital role in er-definition display, and faster file transfer for premium
the industrial Internet. China Mobile Shanghai achieved business travelers. It also offers users access to appli-
excellent latency and deterministic performance in the cations like 5G New Calling, cloud PC, and DragonPass
Jinqiao demonstration area project. travel services.

The 5G-A livestreaming package offers users network

Experience-based packages: speeds of up to 2 Gbps downlink and up to 150 Mbps

We believe that user willingness to embrace the

5G-A era will depend on our ability to provide dif-
ferentiated network advantages. We have been
actively exploring ways to improve user experi-
ence with such 5G-A-based advantages.

12 ISSUE 45 09/2024
uplink. This allows them to enjoy smoother streaming in and incubate benchmark vertical projects like smart
higher definition and more real-time interaction. communications, smart low-altitude connectivity, smart
metro, smart IoV, and new-type manufacturing, injecting
The 5G-A games package provides networks speeds of new momentum into Shanghai's digital and intelligent
up to 2 Gbps downlink and 150 Mbps uplink, allowing transformation and socioeconomic development.
gamers to enjoy smoother, more stable gameplay with
lower latency. In the IoV sector, we worked with Huawei on the Jin-
qiao Intelligent Connected Vehicles Demonstration Area.
For terminal devices, China Mobile Shanghai worked Leveraging 5G-A's integrated-sensing-and-communica-
with device vendors to launch two glasses-free 3D de- tions and wide-coverage capabilities, this collaboration
vices and four 5G-A mobile phones. The combination enabled low-cost and easy-to-adopt IoV applications,
of AI and glasses-free 3D technologies allows users to setting a new benchmark in smart transportation.
experience 3D visuals without having to put on any ad-
ditional devices. China Mobile Shanghai has also unveiled a 5G-A In-
dustrial Internet Lab, through which we will carry out
technical verification, solution research, and performance
Continued innovation: testing. This will allow us to create 5G-A applications for
Exploring the integration of core industrial Internet production lines and support new
industrialization efforts.
5G-A with AI
The integration of 5G-A with AI is a key direction for
digitalization. China Mobile Shanghai is committed to
Exploration and innovation:
helping transform Shanghai into a 5G A² city. A² refers to Accelerating the transition
the convergence of 5G-A and AI. AI-integrated 5G-A net- to commercial 5G-A
works will have significantly higher intelligent capabili-
ties. For example, AI enhances calling services to provide The Shanghai Municipal Government has formulated a
new user experiences, such as AIGC digital avatars and clear strategy to transform Shanghai into a dual-10-giga-
intelligent customer service. AI also enables the Internet bit city marked by both 5G-A and 10-gigabit optical net-
of Vehicles (IoV) to implement training in the cloud and works by the end of 2026. The government and China
inference at the edge, enabling more intelligent auton- Mobile are jointly working to transform Shanghai into a
omous driving. "5G A² Demonstration City" and set the tone for Shang-
hai's development over the next three years in three
Using the power of AI to enhance product experience, we directions: consolidating network capabilities, fostering
have launched a range of innovative applications, such more effective applications, and stimulating industry vi-
as 5G New Calling, mobile cloud disks, video RBT, mobile tality.
HD, cloud phones, mobile healthcare, and cloud PCs.
Looking ahead, China Mobile Shanghai will continue
With the 5G New Calling application, for example, we to expand 5G-A site coverage and explore innovative
use both AI and computing capabilities to provide users AI-integrated applications. We will continue to promote
with a new calling experience that features consistent commercial 5G-A applications and products, and create
HD and visualized interaction, as well as other intelligent prosperity in collaboration with industry partners.
functions like fun calling, real-time transcription, intelli-
gent translation, and AI data.

We recently launched a mobile cloud disk application

called AI Store. For video RBT applications, we launched
new AI features like speech-to-video and AI dancing.

For industry sectors, China Shanghai Mobile will explore

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02
Voices from Industry

Elevating Innovation:
China Unicom Beijing
Paves the Way for
Commercial 5G-A
By Yang Lifan, 3GPP's Release 18 has finally been frozen and the key
Deputy General Manager, China Unicom Beijing technologies, products, and the ecosystem underpinning
5G-A are becoming increasingly mature. This means
the world is ready for commercial 5G-A. This milestone
took center stage at MWC 2024 in both Barcelona and
Shanghai, sparking vibrant discussions across the indus-
try. This evolved and enhanced version of 5G will clearly
lead the industry to new heights in network capabilities.

Global operators are simultaneously ramping up their

5G-A testing and commercial trials. According to a
GSMA Intelligence survey, half of all global operators
are expected to roll out commercial 5G-A networks
within two years of relevant standards being released.

In January, China Unicom Beijing worked with Hua-

wei to further their years-long collaborative innovation
under the 5G Capital initiative by completing the first
large-scale 5G-A networking demonstration in China.

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This included 1:1 network verification in three distinct Award. These successful construction and operational
key locations: Beijing Financial Street in the city center, practices are continuing to serve as benchmarks and
the Beijing Long Distance Call Building, and the Work- guidelines for global 5G development.
ers' Stadium, showcasing a range of innovative tech-
nologies and applications. The demo has provided fea- In 2024, as commercial 5G-A sits just on the horizon,
sible, deployable, and replicable experience for network the 5G Capital collaborative innovation project is gearing
construction and application development to help bring up for its next phase. In January this year, China Unicom
5G-A into reality. Beijing partnered with Huawei to complete China's first
large-scale 5G-A network demonstration under the proj-
As the 5G race reaches its halfway point, China Unicom ect. Industry experts and the media were invited to expe-
Beijing has taken this opportunity to reflect on its inno- rience comprehensive contiguous coverage in three key
vation journey over the past few years. Our experience areas: Beijing Financial Street in the city center, the Long
has helped us identify five key strengths needed for 5G Distance Call Building, and the Workers' Stadium. Various
network development: a steadfast core commitment to industry representatives were also invited to an industry
high-bandwidth strategies, 200 MHz network in core event to discuss commercial 5G-A.
areas, core competitive strength in intelligent opera-
tional capabilities, pioneering innovation in networking This 5G-A project is exemplary in many ways. Beyond
(as seen in our 5G-A Financial Street project), and the delivering exceptional experience and large-scale net-
success of previous projects such as the 5G Capital project. work coverage, its importance lies in the real-world 1:1
networking that has achieved a seamless 5G-A expe-
rience with a minimal number of base stations, pav-
ing the way for the potential large-scale deployment
A Global Benchmark: of 5G-A.
Four years of collaborative
innovation China Unicom Beijing's large-scale 5G-A networking
demonstration project brings three key benefits to the
5G Capital is an innovation program jointly established industry. First, the project delivers critical network capa-
in April 2020 by China Unicom Beijing and Huawei, bilities. 5G-A enhances network performance in terms
which was built upon the companies' years of successful of both speed and latency by up to 10 times. According
collaboration. The initiative used advanced operational to the project tests, in the Financial Street demonstra-
models and cutting-edge technology to set a standard tion area, the network achieved a peak downlink rate
for large-scale commercial deployment. It aimed to es- of 10 Gbps and consistently perceived speeds exceeding
tablish Beijing as the home of the world's leading 5G 5 Gbps. At the Workers' Stadium, an exceptional uplink
network. In 2021, China Unicom Beijing was already speed of 4 Gbps was also recorded.
a pioneer in public media-driven large-scale testing
and introduced 12 performance indicators to create a Second, this project verified key 5G-A technologies. In
new paradigm for network evaluation road testing. In the large-scale 5G-A networking demonstration proj-
2022, China Unicom Beijing then became the world's ect, China Unicom Beijing successfully tested technol-
first carrier to deploy large-scale contiguous coverage ogies such as Extremely Large Antenna Array (ELAA),
with 200 MHz bandwidth, making Beijing the first city high- and low-frequency coordination, and intelligent
in the world to have 200 MHz bandwidth networking. beam management. These technologies are crucial for
In 2023, the 5G Capital project redefined intelligent achieving consistent downlink speeds of 5 Gbps with a
operations by establishing comprehensive 5G network 1:1 high- and low-frequency site configuration.
assessment standards. It used AI to transform user ex-
perience by integrating dynamic and static elements to Third, the project verifies the end-to-end capabilities need-
achieve smart operations. Over these four years, China ed for the planning, construction, maintenance, and opti-
Union Beijing and Huawei collaborated wholehearted- mization of 5G-A networking. The project achieved optimal
ly, consistently leading 5G innovation, which ultimately performance and user experience, laying the groundwork for
earned them the 2022 GLOMO 5G Industry Partnership future large-scale 5G-A network deployments.

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 Historically, each generation of mobile communi-
cation technology has run into at least one signif-
icant bottleneck, and that is where next-gen ap-
plications have emerged. For 4G, the bottlenecks
we saw were high-definition video and interactive
services. These applications have already flour-
ished under 5G. Right now, the bottlenecks are in
AI and industrial control, which are the key areas
for 5G-A and future 6G breakthroughs.

ISSUE 45 09/2024

Sustained collaborative multiple issues like indoor and outdoor deployment,

end-to-end sensing, and ensuring the worst-case per-
innovation: Overcoming formance indicators. Overcoming these challenges will
challenges, optimizing depend on continuous innovation in network construc-
networks, seizing tion, optimization, and maintenance.
opportunities
When it comes to construction, our focus remains on
Advanced technology is only truly "achieved" when it advancing network capabilities. When the network is
sees large-scale industrial application. The future suc- deployed at a certain scale, this involves leveraging big
cess of 5G-A hinges on its ability to achieve widespread data to precisely target specific weaknesses and en-
deployment and broad application across diverse sce- hance network capabilities. With 5G-A, China Unicom
narios. 5G-A must achieve large-scale deployment if we Beijing and its partners are utilizing 800 MHz high-fre-
want to deliver truly universal services to users, support quency products to achieve full-bandwidth coverage for
the growth of various industries, and remain economi- ultra-wideband applications. We are also integrating the
cally viable. This same principle also held true in previ- BladeRRU series to aggregate low-band and mid-band
ous generations of mobile networks. frequencies, while leveraging dual-frequency Massive
MIMO and ELAA dual-frequency array technologies to
But opportunity inevitably comes hand in hand with enable seamless coverage across high and low frequen-
challenges. Before we can achieve large-scale applica- cies. This approach simplifies site configurations capable
tion, the next phase of 5G-A development must address of delivering peak rates ranging from 5 Gbps to 10 Gbps.

16 ISSUE 45 09/2024
In optimization, we are focusing on the smallest el- ing analysis, service ticket command and dispatch,
ements to achieve a seamless 5G-A experience with special situation pre-processing, and detailed scenario
minimal base stations through high- and low-band fre- insights. By integrating AI into the smallest production
quency coordination and 1:1 networking. The "smallest units, we can quickly filter out abnormal data from
elements" refer to three key dimensions: large volumes of maintenance data, pinpoint issues,
1. Geographical elements: These elements specify dif- and implement intelligent, end-to-end service tickets in
ferent segments of the entire network down to specific the production process. This system enables precise and
regions, grids, individual base station coverage areas, automated resource management, and realizes digita-
and even to specific buildings and floors, allowing for lization with visualized, geospatial, E2E management
targeted support to meet personalized needs. capabilities which significantly improves accuracy and
2. Network elements: These elements specify intelligent efficiency.
configuration at the smallest level, from base stations
to cells, carriers, antennas, beams, and even down to
individual parameters.
Fueling 5G-A growth:
3. Time elements: By significantly shortening the net-
work analysis cycle from the industry standard of
Get ready for a boom of
months to days, or even hours, we can implement a innovative applications
new iterative optimization model based on network
data, guided by quality data feedback, and driven by With the rapid commercialization of 5G-A, high-profile
targeted optimizations, to continuously advance differ- application scenarios are drawing increasing attention.
entiated enhancements. Many innovative applications have already emerged, such
as the glasses-free 3D, ultra-high-definition (UHD) shal-
In terms of maintenance, digitalization can ensure net- low compression encoding, and XR split rendering appli-
work stability. We have established a digital operations cations China Unicom Beijing showcased earlier this year
and maintenance system that supports decision-mak- at our 5G Capital event.

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Many are asking what the killer app for 5G-A will be. dia Group and Huawei, has launched the world's first
Historically, each generation of mobile communication UHD shallow compression encoding real-time produc-
technology has run into at least one significant bot- tion system. Harnessing the robust capabilities of 5G-A
tleneck, and that is where next-gen applications have networks, including ultra-large uplink and low latency,
emerged. For 2G, that bottleneck was websites, which this system ensures stable real-time video backhaul and
led to 3G supporting numerous web-based applica- simplifies the complex cable setups in broadcasting stu-
tions. For 3G, the bottleneck shifted to video, resulting dios.
in 4G kicking off a surge of video applications. For 4G,
the bottlenecks we saw were high-definition video and
interactive services. These applications have already Working together to
flourished under 5G.
continue leading by
As we move towards 5G-A, the defining applications
innovating
will mirror 5G's current limitations. Right now, the bot-
tlenecks are in AI and industrial control, which are the 5G-A is poised for robust growth in 2024. The recent
key areas for 5G-A and future 6G breakthroughs. 3GPP Rel-18 standard freeze marks a significant mile-
stone. Globally, many countries and regions are step-
ping into a new phase of 5G-A development, recogniz-
Predicting exact applications is always a gamble. The
ing that network infrastructure will increasingly drive
most impactful uses may not come from the telecom
digital economic growth. China is currently a leader in
sector as they more often align with societal develop-
the digital economy and has reaffirmed its commit-
ments. The demand for societal progress will inevitably
ment to advancing research and development in 5G-A
drive advancements in the telecommunications indus-
and 10 gigabit optical networks.
try. We should never underestimate people's desire for a
better life. Once 5G-A's capabilities are fully unleashed,
a wave of new applications will naturally follow. From 2G to 5G-A, communication technologies have
evolved rapidly, but the fundamental principles remain
steadfast. Mobile network advancements not only re-
Currently, the industry is exploring new applications
quire us to adhere to established norms, but also to
that connect people, vehicles, objects, businesses, and
strive for balanced excellence. We must make insightful
homes. For instance, in people connectivity, 5G-A's en-
decisions to pursue innovation.
hanced deterministic experience capabilities will accel-
erate the shift from the 2D to the 3D mobile Inter-
net. China Unicom Beijing is leading the way here in 5G-A stands as the next summit for operators to as-
consumer applications with offerings like cloud gaming cend. Built upon the foundation of our 5G Capital ini-
and innovations such as glasses-free 3D and XR split tiative, China Unicom Beijing will continue to collab-
rendering. orate with partners like Huawei and actively explore
novel deployment models for 5G-A, accelerating its
commercial adoption. Through continuous technolog-
In the realm of the Internet of Things (IoT), the cost of
ical and business innovation, our goal is to deliver ex-
RedCap modules is steadily dropping, kicking off the
ceptional network experiences and dedicated services,
widespread commercial adoption of the Internet of
spearheading digitalization and intelligence.
Video Things (IoVT) across China. This application now
covers more than 80% of industry sectors. At the same
time, the industry is actively validating passive IoT which
will not just upgrade all walks of life but will also con-
nect production, warehousing, and logistics, empower-
ing the entire processes of fully-connected factories.

Moreover, 5G-A applications are rapidly gaining ground

in B2B scenarios across various industries. China
Unicom Beijing, alongside partners such as China Me-

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Voices from Industry

China Telecom Shanghai:

Fostering an F5G-A All-optical
10-Gigabit Ecosystem

The launch of commercial F5G-A marks the beginning of an all-optical 10-gigabit

era. 10 gigabit networks deliver instantaneous data transmission and enable
leading-edge applications like smart city and cloud gaming to thrive, laying the
foundation for a full-fledged digital China.

As a world-leading operator, China Telecom Shanghai plays a key role in

Shanghai's initiative to build a dual-10-gigabit city. Using 50G PON technology,
the operator launched a 10-Gigabit Cloud Broadband Demonstration Community
and an All-optical 10-Gigabit Cloud Broadband Cooperative Industry Innovation
Demonstration Base to enable iterative network upgrades with new services. This
will make networks more productive and accelerate the city's transition towards
the 10-gigabit era.

By Ji Hongfeng, Three drivers behind

General Manager, Marketing Department, evolution from gigabit to
China Telecom Shanghai
10-gigabit broadband
China has the world's largest optical fiber network and
largest number of gigabit broadband users. The coun-
try is currently making every effort to transition from
the gigabit era to the 10-gigabit era. This evolution is
being driven by three key factors.

The first driver is surging demand for emerging services

like XR and the metaverse. With the rise of virtual re-
ality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and the metaverse,
users will require increasingly higher speeds and low-
er latencies. The immersive experiences created by

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these services will require networks to transfer massive telemedicine, autonomous driving, and smart factories.
amounts of data in real time to ensure seamless inter- This will make our lives more connected and intelligent.
action, making 10-gigabit networks a necessity.
In May this year, the Shanghai Municipal Communica-
The second driver is innovative technologies like 50G tions Administration and the Commission of Economy
PON. 50G PON is the next-generation PON network and Informatization released the All-optical 10-Gigabit
standard after 10G PON. It features ultra-high band- City of Shanghai Action Plan (2024–2025). The plan
width, low latency, and flexible application-specific calls for Shanghai to take a forward-thinking approach
slicing. With over five times more access bandwidth, to build world-leading 10-gigabit optical network in-
higher-quality service support, and stronger network frastructure. By 2025, Shanghai's 10-gigabit optical
security, 50G PON is now the only option for major network infrastructure system will take shape, leading
carriers looking to deliver 10-gigabit broadband access. China in both breadth of coverage and depth of appli-
cation. This infrastructure will power Shanghai's digital
The third driver is the use of fiber to connect all things. and intelligent transformation.
With the emergence of applications related to the Internet
of Things (IoT), smart city, and Industry 4.0, all things be- Specifically, the Action Plan has identified 15 key tasks
ing connected will become the norm. 10-gigabit networks in three areas related to 10-gigabit optical networks:
will be the foundation for applications like smart homes, infrastructure construction, integrated application inno-

With the emergence of applications related to

IoT, smart city, and Industry 4.0, all things being
connected will become the norm. 10-gigabit
networks will be the foundation for applications
like smart homes, telemedicine, autonomous
driving, and smart factories. This will make our
lives more connected and intelligent.

20 ISSUE 45 09/2024
vation, and industry-wide technological innovation. The operator chose not to rest on its laurels. Under the
guidance of the government's industrial policies, China
The first area is significantly improved capacity of Telecom Shanghai—a key player in local network con-
10-gigabit optical network facilities. There will al- struction and information services—is leading the inno-
ready be tens of thousands of 50G PON ports, with vation of 10 gigabit optical-network applications.
50G PON and FTTR deployed in all new residential
buildings, commercial buildings, and industrial parks. In March this year, China Telecom Shanghai launched
There will be more than 45,000 OTN nodes per 10,000 the world's first 50G-PON-based 10-Gigabit Cloud
people, and at least three 400GE hyper-converged Broadband Demonstration Community. The average
data center case studies will be built. download speed per household was 9,391 Mbps, mean-
ing 200 high-definition (HD) photos could be uploaded
The second area is accelerated and integrated appli- and downloaded in just one second.
cation of 10-gigabit optical networks. Over 20,000
10-gigabit broadband users will be developed by build- In addition, 10-gigabit optical networks allow multiple
ing 100 10-gigabit optical-network communities, 100 household members to stream glasses-free 3D video,
10-gigabit optical-network commercial buildings, and watch XR video with headsets, and play HD cloud games
ten 10-gigabit optical-network benchmark campuses. at the same time, creating countless possibilities for fu-
Breakthroughs will be achieved in industry applications ture AI applications.
in domains like smart manufacturing and smart tour-
ism, with at least three benchmark cases developed in Within the 10-Gigabit Cloud Broadband Demonstration
each key domain. Community, China Telecom Shanghai's CNY399 and above
home broadband package users can receive a six-month
The third area is sustained innovation in 10-gigabit optical trial of 10-gigabit cloud broadband at no additional charge.
network technology. Significant progress has been made
in innovative technologies such as new-type optical fiber, To lead the high-quality development of the all-opti-
multi-mode 50G PON evolution, 800+ Gbps ultra-high- cal 10G industry, China Telecom Shanghai unveiled the
speed transmission, metro pooling wavelength division world's first All-optical 10-Gigabit Cloud Broadband
multiplexing (WDM), and optical autonomous networks. Cooperative Industry Innovation Demonstration Base
These developments will help form a standardized system (the "Demonstration Base") on May 17 this year. The
for 10-gigabit optical network technologies and applica- Demonstration Base showcased a number of innovative
tions, and will push telecom enterprises to establish at services, including 10-gigabit cloud network attached
least three 10-gigabit optical network innovation centers. storage (NAS), 3D ultra-HD livestreaming, fast cloud
e-sports, and 3D optical-sensing health.

Pioneer: China Telecom This Demonstration Base, located in Shanghai Posts and
Shanghai helps make Shanghai Telecommunications Design Institute, has seen the com-
the first 10-gigabit city pletion of its phase I project and will soon be open to the
public. The Demonstration Base seeks to lead 10-gigabit
Shanghai is a national leader in digital infrastructure, and industry innovation from four aspects.
China Telecom Shanghai is at the forefront of the city's
ICT development. China Telecom Shanghai helped enable The first is innovation incubation. China Telecom Shang-
Shanghai to become the first city of optical networks and hai will work with industry partners to explore new ap-
the first gigabit city, and is now helping turn it into the plications of 10-gigabit optical networks to fulfill the
first dual-10-gigabit city. Through these efforts, the oper- emerging intelligent needs of individuals, families, and
ator has created a new "smart cloud Shanghai" architec- enterprises, and push digital smart life forward.
ture using ultra-broadband pipes based on optical fibers
and edge cloud services. The resulting 10-gigabit cloud The second aspect is commercial verification. When
broadband delivers the highest-quality network services promoting its services, China Telecom Shanghai uses
to the people of Shanghai. 50G PON's support for smooth evolution to realize zero

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modifications to optical distribution networks (ODNs) on China Telecom Shanghai has been pioneering du-
the live network. End users can choose to upgrade on al-10-gigabit exploration and evolution to help Shanghai
demand using a convenient service model. achieve its goal of building a global dual-10-gigabit city
powered by 5G-A and 10-gigabit optical networks by the
The third is demonstration and promotion. China Tele- end of 2026.
com Shanghai plans to closely integrate 10-gigabit ac-
cess with cloud applications as they launch marketing China Telecom Shanghai calls on players across the
campaigns to bring high-quality 10-gigabit services to industry value chain to invest more and jointly explore
more homes and enterprises in Shanghai. best practices in the construction of F5G-A 10-giga-
bit optical network infrastructure, accelerate inte-
The fourth aspect is ecosystem collaboration. China grated application innovation, and expand the depth
Telecom Shanghai will work with ecosystem partners to and breadth of applications. By creating a platform
first cover 16 administrative districts of Shanghai with for open collaboration with players from different do-
10-gigabit optical networks, as an initial move of the mains, an F5G-A all-optical 10-gigabit ecosystem will
city's 10-gigabit plan. This move aims to quickly build take shape. This will create more complementary ad-
consensus, facilitate industry maturity, and unlock the vantages for shared success.
value of 10-gigabit optical networks.
Looking ahead, China Telecom Shanghai will continue
to work with industry partners to invest in the all-optical
Building an F5G-A all-optical 10-gigabit industry and support Shanghai's All-optical 10
Gigabit City initiative. These efforts will help turn Chi-
10-gigabit ecosystem to na into a cyberpower and create a more productive, digital
facilitate a Digital China China.

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Perspectives

5G-Advanced Poised
for Take-off in 2024
Over the past few years, Huawei has pushed the development of 5G-Advanced,
which is also known as 5G-A, and those efforts are coming to fruition in 2024 as
operators are now in the process of moving to the commercial phase for launching
services and applications.

Reprinted with permission from

Mobile World Live

The initial start of the 5G-Advanced era began with 3GPP Orange
Release-18, the scope of which was finalised in Decem-
ber 2021. Emmanuel Chautard, SVP Operations and Networks
Economics of Orange Group, stated there are several
With operators at different stages of monetising their factors driving the onset of 5G-Advanced, including new
next generation networks, 5G-Advanced provides them services such as XR that require higher network capabili-
with a flexible framework to support massive use cases, ties to deliver low latency and higher bandwidth.
such as millions of sensors for industrial IoT, while cater-
ing to specific types of traffic profiles. He also noted 2 billion services require intelligent con-
nections with low latency to meet the demands of in-
During MWC24, Mobile World Live caught up with three creasingly complex scenarios. Lastly, Emmanuel stated
operator executives to discuss the latest developments industry standards and industry ecosystems are matur-
related to 5G-Advanced now that some of the testing ing, both of which set the stage for 5G-Advanced devel-
and validation measures are completed. opments and deployments.

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“Overall, 5G-Advanced is a result of business development enabled standalone (SA) 5G in its network as part of a
and technical standards development,” he explained. plan to launch 5G-Advanced.

Dr. Sherif cited the superior downlink and uplink speeds

HKT and capacity of 5G-Advanced as the primary reasons for
deploying it. While the current version of 5G is lagging in
Sheldon Yau, CTO of HKT, stated 5G-Advanced is terms of uplink speeds, he noted 5G-Advanced provides
important in the evolution of 5G networks, as well as for fibre-like speeds for mobile broadband users, guaranteed.
staying ahead of competitors. He also noted how crucial it
is in the evolution toward 6G. He noted du is also exploring how to use 5G-Advanced
to upgrade downlink speeds to up to 300 Mbps to 500
Yau highlighted 5G-Advanced’s multi-dimensional Mbps, whether it’s through 3CC or multi-carrier link
capabilities, such as Passive IoT (P-IoT) as well as aggregation.
integrated sensing and communications, which in turn
will give rise to new technologies and applications. He “If we get this, then we can offer things like fibre-like
noted HKT plans to acquire more spectrum resources to fixed wireless access with a guaranteed experience,” he
build 5G-Advanced networks and become an industry said. “It would be an excellent proposition for our current
leader over the next decade. fixed wireless uses.”

du 5G-Advanced use cases

Dr. Mahmoud R Sherif, Head of Innovation and Technico Emmanuel stated Orange has already assessed some
Business Development at du, said his company has key 5G-Advanced technologies, including a 6GHz test

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and P-IoT verification. As Orange expands the reach of its from 1.8GHz to 2.6GHz, while also combining C-Band
SA 5G network across Europe, 5G-Advanced services will and mmWave on high band spectrum.
also improve network energy efficiency to lower power
consumption. “Combining these two together, we can build a very high
quality 5G-Advanced network to maximise the spectrum
As for use cases, he explained Orange is exploring end- value,” he said.
to-end slicing for cloud gaming as well as additional new
applications for various gaming scenarios, and a next HKT’s Yau stated the operator is looking to technological
generation, real-time communication service. breakthroughs in the fields of URLLC and mMTC.

Dr. Sherif stated 5G-Advanced is the perfect network for “URLLC can enable a large number of key services, and
providing the best customer experience across 3D devices mMTC will profoundly change the business landscape,”
such as the Apple Vision Pro. he said.

5G-Advanced also holds the promise of connecting HKT has deployed 10G capable, 5G-Advanced networks
low cost, low power devices using reduced capability in popular shopping malls in Hong Kong. Yau noted
(RedCap). RedCap, which was first introduced in Release 5G-Advanced offers stable 10 Gbps speeds to support
17, is expected to provision devices with low power upgraded digital experiences such as AR shopping,
consumption including industrial IoT sensors. navigation and gaming, which in turn increase customer
engagements.
Dr. Sherif noted Redcap breaks the price barriers to
enable operators to offer services and applications, such Going forward, HKT will introduce P-IoT technology to
as warehousing, CCTV and digital production “at very produce more IoT products and apply it to verticals such
competitive prices”. as healthcare, construction, transportation, and logistics.

He also sees 5G-Advanced as one of the main pillars for Yau stated P-IoT can enable automatic payments by
connected vehicles due to its robust network capabilities. allowing customers to use barcodes instead of standing
in line at a retail store. It also lets shoppers pay for items
on their shopping cards automatically by using P-IoT.
Monetisation of 5G-Advanced
Dr. Sherif stated 5G-Advanced has roughly ten times the
Orange’s Emmanuel Chautard stated large-scale capabilities compared to the current generation of 5G,
5G-Advanced networks will enable new services with the bonus of “a lot more spectrum coordination
such the metaverse but noted operators “need full such as the basic TDD 3CC that we are already in the
interoperability with service platforms, both core process of deploying”.
network and RAN”.
“In addition, the extremely larger antenna array
“We are not sure of the adoption of such services,” he technology can provide fibre-like fixed wireless access
explained. “However, we want to be ready to host them, with a guaranteed experience,” said Dr. Sherif. “This
to manage the quality of service and to provide sufficient brings the possibility for speed monetisation on top of
capacity on our networks to guarantee performance with the traditional volume-based monetisation.”
the right monetisation framework, leading to a relevant
return on investment."

Technology breakthroughs
Orange’s approach for deploying extensive 5G-Advanced
service is using mid-band spectrum, which is in the range

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Perspectives

5G-Advanced as
a Booster for the
Transformation to an AI
World
By Yang Guang, AI applications generate
Senior Principal Analyst, Service Provider new requirements for the
Strategy and Mobile Infrastructure, Omdia
network
Applying artificial intelligence (AI) in telecom services
has become a focus topic among communication
service providers (CSPs). At MWC 2024, leading CSPs
demonstrated their innovative services based on AI
technologies.

Deutsche Telekom presented a visionary AI phone

concept with its technology partners. The AI-
based assistant can replace the countless apps on
the smartphone. “Like a concierge, the assistant
understands your goals and takes care of the details.”
Deutsche Telekom also showed an AI-based product for
the home market - a roving robot router - which can
move around the house and control smart appliances
and fixtures.

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At the same event, SK Telecom demonstrated a series of · Phase 2 spans 2028 to 2030 – Consumer-led AI
applications rooted in telco-specific large language mod- collaboration and entertainment traffic will migrate to
els (LLMs), such as AI-based virtual agents featuring chat- new immersive media formats, which will generate a
bot capabilities, an AI-based system for filtering spam and large amount of data downstream.
smishing, etc. The Asian CSP sees the rise of personal AI
assistants as a game changer and is “preparing a separate Omdia predicts that AI traffic will grow to 64% of the
personal AI assistant service for the global market.” global total data traffic by 2030. Meanwhile, AI-enriched
interactions will also generate requirements for more
CSPs also actively collaborate with leading AI companies to complex service-level agreements (SLA) and higher
develop AI-based enterprise services and improve internal network capacity.
operational efficiency. For example, Telenor announced
the collaboration with NVIDIA during MWC 2024 to bring Diverse AI applications have different requirements for
AI across the Nordic region, providing AI-based services to network bandwidth, latency, reliability, etc. Integrating
startups, enterprises, and government entities and trans- generative AI and immersive technologies could foster
forming internal operational efficiencies. innovative services and stimulate new experiential de-
mands. To satisfy the diverse requirements with a single
With the development of AI-based services, Omdia esti- physical network, end-to-end and flexible SLA manage-
mates AI traffic will grow in two phases: ment capabilities should be implemented to orchestrate
·Phase 1 spans 2024 to 2027 – B2B applications will drive network resources across the entire network, from net-
AI traffic growth. Upstream video and image analysis (and work core to network edge, sites, and even devices.
response) will be key AI activities that generate large traf-
fic flows. Meanwhile, some AI applications require persistent high

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 With the development of AI-based services,
Omdia estimates AI traffic will grow in two
phases. Phase 1 spans 2024 to 2027 – B2B
applications will drive AI traffic growth.
Upstream video and image analysis (and
response) will be key AI activities that generate
large traffic flows. Phase 2 spans 2028 to
2030 – Consumer-led AI collaboration and
entertainment traffic will migrate to new
immersive media formats, which will generate a
large amount of data downstream.

28
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bandwidth and low latency, which limits network such as machine vision or automatic remote control.
utilization, restricts CSPs’ overprovisioning, and raises costs.
CSPs must further increase network capacity to support 5G-Advanced can also empower CSPs to explore new
persistent high-volume AI-enriched traffic. market segments. For example, Chinese CSPs are
testing integrated sensing and communication (ISAC)
to enable low-altitude aviation delivery services, which
5G-Advanced can meet the could create new revenue sources for CSPs and support
growing demands the business expansion of logistics companies. The sensing
data, in turn, can be fed into AI models and algorithms to
According to the industry's common view, early 6G improve aviation traffic management capabilities, building
rollouts will not happen until 2030. CSPs must rely a win-win model between CSPs, the logistics industry, and
on 5G and its enhancement to support the growing authorities.
AI-enriched traffic. Thus, 5G-Advanced is the right
technology that emerges at the right time.
The 5G-Advanced ecosystem
The multi-band single-cell (MBSC) technology of is maturing
5G-Advanced can aggregate carriers in multiple
frequency bands into a single cell to deliver optimal The development of 5G-Advanced has been accelerating
user experience and improve network capacity. Recently, since early 2024. China Mobile, the largest mobile
e& UAE achieved a recorded data speed of 30.5Gbps operator in the world, announced in early February that
through an aggregation of multiple carriers across high- it has deployed more than 100,000 5G RedCap base
band and mid-band spectrums (1600 MHz in mmWave stations, achieving seamless 5G RedCap coverage in 52
and 300 MHz in C-band), which demonstrated the great Chinese cities. In late March, China Mobile launched
potential of 5G-Advanced in improving user experience 5G-Advanced consumer services in 100 Chinese cities
and network capacity. and targeted launching the service in more than 300
Chinese cities by the end of 2024.
The extensive network capacity combined with network
slicing capabilities of 5G standalone architecture can During the SAMENA Leaders’ Summit in May, the United
effectively meet the demand of AI traffic on complex Arab Emirates launched the 5G-A country program
SLA management and can also enable CSPs to provide and announced plans for the UAE to set sail for 5G-A
experience-based service plans that are a new attempt nationwide. Recently, Zain Saudi Arabia also announced
to monetize mobile broadband networks. the plan to launch 5G-Advanced commercial services in
the top eight Saudi cities in 2024-2026 and then extend
CSPs in China's mainland and Hong Kong, Thailand, the service to 18 main cities in 2027-2030.
North America, etc. have provided network slicing based
consumer services, such as China Unicom Guangdong These progresses will boost the maturity of the
branch’s VIP uplink service plans, AIS Thailand’s QoS 5G-Advanced ecosystem regarding devices and
living network app, Verizon’s event slicing services, etc. applications, which will benefit CSPs in the leading 5G
These innovative services demonstrate the potential markets and also support the 5G rollouts in the second-
for CSPs to leverage 5G-Advanced capabilities to build wave 5G markets, such as Latin America and Southeast
sustained mobile broadband business cases. Asia. CSPs in these regions could deploy 5G-Advanced
features from day one when they launch 5G services
In enterprise and vertical industry markets, the 5G to improve monetization capabilities and explore B2B
Reduced Capability (RedCap) can effectively improve markets.
the affordability of 5G connectivity for industrial
IoT applications while providing full network slicing With increasing deployments worldwide, 5G-Advanced
capabilities to meet the demand for complex SLA will become an essential part of digital infrastructure
management. Therefore, 5G RedCap has become a in the second half of the 2020s, supporting diverse AI
perfect connectivity solution for B2B AI applications, applications and boosting the transformation to an AI era.

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04
Tao of Business

From 5G to 5G-A: Charting

a New Course for Business
Success with Further
Innovation
By James Chen, While primary innovation
President, Carrier Sales Department, Huawei unleashes tech dividends,
secondary innovation
accelerates business success
Many inventions have had a significant impact through
secondary innovation. While primary innovation creates
the tech itself, secondary innovation focuses on the
practical side of its application and finding new solutions
to issues that impede the realization of its full potential, its
ability to contribute to thriving industries, and larger-scale
adoption. As 5G advances towards 5G-A, the industry is
getting ready to take another big step forward. Secondary
5G innovation offers insights into new ways to enable the
success of 5G and accelerate business monetization with 5G-A.

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China is leading the way in the scale and quality of experience guarantees, and sustained user retention.
5G development. 5G and many other information Carriers are leveraging the large 5G uplink bandwidth
technologies have become an integral part of China's and preferential network access capabilities to meet the
economy and society. By May 2024, there were more than specific requirements of livestreaming users.
890 million 5G users in China, and they accounted for
53% of the communications network traffic. China has The success of livestreaming packages has opened up new
more than 3.5 million 5G base stations, and more than 30 possibilities for uplink network monetization. As network
million 5G IoT connections. 5G's direct impact on China's capabilities continue to improve, carriers are starting to
total economic output is valued at CNY5.6 trillion. offer new service capabilities such as network acceleration
at the user and service levels, deterministic experiences,
Why has 5G been so successful in China? What can we and tangible experience improvement in order to extend
learn from the Chinese carriers' exploration, practices, 5G network monetization from livestreaming to even
and innovation with 5G? I think it boils down to three more scenarios, user groups, and applications. In this way,
things: scenario innovation, integrated innovation, and secondary 5G innovation is helping carriers reinvent the
collaborative innovation. This article will explore these value of user groups and scenarios to accelerate multi-
three types of innovation with reference to multiple hot- metric network monetization.
button topics, including livestreams by Internet influencers,
New Calling, cloud phones, the Internet of Vehicles (IoV),
and the Internet of Video Things (IoVT). Integrated innovation:
Building new gateways to
Scenario innovation: industry IoT services through
Reinventing the value of network-cloud-intelligence
user groups and scenarios synergy
to accelerate multi-metric New Calling and cloud phones are shaping up as new
network monetization gateways to personal digital services. IoV and IoVT
are creating new opportunities for industry-specific
Livestreaming has become an important Internet connectivity. Chinese carriers have explored the possibilities
application. China has an estimated 150 million and mapped out a new development path based on
registered livestreaming users. In some popular locations 5G-cloud-AI synergy.
or streaming scenarios, many hosts may be present
concurrently. Some may even use multiple smartphones New Calling had attracted over 10 million users within eight
to connect to different livestreaming platforms at the months of its launch. Combining AI generated content
same time. Livestreamers need solid network connectivity (AIGC) with New Calling is only the beginning of next-
support to ensure that their livestreams are smooth and level experiences. Moving forward, Huawei will work with
in high definition. Otherwise, they are likely to lose some carriers to tap into more high-value consumer-facing and
viewers and even their followers. business-facing scenarios. Joint operation teams are being
set up to help carriers build applications that revolutionize
This means livestreaming has particular requirements user experiences, such as intelligent enterprise assistants
for network experience. To meet these requirements, that are capable of interaction. These better-quality, more
more than 15 provincial carriers in China have released appealing products will continue to attract new users and
livestreaming packages with a guaranteed uplink drive up the number of monthly active users (MAUs). In
experience. These offerings have helped the carriers the future, we can integrate multiple calling products and
drastically increase their average revenue per user (ARPU). capitalize on network-cloud-intelligence synergy to make
New Calling a new gateway to information services for all
Four factors contribute to Chinese carriers' success with scenarios.
livestreaming packages: the quick mining of potential
customers, well-aligned selling points, rock-solid Huawei's cloud phones became commercially available on

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 The business success of 5G and 5G-A is only
possible through tireless exploration and
practice, and it requires consistent innovation
and development. I believe that a three-pronged
approach is the key: We need to reinvent the
value of user groups and scenarios for multi-
metric network monetization, leverage network-
cloud-intelligence synergy as the impetus for
service development, and promote collaborative
innovation such as New Video to boost traffic.

32 Volume 2024 ISSUE 1

May 17, 2023. More than 18 million people are currently Leading carriers are pioneering the transition from 5G
using cloud phones. These cloud phones deliver a high- to 5G-A. At MWC Shanghai 2024, leading 5G-A carriers,
resolution, smooth user experience – 2K resolution and including China's three major carriers (China Mobile,
a latency as low as 100 ms – rivaling that of physical China Telecom, and China Unicom), Hong Kong Telecom,
phones. On top of offering exciting new products, carriers the UAE's du, and Omantel, came together for the Global
have also taken solid steps to improve operations. China Launch of the 5G-A Pioneers Program. More than 30
Mobile Zhejiang has made a showcase with its Cloud T carriers around the world have already completed 5G-A
Card, which features one cloud phone, 1 TB of dedicated technical verification, and 15 carriers have started 5G-A
data, 1 TB of cloud disk space, and various other benefits, commercial deployment.
all on one SIM card. Within three months of launch,
China Mobile Zhejiang saw a 40% increase in MAUs, For vehicles, 5G-A extends standalone intelligence to
and 2.5-times higher dataflow of usage (DoU). Going vehicle-to-everything (V2X) intelligence, expanding
forward, Huawei will work with carriers to support the business potential from connectivity to cloud and
evolution of the ecosystem and its products, incubate computing power. For IoT, 5G-A supports passive IoT,
new AI applications, such as AI-assisted image cropping, opening up a new space for hundreds of billions of IoT
collaboration, and translation, and make cloud phones the connections. For new industries, 5G-A brings even more
new gateway to personal computing and AI applications. opportunities. 5G-A provides integrated sensing and
communications for the low-altitude economy, and this
IoV and IoVT have huge market potential. Reduced market is expected to be worth over CNY1 trillion in the
capability (RedCap) technology provides high- future.
performance and cost-effective connection capabilities.
Currently, RedCap has a mature ecosystem encompassing China's 5G development shows that business success is
chips, modules, and devices, and it can help carriers quickly not achieved overnight. A renowned Chinese football
amass a portfolio of success cases. With contiguous commentator once said, "Please don't think that victory is
network coverage, and alongside new capabilities like as within reach as a dandelion on Mt. Ada's hillside." The
slicing and edge cloud computing, new high-value business success of 5G and 5G-A is only possible through
applications such as autonomous-driving model training tireless exploration and practice, and it requires consistent
and report recognition by AI cameras will be developed innovation and development.
to support new IoT services for industries, such as smart
manufacturing and industrial automation. To sum up, I believe that a three-pronged approach is the
key: We need to reinvent the value of user groups and
scenarios for multi-metric network monetization, leverage
Collaborative innovation: network-cloud-intelligence synergy as the impetus

Boosting video service for service development, and promote collaborative

innovation such as New Video to boost traffic. Huawei
traffic through E2E industry will support carriers and work with industry partners to
collaboration drive secondary 5G innovation, pioneer 5G-A exploration,
and charter a new course for 5G business success.
Video services, which include short videos, long videos,
and video calls, typically have a resolution of 540p or
720p, meaning there is plenty of room for improvement.
As part of its efforts to improve consumer experience and
maximize China's network capabilities, Huawei advocated
a move towards a full-HD era at the recent forum on
the high-quality development of mobile video services
in the AI era. Huawei also called for industry players to
work together to make breakthroughs in glasses-free 3D
content, technologies, and experiences, so that everyone
can benefit.

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04
Tao of Business

The New 5G-A

Journey: Embracing
New Opportunities in
Mobile AI
By Cao Ming, 2024 is set to be an extraordinary year for the mobile
President, Wireless Network Product Line, communications industry. Even five years after its com-
mercial launch, the development of 5G continues to ac-
Huawei
celerate. The commercial launch of 5G-A this year will
inject new momentum into the ongoing wave of digi-
talization. The six essential factors for 5G-A are already
in place: standards, services, products, devices, business
models, and policies. 3GPP Release 18-the first standard
version of 5G-A-was frozen in June as scheduled. 5G-A
has already been commercially launched at scale in Chi-
na and some countries in the Middle East, and operators
in Europe, Asia Pacific, and Latin America are actively
verifying 5G-A. More than 60 operators and partners
have announced plans to commercially launch 5G-A
by the end of the year. 5G-A devices are maturing, and
more than 50 models of devices and modules are ex-
pected to be put into commercial use this year.

2024 is also the first year of AI being integrated onto

devices. This presents transformative new opportunities
for the mobile industry. AI foundation models are help-
ing to transform text- and image-based interactions into
multimodal interactions. There are now more than 1,300
foundation models. Chip-level and system-level AI ca-
pabilities are boosting the maturity of AI devices. By the
end of 2024, hundreds of generative-AI devices, such as

34 ISSUE 45 09/2024
AI phones, glasses, and robots, will be able to support food, while also making factory production, warehous-
around-the-clock applications. In addition, millions of AI ing, and logistics more transparent and visible.
applications will provide real-time intelligent services to
assist with day-to-day life, teaching, photography, etc. Connectivity for core production makes industries more
efficient. The development of smart and flexible man-
The launch of both 5G-A and AI devices will mark the ufacturing is making 5G essential for the core links in
beginning of a mobile AI era. The development of mo- production chains. 5G-A's improved capabilities like low
bile communications is about increasing the number of latency, high reliability, large uplink, and accurate posi-
connections, diversifying business models, and expand- tioning will enable factories to go completely wireless,
ing service scope. Over the past 30 years, the industry and this will reduce costs and improve efficiency.
has reaped the benefits of the mobile voice, mobile
Internet, and mobile video eras. The fast-approaching Ultra-reliable smart transportation requires enhanced
mobile AI era is also expected to transform society, and connectivity for vehicles. The Internet of Vehicles (IoV)
create many opportunities within the mobile industry. will transform vehicle-cloud synergies into vehicle-road
and vehicle-vehicle synergies. 5G IoV has already been
verified for 95% of transportation settings. The results
Expanding scope: From basic showed that there were 25% fewer accidents and vehicle
communications to five- flow speeds increased by more than 20% with 5G IoV.
domain connectivity and ISAC
Diverse-service smart homes rely on better connectivi-
Demand for both connectivity services for people, things, ty applications for homes. Home services are diversify-
vehicles, industries, and homes, and for integrated sens- ing from videos for display solely on TVs to easy-to-use
ing and communication (ISAC) is increasing. Such ser- smart appliances, click-and-play cloud gaming, and im-
vices are expected to bring huge social and economic mersive 3D displays on large screens. In regions such as
benefits, but will also require stronger networks. the Middle East, leading operators are already offering
10-gigabit home broadband to satisfy users' needs and
Immersive and interactive services improve connectivity enrich home entertainment.
experiences for individuals. More and more services for
individuals are becoming cloud-based, providing 3D con- ISAC innovations go beyond connectivity to unlock new
tent, and delivering immersive experiences. We are going business opportunities in all-domain sensing. Innovation in
through breakthroughs in glasses-free 3D technology, ISAC technology has enabled 5G-A to extend its capabilities
and the related technologies such as display, tracking are from communications to sensing. This means that it can
developing fast, delivering natural and comfortable 3D support a variety of applications, such as those that sense
experience. Cloud-based services like 5G cloud phones blind spots on the road, give warnings about accidents,
are growing fast, with cloud and devices collaborating detect marine vessels, support unmanned ships, facilitate
to meet the needs for diverse applications and services. low-altitude drone-based logistics and delivery, and assist
Global operators are actively verifying their ability to de- with urban management. These ISAC applications can un-
liver speeds of at least 5 Gbps. lock new opportunities for economic development.

Diversified IoT connections for all scenarios boost both

the quantity and quality of connections for things. 5G-A Transforming human-
IoT will cover high-, medium-, and low-speed connec-
machine interactions: AI is
tions for all scenarios, and this will reduce costs and in-
crease the number of connections. Reduced capability
creating new opportunities
(RedCap) technology is on its way to being commercially for comprehensive and
adopted at scale to provide connectivity for manufac- intelligent upgrades
turing, in-vehicle devices, and wearables. Passive IoT is
maturing and will soon be able to make consumers' lives AI devices will revolutionize human-machine inter-
easier by connecting everyday items such as clothes and actions in several ways. First, interactions will go from

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 Over the past 30 years, the industry has reaped
the benefits of the mobile voice, mobile Internet,
and mobile video eras. The fast-approaching
mobile AI era is also expected to transform
society, and create many opportunities within the
mobile industry.

being touch-based to multimodal. Second, information vice will soon evolve into 100-times more machine-ma-
acquisition will go from retrieved content to AI-gener- chine interactions.
ated content (AIGC). Third, mobile devices will go from
mobile phones to AI-assistant devices and embodied AI. AI makes travel as comfortable as being at home and
delivers better user experiences and higher security. With
AI is becoming a bigger part of everyday life and will intelligent cockpit services, the amount of time that peo-
drive a boom in mobile traffic. AIGC is becoming main- ple spend watching videos in their cars is expected to
stream. AI assistants are able to go through massive increase tenfold and in-car data traffic is expected to in-
amounts of documents within seconds and intelligently crease a hundredfold over the next two years. Intelligent
generate content. This has improved interaction efficien- driving services will need to upload more than 100 GB
cy by a factor of more than 100. AIGC will also promote of data per month and this will be used to continually
the multimodal production of content such as 3D videos train the model and improve its accuracy. In addition,
and provide high-quality content like short-form videos millisecond-level vehicle-road collaboration will increase
and interactive movies. In addition, each device will have traffic speeds by more than 20% while also reducing the
more than 100 local built-in AI models which will collab- number of accidents.
orate with cloud-based foundation models in real time.
This means that human-machine interactions on a de- AI expands the connectivity of everything and creates

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new value through universal and intelligent connectivity. are becoming much more complex. Embracing AI is the
The number of AI-assistant devices is expected to reach 5 key to improving network quality and efficiency.
billion by 2030. AI assistants will generate 10-times more
data traffic than people do. Moreover, AI robots will be Wireless agents are powered by telecom foundation mod-
deployed in numerous industries, and are expected to els and wireless digital twin systems. They boost 5G-A
serve in more than 80% of factories in developed coun- intelligence and will transform O&M processes, network
tries by 2030. experiences, and service development models to help op-
erators improve quality and efficiency.

Networks for AI and AI for For service operations, wireless agents simulate multi-

Networks: Integrating 5G-A modal data such as topological data, environmental data,
and traffic distribution data in real time to generate ac-
with AI improves both quality curate user-experience snapshots, so that operators can
and efficiency accurately and quickly provision services. For fixed wire-
less access (FWA) services, for example, wireless agents
"Networks for AI" are the foundation of the mobile AI era. can support online experience evaluation from multiple
Huawei offers the world's first full series of 5G-A product dimensions, such as coverage, latency, and capacity. This
solutions and the first Release-18-based commercial version supports on-demand service package provisioning and
of 5G-A. The company is focusing its innovation on five foun- shortens the time required for service provisioning from
dational capabilities—broadband, multi-band, multi-anten- up to three weeks to less than one day.
na, intelligence, and green development—to help operators
efficiently deploy 5G-A networks. For network optimization, wireless agents use high-di-
mensional modeling to generate a digital twin with which
In a bid to improve user experience, Huawei is facilitat- they can perform over 1,000 rounds of virtual iterative
ing the evolution of all frequency bands towards 5G-A verification in minutes to identify the configurations with
to unleash the full value of all bands and consolidate the the best possible energy saving performance and user ex-
foundation to ensure a superior network experience. First, perience.
Huawei uses technologies like carrier aggregation and
multi-band serving cells (MBSC) to aggregate spectrum For troubleshooting, wireless agents can understand ma-
resources on demand and develop 5G-A pipe capabilities chine data and automatically plan and orchestrate tasks.
with ultra-high bandwidth. Second, Huawei utilizes differ- This reduces the number of alarms by 90% and makes
ent frequency bands and implements multi-band collabo- engineer site visits more efficient by enabling them to go
ration using technologies like uplink-downlink decoupling directly to the problem and solve it quickly.
and flexible spectrum access (FSA) to realize multi-metric
network capabilities. The mobile AI era provides fertile soil for innovative appli-
cations and business models. We believe that improving
To intelligently connect everything, 5G-A networks need the capabilities of devices, pipes, and services will benefit
to evolve so that they are able to support multiple func- all industry players. The mobile AI era will also revolu-
tions. They need to provide ubiquitous communication, tionize user experience, create new business models and
sensing, computing, and intelligent capabilities to culti- growth opportunities for operators, and facilitate more in-
vate new applications. With ISAC's submeter-level accu- telligent and efficient productivity. Let's work together in
rate sensing capability, a 3D digital map of the physical this new era for a more digitalized and intelligent world.
world can be generated in real time to enable services
like vehicle-road collaboration and the low-altitude econ-
omy. In the future, the convergence of communications
and computing will enable computing power collabora-
tion across clouds, edges, and devices and provide edge
inference capabilities on the network side. This will reduce
both latency and inference costs by more than 60% and
enable real-time intelligent interactions.
"AI for Networks" comprehensively improves network
productivity. As networks and services evolve, networks

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04
Tao of Business

5G-A Core with

Native Intelligence:
Gateways, Business
Models, and the Value
of Connectivity

5G has been commercially available for five years, and

By George Gao
332 operators in 116 countries and regions currently of-
President, Cloud Core Network Product Line,
fer 5G services. 5G enables connectivity for all things to
Huawei empower individuals, homes, and vertical industries. It is
estimated that by the end of 2024, there will be more
than 2 billion 5G connections and over 30,000 private 5G
networks for industries.

2024 marks the commercial launch of 5G-A and the start

of the 5G-A era. Leading operators around the world have
released their 5G-A strategies. 5G-A is enhancing services,
technology, and business, and is creating new business
value by injecting momentum into four key areas: ser-
vices, user experience, networks, and operations.

Core networks powered by native intelligence will be a

prominent feature of mobile networks in the 5G-A era.

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Service intelligence enables operators to create key gate- Video services are becoming more diversified, high-defi-
ways to services; network intelligence can help reshape nition, and social. Demands for differentiated experienc-
business models; and operational intelligence helps es are increasing as more people access video services
re-create the framework of cloud-based infrastructure through a wider range of devices. Short-form video ap-
O&M. Together, these forms of intelligence will allow op- plications have taken off all around the world and are
erators to implement network transformation strategies used by a vast number of people on a daily basis. By
by increasing the number of revenue sources, reducing December 2023, there were 1.55 billion short-form video
expenditure, and improving user experience. accounts in China.

As video creation becomes faster and videos become

Intelligent calling: A key more high-definition, 10 gigabit speeds are becoming

essential. The emergence of AIGC and many new models
gateway to B2C services and of XR devices are increasing the diversity of video appli-
new growth cations. Immersive applications are expected to become
a staple of everyday life. This requires networks to sup-
Driven by both new technologies and market demand, port 10 Gbps rates and 20 ms latency. Video services are
the calling business is evolving into an intelligent assis- also being increasingly integrated with social networking
tant and service platform. features. Short-form video platforms that are powered
by AI can analyze users' networking behavior and pro-
First, the visualized voice calling service powered by vide more accurate recommendations like interest-based
AI-generated content (AIGC) is transforming the call in- follower recommendations and new ways of interacting,
terface. During an average 90-second phone call, users such as real-time interactive comments.
no long see a blank screen, but one that can display per-
sonalized content. Second, calls can serve as intelligent
assistants powered by network intelligence. Users can Enhanced experiences for
enjoy efficient multimodal communications with features different users and services
like auto transcription and real-time translation services.
Third, the calling service is becoming a platform offering 5G-A's enhanced air interface capabilities increases us-
diverse services which can be accessed by dialing. Users er-perceived speeds from 1 Gbps to 10 Gbps.
can dial numbers to query and request telecom services,
book a restaurant, or remotely access car insurance loss Statistics show that China has over 150 million registered
assessment services, without installing any apps. Calling livestreaming users, including 95 million active users, and
will create new value for operators by enabling platform this number continues to grow at a rate of more than
operations and this will unlock new growth potential. 10% annually. Services like cloud gaming and online con-
ferencing are also developing rapidly. Considering how
New Calling saw large-scale deployment and commer- fast operators' service assurance packages are evolving,
cial adoption in China in 2023. In the same year, it was high-value users are very willing to pay for deterministic
verified in Europe, Latin America, Middle East, and Asia experiences. Differentiated experience monetization has
Pacific, and it is expected to be commercially adopted already been recognized as a trend in the market. This
in these regions in 2024. In fact, many leading opera- market could be worth more than CNY10 billion. It also
tors have already completed their commercial trials. offers operators the opportunity to develop new opera-
New Calling is bound to take the world by storm and see tion models that go beyond data traffic monetization.
widespread adoption in the near future.
China Mobile's 5G-A aims to enhance basic network
experiences and improve data rates several-fold by
Upgrade in video content using the three-component carrier (3CC) aggregation

generates explosive traffic capability. Network-service collaboration is expected

to enable the operator's services and networks to be
growth aware of each other by the end of 2024. Experience

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 The evolution from 5G core to 5G-A core not
only represents technological progress, but also
brings the telecom industry one step closer to
being able to deliver intelligent, efficient, and
personalized services.

differentiation capabilities are expected to become connectivity of everything by integrating intelligence and
available in 2025 so that the operator can deliver distributed gateways. The 5G-A core network, powered by
guaranteed experiences. native intelligence, enables operator services in three areas.

First, service intelligence is the foundation and driver of

Experience monetization New Calling. The purpose of New Calling is to make calls

with an intelligent 5G-A core more interesting, informative, and useful, thereby mak-
ing the dialing pad a gateway to engaging and easy-to-
network use operator services.

The first batch of China Mobile's 5G-A demonstration ser- In 2023, China Mobile launched a number of new ser-
vice centers will be launched in 100 cities across China. In vices, including real-time translation, fun calling, vi-
the future, all areas will be covered by 5G-A, multi-metric sualized voice calling, and AI transcription. In just two
5G-A packages will be customizable, and tiered-assurance months, the number of New Calling users in one prov-
5G-A applications will be available. China Mobile will con- ince in China had increased by more than 1 million, and
tinue working with partners to develop 100 benchmark many of these new users were using paid services. New
5G-A industry applications by the end of the year to enable Calling services make communication more efficient and
production and operations in a variety of industries. fun for users, while increasing data traffic and revenue
The intelligent 5G-A core network enables the intelligent for operators.

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The New Calling platform is also expanding to the B2B ments of specific users, services, and scenarios. For
market and hosting businesses and more third-par- specific users, such as subscribers to China Mobile's Go-
ty partners. In May 2024, China Mobile Jiangsu and Tone diamond packages, experience-based benefits are
Huawei jointly launched a number of New Calling-Ad- offered by default to guarantee user experience for all
vanced services, such as visualized voice calling+, AI services and scenarios. Specific service assurance pack-
customer service, and real-time voice-driven digital ages are available for services such as livestreaming and
humans. These new applications make B2C and B2B office services. Instant messaging assurance packages
calling services more engaging and intelligent, and are available for specific scenarios, such as travel on
improve user experience. With consistently high defi- high-speed trains and festivals.
nition, visualized interactions, and higher efficiency,
these applications will pave new pathways to success The intelligent network experience assurance capabili-
for the calling ecosystem. ties can overcome three common challenges that come
with traditional experience monetization practices: the
50,000 private 5G and 5G-A networks are expected to be inability to accurately evaluate experience, unrefined as-
established in the B2B market, and 5G- and 5G-A-pow- surance methods (static assurance), and unperceivable
ered factories are predicted to account for more than assurance. An intelligent core network can accurately
25% of all factories. The new MEC capabilities will drive evaluate user experience in real time and provide dy-
deeper and more widespread industry digitalization. namic assurance accordingly. When assurance is being
Connectivity services will also expand from workshops provided, users can see a message to this effect on their
to production lines, and ultimately to all scenarios, en- screens. Once the assurance provision ends, an experi-
abling operators to gain access to business opportunities ence assurance report is sent to the user by SMS. As a
in various industries. result, user experiences can be perceived, optimized, and
monetized.
Second, network intelligence focuses on delivering dif-
ferentiated user experience. Packages include experi- Network intelligence enables operators to go from tra-
ence-based benefits to meet the experience require- ditional traffic monetization to experience monetization.
Operators can establish an experience-based benefit

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market and release differentiated experience packages to
Intelligent 5G-A core:
monetize user experience. This is not just about techno-
logical innovation, but also about transforming operators'
unlocking new business
business models. opportunities for operators
Third, operational intelligence is the key to operating com- The evolution from 5G core to 5G-A core not only represents
munications networks efficiently. It also drives the automa- technological progress, but also brings the telecom industry
tion and intelligentization of operations and maintenance. one step closer to being able to deliver intelligent, efficient,
When based on telecom foundation models, operational and personalized services. The adoption and further develop-
intelligence can enable cloud-based O&M. Role-oriented ment of 5G-A core network technology will make future tele-
copilots, which help improve staff efficiency through pro- com networks more intelligent, reliable, and efficient, create
fessional Q&A and assisted O&M, and scenario-oriented new user experiences, and cultivate new business models and
agents that can understand user intentions and automati- growth opportunities for operators.
cally orchestrate tasks to fix problems in complex scenarios
are also available. At a Chinese operator's proof of concept
(POC) pilot site, such intelligent capabilities are used to
assist with ticket closure. 80% of tickets can be handled
and closed without manual assistance from staff, and this
saves the operator 750 person-days per month.

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 05Winners

e& UAE: Leading in

5G-Advanced and
Building the Intelligent
Green Network

Already noted for being among the first operators globally to deploy 5G, e& UAE
is now focusing on 5G-Advanced and building 5G business success. The company’s
broad-based, forward-looking strategy encompasses both mobile and fixed
networks, as well as cutting-edge technologies such as artificial intelligence and
machine learning, and zero-emission networks.

By Marwan Bin Shakar, Charting the way in 5G services

Senior Vice President of Wireless and Access, and fiber deployment
e& UAE

In 2023, we saw significant growth in the uptake of 5G

services at e& UAE. A 40% rise in 5G device adoption led
to an increase in the 5G traffic ratio of 42%, and helped
drive enhanced user satisfaction, increased loyalty, and
greater monetisation of 5G services. This improvement
in the user experience with 5G technology is reflected
in Etisalat’s overall Ookla 5G net promoter score (NPS)
which ranks the company in the No.1 position globally.

The launch of revamped consumer and enterprise

packages across all of Etisalat’s 5G deployment
demographics during the year was supported by

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the expansion of our work at e& UAE, where 5G broadband speeds.
development had reached 98.9% by the end of 2023.
We are expecting to exceed 99% in 2024, with the 5G Hence, Etisalat aims to collaborate with partners and
colocation ratio in indoor infrastructure also expected to invest in cutting-edge emerging technologies like
increase from 79% to 94% by year end. transport backbone, 5G-Advanced (5G-A), 50G PON,
artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML),
During the GITEX 2023 global technology event in and quantum networking. In addition to this,
Dubai, Etisalat announced the commercial launch of 5G E t i salat will continue to drive innovation and
as well as some hard assumptions, and we are working digitalization across the organization, both internally
with more and more devices. Gradually, Etisalat will and externally, leveraging technologies such as 5G, AI,
provision these devices to enjoy the added benefits of big data, cloud, and automation.
5G technology.
In the enterprise domain, Etisalat will continue to grow
On fixed as well, we are testing the latest 50G PON its service offering to the business sector and expanding
technology in collaboration with Huawei, as well as the the portfolio of devices and products by offering
100G technology that we tested during GITEX two years Network as a Service and private networks.
ago. We are No.1 in Fiber to the Home (FTTH) penetra-
tion, and soon we will launch an FTTH service, bringing the
latest technology to our customers in the fixed domain as
A multi-pronged approach to
well.
5G-Advanced
Maintaining market leadership e& has made significant progress in testing and deploying
the key pillars of 5G-A technology as stipulated in the
Building on Etisalat’s aggressive, customer-centric 3GPP Release 18, and aims to position the UAE at the
approach, our goal is to steer society towards an forefront of future evolved 5G networks for consumers
understanding that anyone can have access to superfast and enterprises alike.

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e& has made significant progress in testing and
deploying the key pillars of 5G-A technology as
stipulated in the 3GPP Release 18, and aims to
position the UAE at the forefront of future evolved
5G networks for consumers and enterprises alike.

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For 5G-A, Etisalat is working on multiple fronts with hyper-scale application providers, device developers,
partners spanning across enhanced mobile broadband, vendors, and specialist vertical market players in order to
lower latency, IoT connectivity, automation, precise build a robust ecosystem.
positioning, and open architecture. Etisalat has started
deployment in new 5G carriers in the FDD and TDD
bands to activate three- and four-carrier aggregation. In Supporting the UAE's net zero
addition to this, Etisalat is also expecting to use millimetre
wave (mmWave) for fixed-wireless access (FWA) and
strategy through technology
enterprise private use cases. innovation
Etisalat is planning to roll out 5G RedCap features Zero emission networks are a critical focus area for the
and its 5G network once the ecosystem is commercially telecommunication industry as it transitions towards a
available. 5G-A will hasten AI and ML to enable more sustainable future, and e& has set a target of net
efficient network operation optimization. Etisalat zero emissions by 2030 in UAE as part of a commitment
has already laid a foundation by activating large to reducing its environmental impact.
numbers of use cases where these capabilities are
built around an orchestration platform. Areas that Etisalat is working on include digitalization,
and investment in the use of AI/ML to reduce carbon
In terms of fibre, e& UAE is staying ahead of the curve, footprint. Modernization of cell sites which focuses on
having already deployed XGS-PON 10 Gbps symmetrical consolidating hardware at the site to reduce footprint,
base optical network technology in order to enable ultrafast can improve energy efficiency, while using renewable en-
broadband speeds up to 10 Gbps in both the downlink and ergy sources such as solar power to move more traffic
uplink. This supports the transition from GPON to XGS- towards 5G will also help to reduce emissions.
PON but isn't just about higher speeds. It is a fundamental
shift in network capability. XGS offers higher bandwidth The journey towards zero carbon emissions in mobile
capacity compared to GPON, allowing us to cater to the and fixed networks involves collaboration efforts across
ever-growing data demands of our customers. the industry, and encompasses technological
advancement in all areas of technology and critical
design. Competition among all suppliers is driving new
technologies to be greener in the future.
Building on strategic
partnerships and ecosystem
development
We want to continue our strategic partnerships with
vendors such as Huawei in order to fully utilise the
unique capabilities of 5G and 5G-A networks.
Through joint innovation with our technology
partners, we have already succeeded in reaching 10
Gbps speeds in the 6 GHz frequencies, which have
recently been adopted for the IMT bands.

To further monetise 5G, Etisalat will explore the

possibilities of exposing its network APIs to create
more relevant use cases for networks and customers
alike, so effectively moving beyond pure connectivity
to deliver value-added services.

Etisalat will also work to maintain its collaborations with

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 05Winners

AIS Leads Thailand's

Digital Revolution with 5G

Amid the vibrant landscape of Thailand's telecommunications industry, Advanced

Info Service (AIS) stands as a beacon of innovation and progress, catering to over
40 million subscribers nationwide. Mark Chong Chin Kok, Deputy Chief Executive
of AIS, talks about his insights into AIS's 5G business practices in Thailand. As
a leading telecom operator in the country, AIS is committed to providing users
with an exceptional digital experience and has achieved notable breakthroughs in
recent times.

Mark Chong Chin Kok, The following article is an adapted version of Mark
Deputy Chief Executive, AIS Chong Chin Kok's interview.

WinWin: As a leading telecom

operator in Thailand, AIS
is known to be committed
to providing users with an
excellent digital experience
and has made some notable
breakthroughs in recent
times. Could you explain
how AIS got to this stage
and its latest progress in 5G
commercial use?
Over the years, AIS has evolved into Thailand's premier
mobile operator, consistently driving innovation and
pushing the boundaries of connectivity to deliver
exceptional services to our vast customer base. We

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 By investing in a robust 5G network and harnessing
the power of AI, AIS is redefining the digital
experience. AIS is steadfast in its commitment to
driving Thailand's digital transformation and shaping
the future of connectivity in the country. This will
chart a course towards a more connected, intelligent,
and sustainable future for all.

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have established a robust foundation consisting of 5G tunities for growth, innovation, and efficiency. From
networks, home Internet, and 5G platforms for vari- manufacturing and healthcare to logistics and enter-
ous industries. We have also fostered connections and tainment, we are revolutionizing industry processes and
collaborations with businesses of all types and scales, operations through the implementation of private and
aiming to provide customers with a diverse range of quasi-private networks, enabling transformative appli-
products to fit their needs. cations such as autonomous manufacturing, remote
healthcare, and immersive entertainment experiences.
AIS recognized early on that providing an excellent Examples of our work in this include partnering with
digital experience begins with an excellent network. We companies like Siam Cement Group to enable autono-
foresaw the transformative potential of 5G technology mous mining through a private 5G network and collab-
and its ability to revolutionize the way people connect, orating with Toyota Siam to monitor factory electricity
communicate, and conduct business. In response, we currents to ensure machine quality. These endeavors
made significant investments in building a robust 5G address consumer requirements and enterprises' needs
network that covers 90% of the country's population. alike.
In certain cities, like Bangkok and those on the east-
ern seaboard, we provide practically 100% coverage.
But beyond having a good network, we also needed
to ensure that the network could deliver the necessary WinWin: Considering the
download speed, uplink speed, and low latency that new opportunities that
modern users, such as gamers, require.
AI and developments in
network-cloud-intelligence
WinWin: As a pioneer in 5G convergence could bring,
commercial success, can you what can AIS contribute?
share the highlights of AIS's What's the company's
experiences in 5G commercial business plan and roadmap
use? for the future?
At the core of our 5G strategy lies the Living Network, In addition to our investments in 5G infrastructure, we
a revolutionary framework designed to empower us- are aiming to harness the power of artificial intelligence
ers with unprecedented control and customization over (AI). We've embarked on experiments with AI solu-
their network experience. Through the Living Network, tions aimed at raising employee productivity and im-
our users gain access to three distinct modes — Boost, proving operational cost efficiency. For instance, we've
Live, and Gamer — each tailored to cater to specific launched a voice AI for debt collection on behalf of
needs and preferences. Whether it's enhancing down- agents, demonstrating its comparable effectiveness to
load speeds, facilitating high-density video streaming, human agents but at a significantly lower cost. We plan
or minimizing latency for gaming enthusiasts, the Liv- to implement other AI solutions to further improve cost
ing Network offers users unparalleled flexibility and efficiencies, such as AI chatbots for call center transac-
versatility in optimizing their network performance. By tions.
putting control directly into the hands of users, AIS is
redefining the digital experience and setting new stan- Ultimately, AIS remains steadfast in its commitment to
dards for connectivity and convenience. driving Thailand's digital transformation and shaping
the future of connectivity in the nation. With 5G tech-
Beyond its consumer-centric initiatives, AIS is driving nology as its cornerstone and innovation as its guid-
digital transformation across a wide range of industries ing principle, we are charting a course towards a more
through the deployment of cutting-edge 5G solutions. connected, intelligent, and sustainable future for all. As
By collaborating with businesses and enterprises, we Thailand continues its journey towards digitalization,
are leveraging the power of 5G to unlock new oppor- we are ready to lead the charge, empowering individu-
als, businesses, and communities to thrive in the digital
era and beyond.

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05
Winners

Telefónica : Paving the

way from 5G SA to
5G-Advanced
Cayetano Carbajo, Director for Core, Transport and Service Platforms at Telefónica
Group CTIO Office since 2019 has big ambitions for Telefónica.

Telefónica wants to create new monetizable 5G services and it is on a transformation

journey to leverage automation and AI to deliver those goals, said Mr. Carbajo
in an in-depth interview with Roberto Kompany, Principal Analyst for Mobile
Infrastructure Service at analyst firm Omdia.

By Cayetano Carbajo, Telefónica’s autonomous

Director for Core, Transport and Service
network journey
Platforms, CTIO Office, Telefónica Group

During the interview we discussed Telefónica’s progress

in deploying 5G standalone (SA) core, the importance of
deploying automation and AI, network monetization and
the importance of collaboration. Some of my key takeaways
from this interview:

Telefónica has deployed 5G Standalone (SA) core in its

major markets and will proceed to deploy monetizable use
cases: Telefónica understands the benefits and agility that
a containerized and cloud-native 5G SA core will bring to
deliver monetizable services, such as network slicing and
low latency use cases. It has deployed what it calls a com-
mon core, where this consists of servicing both 4G and 5G
subscribers in Brazil, Germany, Spain and the UK, us-
ing a convergent core network. This combined type
of core network allows the operator to focus on re-
ducing the operational complexities by managing a

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single platform. One of the challenges mentioned the micro services one by one”, said Mr. Carbajo.
was the lack of availability of a wide range of 5G SA
compatible devices. Nonetheless, it is believed that Operators must innovate with new services: In to-
this will be resolved soon. day’s market environment where some of opera-
tor’s traditional communication services have lost
Telefónica continuously scouts the market for poten- relevance, it is even more important for operators
tial use cases and looks to prove their commercial to be creative and develop new and interesting ser-
viability. Some of these can include but not limited vices. One such service that will open new horizons
to computer vision and autonomous vehicle control. and intrigue customers is the New Calling service
where some of its use cases include visualized
Automation and AI will help manage network com- voice calling creating personal avatars, facilitating
plexity: Networks are becoming more and more real-time two-way translations, or improved inter-
complex, and Telefónica wants to be able to have active menus. The industry including handset man-
TM Forum level four for automation standards in ufacturers should collaborate to deliver these use
2025. “That means that we want to have closed- cases to customers.
loop automation by 2025 in our main markets”, said
Mr. Carbajo. Without automation, management of Telefónica sees three avenues to network moneti-
the network becomes unfeasible. Mr. Carbajo also zation: The operator values the improved connec-
believes that AI tools will utilize the large amount of tivity and network speed that 5G and 5G-Advanced
data that the network generates, from alarms, sta- deliver. However to better monetize the network,
tistics, and telemetry to help improve network op- Telefónica is exploring three main avenues. These
erations and this is also an opportunity to improve are collaboration within Open Gateway community
productivity and deliver benefits to the customer. to expose network capabilities through application
programming interfaces (APIs) and facilitate third
Besides AI, Telefonica has two strategic priorities for party developers to create monetizable applications
automation. One is using continuous integration, for the end customer. The second is network slic-
continuous deployment, continuous testing (CIC- ing, and while this has been talked about within the
DCT) pipeline that it has built and on which it will industry for a number of years, Telefónica believes
integrate its vendors to automatically deliver, test that dynamic slicing will soon unleash significantly
and roll out new software releases for its platform. higher quality of experience (QoE) especially for the
CICDCT is one of the key pillars of cloud-native business-to-business (B2B) market. Mobile edge
technologies, that will help facilitate better 5G core computing is the third path to improving network
network functions’ lifecycle management. Using this monetization, where customers will have access to
tool, operators can benefit from today’s faster rate applications that will run close to them, but still
of software releases, in order to roll out new ser- within the operator’s infrastructure, delivering im-
vices, monetize their networks and remain competi- proved low latency communications and computing
tive in the market. services.

The second strategic priority is using in service soft- Collaboration is key and the Joint Innovation Cen-
ware upgrade (ISSU), a manner to upgrade network ter helps to promote this: The collaboration Tele-
nodes while these are still in operation and with- fonica has had with Huawei over the last 20 years
out having a maintenance window. This will greatly has helped build new state-of-the-art technologies,
reduce the operator’s operating costs and reduce such as 800G & Super C+L, Alps, SRv6 for the trans-
downtime of parts of the network during an upgrade port network infrastructure, CDCT automation, New
process. Telefónica has already implemented ISSU in Calling, future architecture evolution, ultra-reliabil-
some markets for some of the subscriber data man- ity in core network. Other joint collaborations have
agement network functions. “So, this is the realiza- been in the areas of automation and network pro-
tion of one of the promises of cloud-native technol- grammability, where Huawei staff have reacted fast
ogy where you have containers, and you can upgrade to resolve the operator’s challenges quickly.

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 Automation and AI will help manage network
complexity: Networks are becoming more and
more complex, and Telefónica wants to be able
to have TM Forum level four for automation
standards in 2025. “That means that we want to
have closed-loop automation by 2025 in our main
markets”, said Mr. Carbajo.

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 05Winners

CTM: 5G-A Takes Digital

Macau to a New Era

In the bustling city of Macau, where tradition meets innovation, the convergence
of 5G and AI is reshaping the landscape of connectivity and driving forward the
world's digital transformation agenda. Hudson Lou, Director of Network and
Technology Development at CTM, talked to WinWin about the intricacies of
Macau's digital evolution.

By Hudson Lou, Established in October 1981, CTM stands as the leading

telecom service provider in Macau, offering a compre-
Director of Network & Services Development, CTM
hensive suite of mobile, fixed lines, fiber broadband, and
enterprise solutions. With CITIC Telecom as our major
shareholder, CTM is committed to advancing technology
and deploying cutting-edge solutions to realize a smart
living environment in Macau. Our relentless pursuit of
innovation is fueled by a vision to create a Digital Macau
and establish the city as a renowned smart city on a
global scale.

A testament to partnership:
CTM and Huawei
Nestled within Macau's vibrant streets lies a monumental

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 With 5G penetration soaring to an impressive
75% within a year, CTM's market leadership
reflects our deep understanding of local needs
and our commitment to delivering tailored
solutions across diverse industries.

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achievement: complete coverage with both 5G and
Charting the path to smart
full fiber infrastructure. This remarkable feat is a testa-
ment to the enduring partnership between CTM and
city development
Huawei, a collaboration that spans a decade of inno-
Looking ahead, 5G emerges as a cornerstone in Macau's
vation and progress. Our strategic alliance has enabled
journey towards becoming a smart city. CTM, leveraging
us to achieve full fiber coverage and territorial 5G de-
its expertise in multi-endpoint services, is poised to play
ployment, supporting both non-standalone (NSA) and
a pivotal role in shaping the city's digital future. Through
standalone (SA) architectures.
collaboration with government agencies, businesses, and
academia, CTM aims to create a comprehensive digital
ecosystem that opens up a brand-new, yet localized, dig-
Empowering communities italized economic model.
with 5G
The rapid adoption of 5G technology underscores Ma- Embracing the future with 5G-A
cau's readiness to embrace the digital era. With 5G
penetration soaring to an impressive 75% within a year, As a pioneer in innovation, CTM is ready to embrace the
CTM's market leadership reflects our deep understand- next technological frontier: 5G-A. With plans to launch
ing of local needs and our commitment to delivering 5G-A in Macau by 2024, CTM aims to elevate connec-
tailored solutions across diverse industries. tivity to new heights, offering unprecedented speed, re-
liability, and security. And with the support of our long-
The introduction of 5G has unlocked a world of possi- term partner Huawei, we look forward to unlocking the
bilities for Macau's residents and businesses. From ul- potential of 5G-A, harnessing the power of edge com-
tra-fast download speeds to low latency connectivity, 5G puting and AI to create transformative experiences for
technology has revolutionized the way we live, work, and our customers.
play. CTM's comprehensive 5G network ensures that all
sectors of society can benefit from this transformative The future of connectivity in Macau is bright, and CTM is
technology, from healthcare and education to transpor- leading the way. With the launch of 5G-A on the horizon,
tation and entertainment. we are excited to usher in a new era of innovation and
progress. Together with our partners and stakeholders,
we will continue to push the boundaries of what is pos-
sible and ensure that Macau remains at the forefront of
Driving innovation with technological innovation.
smart solutions
CTM's 5G network is driving economic growth and en-
hancing the quality of life for Macau’s residents through
various initiatives. These include the adoption of im-
mersive VR content in education, the use of 5G and IoT
platforms for fleet management, the implementation of
high-security 5G private networks by government de-
partment, and the establishment of a 5G cross-regional
private network for university science research.

As Macau continues to evolve into a smart city, CTM

remains committed to providing even more innovative
solutions for daily use. By leveraging new technologies
such as AI, extended reality and spatial video, CTM aims
to enhance business experience and promote network
evolution for operators in Macau.

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05
Winners

Entel Propels Chile into

F5G-Advanced Era

In today's digital age, the evolution of telecommunications networks plays a pivotal

role in shaping the future of nations. Luis Uribe, Chief Technology Officer of Entel,
introduces Entel's role in ushering Chile into the 800G open F5G-Advanced era,
the transformative impact it holds for the country's digital landscape, and future
plans to accelerate 200G optical transport network (OTN) to metro networks
and achieve co-site deployment with optical line termination (OLT) equipment,
ultimately building a green all optical network.

By Luis Uribe, Entel, officially known as Empresa Nacional de Teleco-

Chief Technology Officer, Entel municaciones S.A., is the largest telecommunications
company in Chile. Established in 1964 by the Chilean
government, Entel was tasked with enhancing the coun-
try's telecommunications quality and infrastructure. To-
day, Entel offers a wide range of services including mo-
bile telephony, fixed line services, Internet services, and
digital television. The company continues to innovate
and expand, solidifying its position as a leading player in
the telecommunications industry.

Entel's multifaceted presence

in Chile's digital realm
Entel plays a multifaceted role in Chile's digital ecosystem,

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As a key technology of the F5G-Advanced era, the
800G backbone network provides the foundation
for digital innovation and economic growth over the
next decade.

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encompassing mobile business, technology innovation, The future evolution of Entel's optical transport network
home Internet services, and digital solutions for is guided by industry standards and technological
businesses. At the heart of our operations lies the optical advancements. With the release of the F5G-Advanced
transport network, a critical component of Entel's over- standard by European Telecommunications Standards
arching business strategy. Institute (ETSI) last year, defining the generation of op-
tical transport networks up to 800G, Entel is poised to
As a leading technology and telecommunications lead the charge in Chile's digital transformation journey.
company in Chile and Peru, Entel is committed to
building a world-class network infrastructure that Entel's optical network evolution mirrors the global
delivers unparalleled service experiences to our sub- industry's trajectory, marked by significant milestones
scribers. The optical transport network serves as the and groundbreaking initiatives. From deploying the
bedrock for our mobile services, broadband offer- first 10G wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM)
ings, and enterprise solutions, providing ultra-large system on the backbone network in 2005 to embark-
bandwidth, ultra-low latency, and a simplified ar- ing on the Big Bang project in 2017, and finally to
chitecture to meet the evolving needs of businesses building a 100G backbone network covering the entire
and consumers alike. country of Chile, Entel has been at the forefront of
technological innovation.

In line with the F5G-Advanced standard, Entel launched

Pioneering the evolution of the world's first national backbone network in 800G,
Entel's optical transport network setting a new benchmark for optical network excellence

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in Chile. Looking ahead, we are committed to further Together, with our partners and stakeholders, Entel looks
enhancing our backbone network infrastructure, with forward to leading Chile into a future where connectivi-
plans to deploy 400G/800G backbone networks ty knows no bounds, and where technology serves as a
nationwide and accelerate the adoption of 200G catalyst for progress and prosperity for all.
OTN in metro networks and achieve co-site deploy-
ment with OLT equipment. We believe a green all-optical
architecture will help us to build the best fixed broad-
band (FBB) services and mobile broadband (MBB) ser-
vices in Chile.

Empowering Chile's digital

strategy with the 800G
backbone network
Entel's 800G backbone network, known internally as the
Galileo Project, is set to play a pivotal role in Chile's 2035
Digital Strategy. As a key technology of the F5G-Ad-
vanced era, the 800G backbone network provides the
foundation for digital innovation and economic growth
over the next decade.

The Galileo Project encompasses extensive infrastructure

for world-class fixed networks, spanning major cities
from Arica to Puerto Montt and extending to extreme
areas such as Easter Island and Punta Arenas. With ca-
pacities of up to Nx800 Gbps and high availability of
up to 99.999%, the Galileo Project is prepared to deliver
high-capacity services with unparalleled reliability.

In alignment with Chile's commitment to achieving car-

bon neutrality by 2050, Entel is dedicated to building
a greener and more eco-friendly network. The Galileo
Project incorporates advanced technologies such as full
optical switching and intelligent green management
systems, designed to lower power consumption and im-
prove energy efficiency.

Charting a sustainable and

digitally inclusive future
As we chart the course towards Chile's digital future, at
Entel we remain steadfast in our commitment to driv-
ing innovation, sustainability, and inclusivity. The 800G
era heralds a new chapter in Chile's digital journey, one
defined by limitless possibilities and transformative po-
tential.

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